How to create folders using file names and then move files into folders?

It's not necessary to use trim or xargs:

for f in *.txt; do    band=${f% - *}    mkdir -p "$band"    mv "$f" "$band"done

python perl bash unix batch-file

with Perl

use File::Copy move;while (my $file= <*.txt> ){    my ($band,$others) = split /\s+-\s+/ ,$file ;    mkdir $band;    move($file, $band);}

python perl bash unix batch-file

gregseth's answer will work, just replace trim with xargs. You could also eliminate the if test by just using mkdir -p, for example:

for f in *.txt; do    band=$(echo "$f" | cut -d'-' -f1 | xargs)    mkdir -p "$band"    mv "$f" "$band"done

Strictly speaking the trim or xargs shouldn't even be necessary, but xargs will at least remove any extra formatting, so it doesn't hurt.

CodeHunter