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How do I move files out of a broken directory in linux?

I know the premise of the question may be confusing, but I want to understand what happened.

Recently I have been experimenting with the rockchip OK3399 single-chip computer(see here) and have installed a linux system on it with TF card installation. Using Putty and connecting with serial protocol, I was able to establish a connection with the OK3399 computer and control it through my laptop.

I am trying to self-learn some linux with the OK3399 system. I created a bash code by the name of displayvids.sh inside the directory /usr/bin, which is meant to take a variable number of pictures with a mipi camera and then save in a directory for work.

I finished writing the code, but for some reason I cannot run the .sh file when my working directory is not the /usr/bin directory, despite /usr/bin being in the %PATH% environment variable. So, I executed the following command:

mv /usr/bin/display* /usr/local/bin

... attempting to move the file to /usr/local/bin instead. The command ran successfully, but when I tried to run the command:

cd /usr/local/bin

It tells me that I cannot cd to bin

enter image description here

As seen from the above image, the /usr/local/bin is not even a directory. Why would mv succeed if the target was not a directory? How can I retrieve my bash file?

Solution

  • Why would mv succeed if the target was not a directory?

    mv can also rename files:

    mv foo.txt bar.txt

    You renamed your script to bin and moved it under /usr/local.

    You may want to remember to add a trailing slash next time, to have mv barf if the target isn't a directory:

    mv /usr/bin/display* /usr/local/bin/

    How can I retrieve my bash file?

    Rename it back.

    mv bin displayvids.sh

    For future reference, you can use the file command to (try to) identify the contents of a file, if it's installed:

    file bin

    would have probably said bin: Bash script or similar.