Empty Directory? (Was: Picking a character from a word)

[Mario Dorion]

In article <13241 at brl-adm.ARPA>, rbj at icst-cmr.arpa (Root Boy Jim) writes:
> 	   set nonomatch
> 	   if ( ! -e $dir/* ) echo $dir is empty.
> 
> Didn't work under 4.3 BSD. How about a two-step solution?
> 
> 	ls -A $dir > /tmp/$$
> 	if ( -z /tmp/$$ ) echo directory empty

Wouldn't
        if [ `ls -a $dir | wc -w` -eq 2 ]  \* for . and .. *\
        then echo $dir is empty
        fi
work ?????

BTW: what does "set nonomatch" do ???

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