du calculating whole directory size when we pipe the null input, how to stop it

Question

[emdfqmm@nfwne ncndnkln]$ ll -h | grep "Oct" | grep "2018" | xargs du -ch
5.0G    ./something
5.0G    .
5.0G    total

[emdfqmm@nfwne ncndnkln]$ ll -h | grep "Oct" | grep "2018" | wc -l
0

When it got null input its calculating the whole directory size how to stop it

I don't think any part of your command is doing what you want it to do. This seems like an [XY Problem](http://xyproblem.info/). Can you please redo your question to ask what your goal is and I'm sure someone can help you find the correct solution. — jesse_b, Nov 21 '18 at 15:01

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 21 '18 at 15:04

xargs has an option to not run if no input is given:

-r, --no-run-if-empty
  If the standard input does not contain any nonblanks, do not run
  the command.  Normally, the command is run once even if there is
  no input.  This option is a GNU extension.

So use xargs -r du -ch instead.

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 21 '18 at 15:07

Use find with -exec:

month="Oct-2018";
find . -mindepth 1 -maxdepth 1 -newermt "01-$month -1 sec" -and -not -newermt "01-$month +1 month -1 sec" -exec du -ch {} \;

Though, somehow I believe, you want du -sh instead of du -ch.

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du calculating whole directory size when we pipe the null input, how to stop it

2 Answers2