< Previous | Contents | Next >
More Fun With ls
The ls command is probably the most used command, and for good reason. With it, we can see directory contents and determine a variety of important file and directory at- tributes. As we have seen, we can simply enter ls to see a list of files and subdirectories contained in the current working directory:
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls
Desktop Documents Music Pictures Public Templates Videos
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls
Desktop Documents Music Pictures Public Templates Videos
Besides the current working directory, we can specify the directory to list, like so:
me@linuxbox ~]$ ls /usr
bin games kerberos libexec sbin src etc include lib local share tmp
me@linuxbox ~]$ ls /usr
bin games kerberos libexec sbin src etc include lib local share tmp
Or even specify multiple directories. In this example we will list both the user's home di- rectory (symbolized by the “~” character) and the /usr directory:
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls ~ /usr
/home/me:
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls ~ /usr
/home/me:
Desktop Documents Music Pictures Public Templates Videos
/usr:
bin games kerberos libexec sbin src etc include lib local share tmp
Desktop Documents Music Pictures Public Templates Videos
/usr:
bin games kerberos libexec sbin src etc include lib local share tmp
We can also change the format of the output to reveal more detail:
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls -l
total 56
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Desktop
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Documents
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Music
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Pictures
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Public
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Templates
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Videos
[me@linuxbox ~]$ ls -l
total 56
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Desktop
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Documents
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Music
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Pictures
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Public
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Templates
drwxrwxr-x 2 me me 4096 2007-10-26 17:20 Videos
By adding “-l” to the command, we changed the output to the long format.