I'm using Fedora and downloaded a large batch of songs for my MP3 player. Many filenames begin with "[SPOTDOWNLOADER.COM]", followed by the actual song title. How can I remove that repeated text from all the MP3 filenames in one operation instead of renaming each file individually?
3 Answers
If there might be a space or a dot next to the unwanted text, you can include it in the pattern so you don't end up with awkward double spaces or dots. For example: `rename -n 's/.?[SPOTDOWNLOADER.COM] ?//g' *.mp3`. Remove `-n` only after checking the proposed filenames.
A Perl-based rename command is a good fit. From the directory containing the files, preview the changes first with: `rename -n 's/[SPOTDOWNLOADER.COM]//g' *.mp3`. If the preview looks right, run the same command without `-n` to perform the renames. The square brackets need escaping because they have a special meaning in regular expressions.
If you prefer a graphical interface, bulk-renaming tools such as KRename, GPRename, or a file manager's batch rename feature can handle find-and-replace operations. Just make sure you're changing filenames, not the embedded ID3 music tags; a tag editor is needed for the latter.
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