Safe File Operations
CRITICAL: Before running any potentially destructive commands (mv, rm, cp with overwrite, etc.), ALWAYS verify the environment first:
- •Check working directory: Run
pwdto confirm you're in the expected location - •Verify file existence: Use
ls -la <file>to check files exist and are what you expect - •Check file types: Verify if files are regular files or symlinks before operations
- •Test on one file first: For batch operations, test the command on a single file before looping
- •Verify after operations: Check the result with
ls -lato confirm success
Example safe workflow:
bash
# DON'T DO THIS: mv CLAUDE.md AGENTS.md # Blind execution # DO THIS INSTEAD: pwd # Verify location ls -la CLAUDE.md # Confirm file exists mv CLAUDE.md AGENTS.md # Execute ls -la AGENTS.md # Verify success
For batch operations:
bash
# Test on ONE file first cd /path/to/first/dir && pwd && ls -la CLAUDE.md && mv CLAUDE.md AGENTS.md && ls -la AGENTS.md # Only after confirming success, proceed with batch for dir in ...; do ...; done
The user is trusting you with their files. Be careful!