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Recovering from Renaming Failures ​

F2's conflict detection helps prevent most common renaming issues. However, there are still some cases where renaming a file or directory may fail due to external factors. These include:

  • The source file is being used by another program.
  • The source file has been moved or modified by another program.
  • You do not have the necessary permissions to rename the file.

When a renaming operation fails for any file, F2 does not halt the entire process. Instead, it skips to the next file in the list.

At the end of the renaming process, it will display a summary of the files that failed to be renamed along with the reasons why.

Example Renaming Operation with Failures ​

In the following example, we will attempt to rename several JPEG files in a directory. Some of these files will be made immutable using the chattr command on Linux, causing the renaming operation to fail for those files.

Here's the directory structure before renaming:

text
├── kevin-wong-tt7aK2yV7xo-unsplash.jpg
├── nathan-anderson-7TGVEgcTKlY-unsplash.jpg
├── photo-1434907652076-85f8401482c3.jpg
├── photo-1510272839903-5112a2e44bc6.jpg
├── photo-1521579971123-1192931a1452.jpg
├── samuele-errico-piccarini-t4OxCpKie70-unsplash.jpg
└── valentin-salja-VMroCCpP648-unsplash.jpg

Use the following command to make some of the files immutable:

bash
sudo chattr +i kevin-wong-tt7aK2yV7xo-unsplash.jpg nathan-anderson-7TGVEgcTKlY-unsplash.jpg valentin-salja-VMroCCpP648-unsplash.jpg

Now, attempt to rename the files using F2:

bash
f2 -r "unsplash-image-%03d" -ex

Output:

text
error: rename kevin-wong-tt7aK2yV7xo-unsplash.jpg unsplash-image-001.jpg: operation not permitted
error: rename nathan-anderson-7TGVEgcTKlY-unsplash.jpg unsplash-image-002.jpg: operation not permitted
error: rename valentin-salja-VMroCCpP648-unsplash.jpg unsplash-image-007.jpg: operation not permitted
error: some files could not be renamed

In this output, the renaming operation was successful for some files but failed for the immutable files.

Here's the current directory structure after renaming

text
├── kevin-wong-tt7aK2yV7xo-unsplash.jpg
├── nathan-anderson-7TGVEgcTKlY-unsplash.jpg
├── unsplash-image-003.jpg
├── unsplash-image-004.jpg
├── unsplash-image-005.jpg
├── unsplash-image-006.jpg
└── valentin-salja-VMroCCpP648-unsplash.jpg

The immutable files were not renamed, but the rest were successfully renamed as per the command.

Reverting the Changes ​

If you wish to revert the changes that were successful, you can use the --undo/-u flag. First, perform a dry-run to preview the changes, and then execute the actual reversion.

bash
f2 -u # dry-run
text
f2 -ux # revert the changes

After running the revert command, all files will be restored to their original state, allowing you to fix the issues (e.g., removing the immutable attribute) before attempting to rename the files again.

You can learn more about how undo works here.