RENAME-CLEAN - Replace Undesirable Characters in Linux File Names

The rename-clean command line utility replaces undesirable characters with underscores in Linux file names. Undesirable characters are any that are not ASCII alphanumeric (0-9, a-z, A-Z), underscore (_), hyphen (-), or dot (.). If characters are replaced, then repeated underscores are also reduced to a single underscore and trimmed from the name stem and suffix. A unique name is always created by appending a number on the name stem if necessary.

I use it after downloading an archive of files from the internet such as a torrent to remove spaces, emojis, and other odd characters from the file names.

Example usage follows:

Clean up all file and directory names in the current directory:

$ rename-clean (or rename-clean .)

Clean up all file and directory names in the current directory and recursively under any child directories:

$ rename-clean -r

Clean up all all jpeg file names in current directory:

$ rename-clean *.jpg

Read a list of names to be cleaned up from a file:

$ rename-clean - <list-of-bad-file-names.txt

Clean up all file and directory names, but also allow + and % characters in names. Note you can allow extra characters by default using the -a/--add option as described in the Command Default Options section below:

$ rename-clean -a '+%'

You can run with the -d/--dryrun option to see what would be changed without actually renaming anything.

The latest version and documentation is available at https://github.com/bulletmark/rename-clean.

Command Default Options

You can add default options to a personal configuration file ~/.config/rename-clean-flags.conf. If that file exists then each line of options will be concatenated and automatically prepended to your rename-clean command line arguments. Comments in the file (i.e. starting with a #) are ignored. Type rename-clean -h to see all supported options.

Installation or Upgrade

Python 3.8 or later is required. Note rename-clean is on PyPI so the easiest way to install it is to use uv tool.

$ uv tool install rename-clean

To upgrade:

$ uv tool upgrade rename-clean

To uninstall:

$ uv tool uninstall rename-clean

Alternatively, run it immediately using uvx without explicit installation by typing uvx rename-clean.

Command Line Options

Type rename-clean -h to view the usage summary:

usage: rename-clean [-h] [-r] [-d] [-q] [-i] [-s] [-m] [-c CHARACTER]
                       [-a ADD]
                       [path ...]

Utility to replace undesirable characters with underscores in Linux file
names. Undesirable characters are any that are not ASCII alphanumeric (`0-9`,
`a-z`, `A-Z`), underscore (`_`), hyphen (`-`), or dot (`.`). If characters are
replaced, then repeated underscores are also reduced to a single underscore
and trimmed from the name stem and suffix. A unique name is always created by
appending a number on the name stem if necessary.

positional arguments:
  path                  one or more file or directory names to rename, or "-"
                        to read names from stdin. Default is all files in
                        current directory if no path given.

options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -r, --recurse         recurse through all sub directories
  -d, --dryrun          do not rename, just show what would be done
  -q, --quiet           do not report changes
  -i, --ignore-hidden   ignore hidden files and directories (those starting
                        with ".")
  -s, --recurse-symlinks
                        recurse into symbolic directory links, default is to
                        rename a link but not recurse into it
  -m, --more-aggressive
                        replace repeated underscores even if there are no
                        other replacements
  -c, --character CHARACTER
                        character to replace undesirable characters with,
                        default = "_"
  -a, --add ADD         additional characters to allow in names, e.g. "+%"
                        (default: only alphanumeric, "_", "-", and ".")

Note you can set default options in $HOME/.config/rename_clean-flags.conf

License

Copyright (C) 2025 Mark Blakeney. This program is distributed under the terms of the GNU General Public License. This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or any later version. This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GNU_General_Public_License for more details.