if you put * inside quotes, it does NOT work as a wildcard in Bash.

Why?

In Bash, wildcard expansion (called globbing) happens before quotes are processed. But if you quote something, you’re telling Bash:

“Treat this literally — don’t expand it.”

Examples

✅ Works (unquoted wildcard)

ls *.txt

→ Expands to:

ls file1.txt file2.txt

❌ Does NOT work (quoted wildcard)

ls "*.txt"

→ Bash treats "*.txt" as a literal filename → It will look for a file literally named *.txt

Partial quoting nuance

ls file"*.txt"

This still does NOT expand, because part of the pattern is quoted.

How to safely use wildcards with variables

If you’re using variables:

pattern="*.txt"
ls $pattern     # expands
ls "$pattern"   # does NOT expand

Rule of thumb

  • Unquoted → wildcard expands
  • Quoted → wildcard is literal

If you want, I can show you tricks like safely combining wildcards with spaces or using find instead (which behaves differently).