using adb push to transfer files to an android device

[Oren Medicks]

Hi there!
I ma trying to use this alias to routinely copy a file to my android device (rooted Galaxy 7), my OS is Mint 20.1 Cinnamon.

alias acim=adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/'ACIM lessons'
the wildcards mean the file name will always be numbers between 100 - 400

ADB only returns its help screen, with no error.

Running the same command through terminal, without the alias works just fine.

An idea why it wouldn't work as alias?

Any help will be much appreciated

Oren

[1000]

You can not create alias if command not working from terminal.
Is the path correct? 'hero2lte:/storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/ACIM lessons'

[Welcome]

Edit: To revisit the context, OP's original post had ...

Code: Select all

alias acim='adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 hero2lte:storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/ACIM lessons'

Android directory "ACIM lessons" with a space ...

[Oren Medicks]

Thank you all for chiming in!
As 1000 suggested, the path was incorrect ( I edited my original post to reflect the correction)

Now the command works well from the terminal -

oren@oren-V530S-07ICB:~$ adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/'ACIM lessons'
/home/oren/Downloads/222.mp3: 1 file p...ed. 10.4 MB/s (514033 bytes in 0.047s)

but still, as alias, I still just get the adb help screen.

[1000]

Try something like this add

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###########################{
MY_ACIM(){
adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/'ACIM lessons'
}

# USAGE: acim
alias acim='MY_ACIM'
###########################}

Reload the base

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source ~/.bashrc

( However I don't know where you want save alias. I guess that you added alias in ~/.bashrc file )
and test acim command.

[Oren Medicks]

This works perfectly!
Thanks a lot!

[Termy]

It's not properly quoted. This should work:

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alias acim='adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/ACIM\ lessons'

[Moonstone Man]

It's not properly quoted.

You beat me to it.

[Termy]

Thinking about it, rather than telling you it's wrong, it'd be better to explain why. So let's look at what you typed:

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alias acim=adb push /home/oren/Downloads/???.mp3 storage/0012-4040/audiobooks/'ACIM lessons'

The shell, not too surprisingly, typically reads from left-to-right (exceptions are well outside the scope of this thread). The shell, therefore, will first see alias, which is a BASH builtin, meaning it's built into the shell. I'm assuming you're using BASH, by the way. You probably have an idea what alias does, because you're using it right there.

After alias, the shell will see the acim=adb word (shell's idea of a word) which alias interprets to mean that acim is to be the name associated with the alias, and it equals the value of adb. However, then it sees the rest: a series of out-of-place words which appear as though they were additional arguments to the alias builtin. As expected, the builtin errors out.

The reason what I posted should work, is because it keeps the entire command you want assigned to the acim alias together, as part of the one argument, which is in the syntax of alias NAME=COMMAND.

You might've noticed I changed your 'ACIM lessons' to ACIM\ lessons; that's because the shell would get confused seeing multiple pairs of apostrophes (AKA: single-quotes). It works because I've escaped the space, effectively stopping the shell (when you actually use the alias) from interpreting ACIM (and stuff before it) and lessons as two separate fields.

Hope that helped, or at the very least was interesting to you and/or passers-by.

[Oren Medicks]

Thank you very much for this elaborate and insightful reply.
It not only helped by solving the problem; It will surely be very useful in future attempts to write commands, aliases etc.
All the very best!

[Termy]

That puts a nice big smile on my face. Happy to help!