How do I create a temporary directory using mktemp in my current working directory?

Question

I created a pipeline that strings multiple programs together, unfortunately these programs are creating a huge amount of temporary files in the /tmp folder and when using large datasets my pipeline crashes because the /tmp folder fills up.

How do I export temporary files so that they are created in my current working directory where the pipeline is being run and not in the /tmp folder?

Currently I have tried to export the TMPDIR env variable to an already created directory /work in my current working directory, but the temporary files are still being created in the /tmp folder:

export TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d --tmpdir=/work)
<script>
rm -rf $TMPDIR

The programs do not have the option to set different output folders for temporary files created.

Answer 1

Just change /work to work if the directory work is in your current directory. /work means that you have a top-level directory named /work. Without the forward slash, it will be a relative directory.

I just tested this code on my computer. No files were written to /tmp that I noticed:

mkdir work
export TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d --tmpdir=work)
ls work
# tmp.AWA4dTERha
rm -rf $TMPDIR
ls work
# --no output--