Going to the parent directory of a file with cd?

Question

I am writing a .sh to do some work for me, but I am now at the point where I have to cd to the directory the file /path/to/file.end is in. terminal doesn't allow

cd /path/to/file.end
bash: cd: /path/to/file.end: Not a directory

there is sadly no workaround I know of, so it would be nice if you could help!

Solution 1

Type cd $( dirname /path/to/file.end). That will take you into /path/to.

Explanation:

• dirname returns the complete path for a file (without the filename, which you would get with basename) - i.e. dirname /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/99update-notifier returns /etc/apt/apt.conf.d
• the expression $(anything) is replaced by the result of the command in the parentheses. So cd $( dirname /etc/apt/apt.conf.d/99update-notifier) is executed as cd /etc/apt/apt.conf.d

Another (but old and discouraged) notation for the same was

cd `dirname /path/to/file.end` 

Solution 2

You can not cd into a file. Here is a (command line) function that will automatically cd into a path for a given fully qualified file path:

function fcd () { [ -f "$1" ] && { cd "$(dirname "$1")"; } || { cd "$1"; } ; pwd; }

Solution 3

If you append "/.." to the filename that will take you to the correct directory e.g. cd /path/to/file.end/... It works on Cygwin anyway.

Comments

[Admin]

Um, do you mean cd /path/to? That will change the directory to the directory that the file file.end is in.

[Admin]

No, the file is variable, and I would like to enter the path of the file (drop it into the terminal) and then go to the folder it is in

[Azsgy]

Did I get this right?: function fcd () { [ -f $1 ] && { cd $(/file.end $1); } || { cd $1 ; } pwd } the response is: bash: syntax error near unexpected token `pwd' it gives me an error this way :(

[fiatux]

@Atsch, need a semicolon before pwd, and if you're defining a function in one line, need a semicolon after pwd.

[Rinzwind]

darn I should have not doubted myself. The alternative looked better to me when I found it _O-

[Rinzwind]

Does not work in bash ;) touch test && cd /home/test/test/.. says bash: cd: /home/test/test/..: No such file or directory

[sdaau]

Thanks, was looking for something like this - I bump into bash: cd: Not a directory more often than I'd like to; this might help. Cheers!

[lucidbrot]

Does work in windows cmd

[Dario Seidl]

A more robust version of this function that handles multiple arguments can be found here: stackoverflow.com/a/59049206/401712 (cd is not commonly used with multiple arguments, but it's still good to support them)