ls
list directory contents
Synopsis
ls
[OPTION]... [FILE]...
add an example, a script, a trick and tips
examples
To print only directories (Linux doesn't have folders), no external command is needed:
printf "%s\n" */
example added by Chris F.A. Johnson
source
How can I sort the output of 'ls' by last modified date?
ls -t
or (for reverse, most recent at bottom):
ls -tr
The ls man
page describes this in more details, and lists other options.
source
How to list folders using bash commands?
find . -maxdepth 1 -type d
Will list just folders. And as Teddy pointed out you'll need
-maxdepth to stop it recusrsing into sub dirs
source
How do I limit the number of displayed lines through ls?
Simple - you pipe the output through head:
ls -Bgclt /somwhere/in/the/past | head -n 3
You use -n 3 instead of -n 2 because of the 'total' line at the
top of the ls output.
source
How can I make "ls" show dotfiles first?
Try adding
export LC_COLLATE="C"
in your dotfiles, or changing the LC_ALL assignment
to:
export LC_ALL="C"
This controls the way sorting on character level works — while
the default would be to sort dotfiles inline, this will make
sort list dotfiles first.
To go further, quoting the
GNU Coreutils manual (emphasis mine):
If you use a non-POSIX locale (e.g., by setting
LC_ALL to en_US), then sort
may produce output that is sorted differently than
you're accustomed to.
In that case, set the LC_ALL environment variable
to C. Note that setting only
LC_COLLATE has two problems. First, it is
ineffective if LC_ALL is also set. Second, it has
undefined behavior if LC_CTYPE (or
LANG, if LC_CTYPE is unset) is set to
an incompatible value. For example, you get undefined behavior
if LC_CTYPE is ja_JP.PCK but
LC_COLLATE is en_US.UTF-8.
source
what does the asterisk mean after a filename if you do ls -l
It means that the file is executable. A classifier is
shown when -F is passed to ls via the
command line or otherwise.
source
How do I get ls --color=auto to work on Mac OS X?
ls is actually separate from Bash. OS X has a BSD
version of ls, which requires -G on the command
line, or CLICOLOR (and perhaps LSCOLORS) in the environment.
See man ls for more info.
source
ls -d is not displaying directories. Is there a way to get ls to only display directories instead of files and directories
Try this
find . -maxdepth 1 -type d
to get just directories under your current location.
source
Tell `ls` to print only the base filename
Found the answer myself .. which is to use the
basename command.
ls /net/nas/data/languages/pypm/sites/rex/free/2.6/*/pool/v/vi/virtual*1.4.4*pypm | xargs -n 1 basename
virtualenv-1.4.4_linux-x86_2.6_1.pypm
virtualenv-1.4.4_linux-x86_64_2.6_1.pypm
virtualenv-1.4.4_macosx_2.6_1.pypm
virtualenv-1.4.4_win32-x86_2.6_1.pypm
source
ls and du shows VERY different size!
It's a sparse
file. ls is reporting the allocated size;
du is reporting the amount of space actually used.
As your torrent client downloads more it will fill in the gaps
and the du-reported size will grow to match what
ls reports.
source
How to have Linux ls command show second in time stamp
Does your version of ls support the --time-style
option? If so:
ls -la --time-style=full-iso blah
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 2011-11-08 18:02:08.954092000 -0700 blah
source
is there a way to read the cumulative size of all files in a folder?
You can use the du command:
du -sh foldername
source
What is the meaning of 'T' in the execution permissions of a directory?
Look for sticky bit in here.
Regarding your second question, look at this wikipedia entry on how to set it.
The difference between the two is that 'T' is present
on a file or directory without the execution bit set for the
others category
source
Linux shows several folders with the exact same name
Run fsck on this partition: examples
Do not forget unmount partition before and mount it back after
fsck process.
source
How can I list only non-empty files using ls?
find dirname -type f ! -empty
description
List
information about the FILEs (the current directory by
default). Sort entries alphabetically if none of
-cftuvSUX nor --sort is
specified.
Mandatory
arguments to long options are mandatory for short options
too.
-a, --all
do not ignore entries starting
with .
-A,
--almost-all
do not list implied . and
..
--author
with -l, print the
author of each file
-b,
--escape
print C-style escapes for
nongraphic characters
--block-size=SIZE
scale sizes by SIZE before
printing them. E.g.,
’--block-size=M’ prints sizes
in units of 1,048,576 bytes. See SIZE format below.
