Bashscripts.org

$ tree example
example/
|-- destination
|   |-- a
|   |   |-- Afoo
|   |   `-- afoo
|   `-- b
|       |-- Bfoo
|       `-- bfoo
`-- source
    |-- Afoo
    |-- Bfoo
    |-- afoo
    `-- bfoo

#!/bin/bash
to_path=$1

for i in *; do
    first_letter=$(echo $i|cut -b1)                                  # Chop out the first "byte" (the first letter) from $i
    [ -d $to_path/$first_letter ] || mkdir -p $to_path/$first_letter # Check if the directory exists or create it
    ln -s $i $to_path/$first_letter/$i                               # symlink it
done

#!/bin/bash

destdir="/media/akml01/ml/by-alphabet"
srcdir="/media/akml01/ml/main"

die() { echo "$(color red)$1$(color off)"; exit 1; }

rm -rf $destdir/* \
   || die "Failed to clear $destdir/"

for item_src in $srcdir/*; do
   item="$(basename "$item_src")"
   letter="$(echo "$item" | tr -c "[:alnum:]" 1 \
                          | tr "[:digit:]" 1 \
                          | tr "[:upper:]" "[:lower:]" \
                          | cut -c1)" \
      || die "Failed to index $item_src"
   echo "$letter: $item_src"
   mkdir --parents $destdir/$letter \
      || die "Failed to make directory $destdir/$letter"
   ln --symbolic --target-directory="$destdir/$letter/" "$item_src" \
      || die "Failed to link to $item in $destdir/$letter/"
done