Seeing What's Inside

The ls command (List) is one of the most fundamental commands. It displays the contents (files and directories) of a given directory.

Basic Usage

If you run ls without any arguments, it lists the contents of your current working directory.

bash $ ls Desktop Documents Downloads Music Pictures Public Templates Videos

Listing Contents of Another Directory

You can specify a directory path as an argument to ls:

bash $ ls /etc

This will list the configuration files and folders found inside the /etc directory, regardless of where you currently are.

Color Coding

In most modern shells, ls uses color coding to help you differentiate types of entries:

• Blue: Directory
• White/Default: Regular File
• Green: Executable file or script
• Cyan: Symbolic Link