--- layout: page category-page: basic category-title: Basic commands tags: directory list author: Alessandro Marinelli title: ls previous-page: pages/cmd/basic/closeshell.html next-page: pages/cmd/basic/man.html --- The ls command is used to list a directory content or a file.
The name stands for LiSt. The default ls command syntax is:
ls [flags] [path]
Where [flags] are the ls flags, read below for more info,and [path] is the (optional) path (absolute or relative).If no path is provided the current directory is listed.

Usage

List the elements on the current working directory

Let's see how to show a list containing the elements included in the current working directory
ls
    Other Multimedia	my-cat.jpg
    Photos				Videos
As you can see, typing ls in the Unix Shell, will give as output the list of elements contained in the current working directory.
Elements listed can be files (look for exemple at the elementmy-cat.jpg), such as other directories (look for example at the folder Photos).

List the elements contained in a directory

ls Photos
    01.jpg		02.jpg
    03.jpg		04.jpg
As you can see, now the Unix Shell is showing us the elements contained in the folder Photos.

Show hidden files

You can include hidden files (those which name starts with ".") in the displayed list using the -a flag.
ls -a Photos
    .				01.png
    ..				02.png
    .DS_Store		03.png
    .secret.png		04.jpg
As you can see, now the shell shows more files for the same directory.

Show list in long format

ls -l
    total 10816
    -rw-r--r--@ 1 YourName  YourGroup  3143706  4 Ott 13:28 01.png
    -rw-r--r--@ 1 YourName  YourGroup  2269193 28 Ott 18:58 02.png
    -rw-r--r--@ 1 YourName  YourGroup  37900   28 Ott 22:07 03.png
    -rw-r--r--@ 1 YourName  YourGroup  75924   20 Ott 16:01 04.jpg
If the -l flag is given, the following information will be displayed for each file: file mode, number of links, owner name, group name, number of bytes in the file, abbreviated month, day-of-month file was last modified, hour file last modified, minute file last modified, and the path. In addition, for each directory whose contents are displayed, the total number of 512-byte blocks used by the files in the directory is displayed on a line by itself, immediately before the information for the files in the directory.