-B,
--ignore-backups
do not list implied entries
ending with ~
-c
with -lt: sort by, and show, ctime (time of
last modification of file status information) with
-l: show ctime and sort by name otherwise: sort
by ctime, newest first
-C
list entries by columns
--color[=WHEN]
colorize the output. WHEN
defaults to ’always’ or can be
’never’ or ’auto’. More info
below
-d,
--directory
list directory entries instead
of contents, and do not dereference symbolic links
-D,
--dired
generate output designed for
Emacs’ dired mode
-f
do not sort, enable -aU, disable
-ls --color
-F,
--classify
append indicator (one of
*/=>@|) to entries
--file-type
likewise, except do not append
’*’
--format=WORD
across -x, commas
-m, horizontal -x, long
-l, single-column -1,
verbose -l, vertical -C
--full-time
like -l
--time-style=full-iso
-g
like -l, but do not list owner
--group-directories-first
group directories before
files.
augment with a
--sort option, but any use of
--sort=none (-U)
disables grouping
-G,
--no-group
in a long listing, don’t
print group names
-h,
--human-readable
with -l, print
sizes in human readable format (e.g., 1K 234M 2G)
--si
likewise, but use powers of 1000 not 1024
-H,
--dereference-command-line
follow symbolic links listed on
the command line
--dereference-command-line-symlink-to-dir
follow each command line
symbolic link that points to a directory
--hide=PATTERN
do not list implied entries
matching shell PATTERN (overridden by -a or
-A)
--indicator-style=WORD
append indicator with style
WORD to entry names: none (default), slash
(-p), file-type
(--file-type), classify
(-F)
-i,
--inode
print the index number of each
file
-I,
--ignore=PATTERN
do not list implied entries
matching shell PATTERN
-k,
--kibibytes
use 1024-byte blocks
-l
use a long listing format
-L,
--dereference
when showing file information
for a symbolic link, show information for the file the link
references rather than for the link itself
-m
fill width with a comma separated list of entries
-n,
--numeric-uid-gid
like -l, but list
numeric user and group IDs
-N,
--literal
print raw entry names
(don’t treat e.g. control characters specially)
-o
like -l, but do not list group
information
-p,
--indicator-style=slash
append / indicator to
directories
-q,
--hide-control-chars
print ? instead of non graphic
characters
--show-control-chars
show non graphic characters
as-is (default unless program is ’ls’ and
output is a terminal)
-Q,
--quote-name
enclose entry names in double
quotes
--quoting-style=WORD
use quoting style WORD for
entry names: literal, locale, shell, shell-always, c,
escape
-r,
--reverse
reverse order while sorting
-R,
--recursive
list subdirectories
recursively
-s,
--size
print the allocated size of
each file, in blocks
--sort=WORD
sort by WORD instead of name:
none -U, extension -X, size
-S, time -t, version
-v
--time=WORD
with -l, show time
as WORD instead of modification time: atime -u,
access -u, use -u, ctime
-c, or status -c; use specified
time as sort key if
--sort=time
--time-style=STYLE
with -l, show
times using style STYLE: full-iso, long-iso,
iso, locale, +FORMAT. FORMAT is interpreted like
’date’; if FORMAT is
FORMAT1<newline>FORMAT2, FORMAT1 applies to
non-recent files and FORMAT2 to recent files; if STYLE
is prefixed with ’posix-’, STYLE takes
effect only outside the POSIX locale
-t
sort by modification time, newest first
-T,
--tabsize=COLS
assume tab stops at each COLS
instead of 8
-u
with -lt: sort by, and show, access time
with -l: show access time and sort by name
otherwise: sort by access time
-U
do not sort; list entries in directory order
-v
natural sort of (version) numbers within text
-w,
--width=COLS
assume screen width instead of
current value
-x
list entries by lines instead of by columns
-X
sort alphabetically by entry extension
-Z,
--context
print any SELinux security
context of each file
-1
list one file per line
--help
display this help and exit
--version
output version information and
exit
SIZE is an
integer and optional unit (example: 10M is 10*1024*1024).
Units are K, M, G, T, P, E, Z, Y (powers of 1024) or KB, MB,
... (powers of 1000).
Using color to
distinguish file types is disabled both by default and with
--color=never. With
--color=auto, ls emits color codes
only when standard output is connected to a terminal. The
LS_COLORS environment variable can change the settings. Use
the dircolors command to set it.
Exit
status:
0
if OK,
1
if minor problems (e.g., cannot access
subdirectory),
2
if serious trouble (e.g., cannot access
command-line argument).
copyright
Copyright © 2012 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+:
GNU GPL version 3 or later
<http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute
it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
reporting bugs
Report ls bugs to bug-coreutils[:at:]gnu[:dot:]org
GNU coreutils home page:
<http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
General help using GNU software:
<http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>
Report ls translation bugs to
<http://translationproject.org/team/>
see also
The full
documentation for ls is maintained as a Texinfo
manual. If the info and ls programs are
properly installed at your site, the command
info
coreutils 'ls invocation'
should give you
access to the complete manual.
author
Written by
Richard M. Stallman and David MacKenzie.