bin/ls/ls.1

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.\"     @(#)ls.1	8.7 (Berkeley) 7/29/94
.\" $FreeBSD: src/bin/ls/ls.1,v 1.86 2005/02/13 22:25:09 ru Exp $
.\"
.Dd December 28, 2020
.Dt LS 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm ls
.Nd list directory contents
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm
.Op Fl 1ABCFGHILPRSTW_abcdfghiklmnopqrstuwxy
.Op Fl D Ar format
.Op Ar
.Sh DESCRIPTION
For each operand that names a
.Ar file
of a type other than
directory,
.Nm
displays its name as well as any requested,
associated information.
For each operand that names a
.Ar file
of type directory,
.Nm
displays the names of files contained
within that directory, as well as any requested, associated
information.
.Pp
If no operands are given, the contents of the current
directory are displayed.
If more than one operand is given,
non-directory operands are displayed first; directory
and non-directory operands are sorted separately and in
lexicographical order.
.Pp
The following options are available:
.Bl -tag -width indent
.It Fl A
List all entries, including dot files, except for dot and dot-dot.
Always set for the super-user, but may be turned
off with
.Fl I .
.It Fl B
Force printing of non-printable characters (as defined by
.Xr ctype 3
and current locale settings) in file names as
.Li \e Ns Va xxx ,
where
.Va xxx
is the numeric value of the character in octal.
.It Fl C
Force multi-column output; this is the default when output is to a terminal.
.It Fl D Ar format
When printing in the long
.Pq Fl l
format, use
.Ar format
to format the date and time output.
The argument
.Ar format
is a string used by
.Xr strftime 3 .
Depending on the choice of format string, this may result in a
different number of columns in the output.
This option overrides the
.Fl T
option.
.It Fl F
Display a slash
.Pq Ql /
immediately after each pathname that is a directory,
an asterisk
.Pq Ql *
after each that is executable,
an at sign
.Pq Ql @
after each symbolic link,
an equals sign
.Pq Ql =
after each socket,
a percent sign
.Pq Ql %
after each whiteout,
and a vertical bar
.Pq Ql \&|
after each that is a
.Tn FIFO .
.It Fl G
Enable colorized output.
This option is equivalent to defining
.Ev CLICOLOR
in the environment.
(See below.)
This functionality can be compiled out by removing the definition of
.Ev COLORLS .
.It Fl H
Symbolic links on the command line are followed.
This option is assumed if
none of the
.Fl F , d ,
or
.Fl l
options are specified.
.It Fl I
This turns off the listing of dot files.
Dot files are listed by default when
.Nm
is run as root.
Note that the
.Fl I
and
.Fl A
options will override each other.
.It Fl L
If argument is a symbolic link, list the file or directory the link references
rather than the link itself.
This option cancels the
.Fl P
option.
.It Fl P
If argument is a symbolic link, list the link itself rather than the
object the link references.
This option cancels the
.Fl H
and
.Fl L
options.
.It Fl R
Recursively list subdirectories encountered.
.It Fl S
Sort by size (largest file first) before sorting the operands in
lexicographical order.
.It Fl T
When used with the
.Fl l
(lowercase letter
.Dq ell )
option, display complete time information for the file, including
month, day, hour, minute, second, and year (named locales use the
ISO 8601 extended format).
.It Fl W
Display whiteouts when scanning directories.
.It Fl a
Include directory entries whose names begin with a
dot
.Pq Pa \&. .
.It Fl b
As
.Fl B ,
but use
.Tn C
escape codes whenever possible.
.It Fl c
Use time when file status was last changed for sorting or printing.
.It Fl d
Directories are listed as plain files (not searched recursively).
.It Fl f
Output is not sorted.
This option implies
.Fl a .
.It Fl g
This option is deprecated and is only available for compatibility
with
.Bx 4.3 ;
it was used to display the group name in the long
.Pq Fl l
format output.
.It Fl h
When used with the
.Fl l
option, use unit suffixes: Byte, Kilobyte, Megabyte, Gigabyte, Terabyte
and Petabyte in order to reduce the number of digits to four or fewer
using base 2 for sizes.
.It Fl i
For each file, print the file's file serial number (inode number).
.It Fl k
If the
.Fl s
option is specified, print the file size allocation in kilobytes,
not blocks.
This option overrides the environment variable
.Ev BLOCKSIZE .
Note that
.Fl k
is mutually exclusive to
.Fl h ,
and later
.Fl k
will nullify earlier
.Fl h .
.It Fl l
(The lowercase letter
.Dq ell . )
List in long format.
(See below.)
