Using the Linux find Command to Locate *.txt Files with Path, Prune, and Logical Operators

1. Find all files with a .txt suffix in the current directory:

find ./ -name "*.txt"

2. Find .txt files under the dir0 directory and its sub‑directories:

find ./ -path "./dir0*" -name "*.txt"

3. Find .txt files under dir0/dir00 and its sub‑directories:

find ./ -path "*dir00*" -name "*.txt"

4. Find .txt files outside dir0 and its sub‑directories:

find ./ -path "./dir0*" -a -prune -o -name "*.txt" -print

Note: -a is the logical AND operator, -o is OR, and -prune returns true for the matched path, causing the following -o branch to be evaluated only for directories that are not dir0 .

5. Find .txt files under both dir0 and dir1 (including their sub‑directories):

find ./ \( -path "./dir0*" -o -path "./dir1*" \) -a -name "*.txt" -print

6. Find .txt files outside dir0 and dir1 and their sub‑directories:

find ./ \( -path "./dir0*" -o -path "./dir1*" \) -a -prune -o -name "*.txt" -print

The parentheses group expressions; they must be escaped (\( and \)) so the shell passes them unchanged to find .

7. Find .txt files in any directory named dir_general :

find ./ -path "*/dir_general/*" -name "*.txt" -print

8. List all files while excluding the .git directory (the .git directory itself is not printed):

find . -path ./.git -prune -o -print -a \( -type f -o -type l -o -type d \) | grep '.git'