transcode.bash

#!/bin/bash

shopt -s globstar
sdir=$HOME/Documents/website
tdir=$HOME/tmp/transcoded-website

scode=WINDOWS-1252
tcode=UTF-8

mkdir -vp "$tdir"

cp -al "$sdir/." "$tdir" || exit

for f in "$tdir"/**/*.shtml \
         "$tdir"/**/*.txt \
         "$tdir"/**/*.p[lm]
do
    # if you want to do some tests, put those here, e.g.:
    # [[ -s $f ]] || continue # skip things that aren't plain files
    # file "$f" | grep -qs "Text" || continue  # skip things that don't contain text
    # file "$f" | grep -qsE "Unicode|UTF" && continue # skip things that are already Unicode or UTF-something
    
    g=$f.NEW$$

    iconv --from-code=$sc --to-code=$tc <"$f" >"$g" || exit

    if cmp -s "$f" "$g" ; then
        # the transcoded file is identical to the original, so don't replace it
        rm "$g"
    else
        touch --ref="$f" "$g"  # optional -- set timestamp to match original file
        chmod --ref="$f" "$g"  # optional -- set permissions to match original file
        mv -T "$g" "$f"
    fi
done