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Shell globbing lets you match filenames using patterns. While * matches any string and ? matches a single character, square brackets ([ ]) define character classes, enabling you to match one character from a specific set or range.

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Matching a Range of Characters

Given a directory:
You can match only fileA, fileB, and fileC by specifying a range inside brackets:
Here, [A-C] matches any uppercase letter from A through C. Note that the dash (-) defines a range and must go from lower to higher:

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Common Examples

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Negated Character Classes

Prefix ! or ^ inside brackets to exclude characters or ranges:
In Bash both ! and ^ work for negation. POSIX shells require ! at the start of the class.
The image explains that square brackets are special characters in Shell used for creating glob expressions by matching characters inside the brackets.

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Listing Specific Characters

To match non-consecutive filenames such as fileA, fileC, and fileE, simply list them:

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Case Sensitivity

Globbing in Bash is case sensitive. If you have both uppercase and lowercase files:
To match only lowercase:
To remove both lowercase and uppercase a–e, combine ranges:
When mixing ranges, list them in the order you want matched: here a-e before A-E.

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Numeric Ranges and Negation

Numeric ranges behave the same way:

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Multiple Character Classes

You can chain classes to match multiple positions. For example, to match filea1, filea2, fileb1, fileb2:
Each [a-b] matches one letter, and [1-2] matches one digit. If you try only [1-2], it won’t match because the letter is missing:

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Literal Characters Inside Brackets

Inside character classes, special glob characters lose their meaning:
To use * as a wildcard, place it outside the brackets:
Or constrain both positions:

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Globbing vs. File Creation

Globs match existing filenames; they do not generate names. If you use a glob in a command like touch when no files match, the pattern is taken literally:
To produce a series of filenames based on a pattern, consider using brace expansion instead of globs.
Globbing won’t create files—only match them. If you expect new files, use brace expansion or a loop.

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