A total sum (in blocks, see the
.Fl s
option for the block size unit) for all the file
sizes is output on a line before the long listing.
.It Fl m
Stream output format; list files across the page, separated by commas.
.It Fl n
Display user and group IDs numerically rather than converting to a user
or group name in a long
.Pq Fl l
output.
.It Fl o
Include the file flags in a long
.Pq Fl l
output.
.It Fl p
Write a slash
.Pq Ql /
after each filename if that file is a directory.
.It Fl q
Force printing of non-graphic characters in file names as
the character
.Ql \&? ;
this is the default when output is to a terminal.
.It Fl r
Reverse the order of the sort to get reverse
lexicographical order or the oldest entries first.
.It Fl s
Display the number of file system blocks actually used by each file, in units
of 512 bytes, where partial units are rounded up to the next integer value.
A total sum for all the file
sizes is output on a line before the listing.
The environment variable
.Ev BLOCKSIZE
overrides the unit size of 512 bytes.
.It Fl t
Sort by time modified (most recently modified
first) before sorting the operands by lexicographical
order.
.It Fl u
Use time of last access,
instead of last modification
of the file for sorting
.Pq Fl t
or printing
.Pq Fl l .
.It Fl w
Force raw printing of non-printable characters.
This is the default
when output is not to a terminal.
.It Fl x
The same as
.Fl C ,
except that the multi-column output is produced with entries sorted
across, rather than down, the columns.
.It Fl 1
(The numeric digit
.Dq one . )
Force output to be
one entry per line.
This is the default when
output is not to a terminal.
.It Fl _
(underscore) When printing in the long
.Pq Fl l
format, use GMT based date and time output with nanotime timestamp.
.El
.Pp
The
.Fl 1 , C , x ,
and
.Fl l
options all override each other; the last one specified determines
the format used.
.Pp
The
.Fl c
and
.Fl u
options override each other; the last one specified determines
the file time used.
.Pp
The
.Fl S
and
.Fl t
options override each other; the last one specified determines
the sort order used.
.Pp
The
.Fl B , b , w ,
and
.Fl q
options all override each other; the last one specified determines
the format used for non-printable characters.
.Pp
The
.Fl H , L
and
.Fl P
options all override each other (either partially or fully); they
are applied in the order specified.
.Pp
By default,
.Nm
lists one entry per line to standard
output; the exceptions are to terminals or when the
.Fl C
or
.Fl x
options are specified.
.Pp
File information is displayed with one or more
.Ao blank Ac Ns s
separating the information associated with the
.Fl i , s ,
and
.Fl l
options.
.Ss The Long Format
If the
.Fl l
option is given, the following information
is displayed for each file:
file mode,
number of links, owner name, group name,
number of bytes in the file,
last modified time in either per POSIX requirements or
using the format DD-MMM-YYYY hh:ss, and the pathname.
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.
.Pp
In the POSIX locale, If the modification time of the file is in the future,
or more than 6 months in the past, then the year of the last modification
is displayed in place of the hour and minute fields.
.Pp
If the owner or group names are not a known user or group name,
or the
.Fl n
option is given,
the numeric ID's are displayed.
.Pp
If the file is a character special or block special file,
the major and minor device numbers for the file are displayed
in the size field.
If the file is a symbolic link the pathname of the
linked-to file is preceded by
.Dq Li -> .
.Pp
The file mode printed under the
.Fl l
option consists of the
entry type and the permissions.
The entry type character describes the type of file, as
follows:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width 4n -offset indent -compact
.It Sy b
Block special file.
.It Sy c
Character special file.
.It Sy d
Directory.
.It Sy l
Symbolic link.
.It Sy s
Socket link.
.It Sy p
.Tn FIFO .
.It Sy \-
Regular file.
.El
.Pp
The next three fields
are three characters each:
owner permissions,
group permissions, and
other permissions.
Each field has three character positions:
.Bl -enum -offset indent
.It
If
.Sy r ,
the file is readable; if
.Sy \- ,
it is not readable.
.It
If
.Sy w ,
the file is writable; if
.Sy \- ,
it is not writable.
.It
The first of the following that applies:
.Bl -tag -width 4n -offset indent
.It Sy S
If in the owner permissions, the file is not executable and
set-user-ID mode is set.
If in the group permissions, the file is not executable
and set-group-ID mode is set.
.It Sy s
If in the owner permissions, the file is executable
and set-user-ID mode is set.
If in the group permissions, the file is executable
and setgroup-ID mode is set.
.It Sy x
The file is executable or the directory is
searchable.
.It Sy \-
The file is neither readable, writable, executable,
nor set-user-ID nor set-group-ID mode, nor sticky.
(See below.)
.El
.Pp
These next two apply only to the third character in the last group
(other permissions).
.Bl -tag -width 4n -offset indent
.It Sy T
The sticky bit is set
(mode
.Li 1000 ) ,
but not execute or search permission.
(See
.Xr chmod 1
or
.Xr sticky 8 . )
.It Sy t
The sticky bit is set (mode
.Li 1000 ) ,
and is searchable or executable.
(See
.Xr chmod 1
or
.Xr sticky 8 . )
.El
.El
.Sh ENVIRONMENT
The following environment variables affect the execution of
.Nm :
.Bl -tag -width ".Ev CLICOLOR_FORCE"
.It Ev BLOCKSIZE
If the environment variable
.Ev BLOCKSIZE
is set, the block counts
(see
.Fl s )
will be displayed in units of that size block.
.It Ev CLICOLOR
Use
.Tn ANSI
color sequences to distinguish file types.
See
.Ev LSCOLORS
below.
In addition to the file types mentioned in the
.Fl F
option some extra attributes (setuid bit set, etc.) are also displayed.
The colorization is dependent on a terminal type with the proper
.Xr termcap 5
capabilities.
The default
.Dq Li cons25
console has the proper capabilities,
but to display the colors in an
.Xr xterm 1 ,
for example,
the
.Ev TERM
variable must be set to
.Dq Li xterm-color .
Other terminal types may require similar adjustments.
Colorization
is silently disabled if the output is not directed to a terminal
unless the
.Ev CLICOLOR_FORCE
variable is defined.
.It Ev CLICOLOR_FORCE
Color sequences are normally disabled if the output is not directed to
a terminal.
This can be overridden by setting this variable.
The
.Ev TERM
variable still needs to reference a color capable terminal however
otherwise it is not possible to determine which color sequences to
use.
.It Ev COLUMNS
If this variable contains a string representing a
decimal integer, it is used as the
column position width for displaying
multiple-text-column output.
The
.Nm
utility calculates how
many pathname text columns to display
based on the width provided.
(See
.Fl C
and
.Fl x . )
.It Ev LANG
The locale to use when determining the order of day and month in the long
.Fl l
format output.
See
.Xr environ 7
for more information.
.It Ev LSCOLORS
The value of this variable describes what color to use for which
attribute when colors are enabled with
.Ev CLICOLOR .
This string is a concatenation of pairs of the format
.Ar f Ns Ar b ,
where
.Ar f
is the foreground color and
.Ar b
is the background color.
.Pp
The color designators are as follows:
.Pp
.Bl -tag -width 4n -offset indent -compact
.It Sy a
black
.It Sy b
red
.It Sy c
green
.It Sy d
brown
.It Sy e
blue
.It Sy f
magenta
.It Sy g
cyan
.It Sy h
light grey
.It Sy A
bold black, usually shows up as dark grey
.It Sy B
bold red
.It Sy C
bold green
.It Sy D
bold brown, usually shows up as yellow
.It Sy E
bold blue
.It Sy F
bold magenta
.It Sy G
bold cyan
.It Sy H
bold light grey; looks like bright white
.It Sy x
default foreground or background
.El
.Pp
Note that the above are standard
.Tn ANSI
colors.
The actual display may differ
depending on the color capabilities of the terminal in use.
.Pp
The order of the attributes are as follows:
.Pp
.Bl -enum -offset indent -compact
.It
directory
.It
symbolic link
.It
socket
.It
pipe
.It
executable
.It
block special
.It
character special
.It
executable with setuid bit set
.It
executable with setgid bit set
.It
directory writable to others, with sticky bit
.It
directory writable to others, without sticky bit
.El
.Pp
The default is
.Qq "exfxcxdxbxegedabagacad" ,
i.e., blue foreground and
default background for regular directories, black foreground and red
background for setuid executables, etc.
.It Ev LS_COLWIDTHS
If this variable is set, it is considered to be a
colon-delimited list of minimum column widths.
Unreasonable
and insufficient widths are ignored (thus zero signifies
a dynamically sized column).
Not all columns have changeable widths.
The fields are,
in order: inode, block count, number of links, user name,
group name, flags, file size, file name.
.It Ev TERM
The
.Ev CLICOLOR
functionality depends on a terminal type with color capabilities.
.It Ev TZ
The timezone to use when displaying dates.
See
.Xr environ 7
for more information.
.El
.Sh COMPATIBILITY
The group field is now automatically included in the long listing for
files in order to be compatible with the
.St -p1003.2
specification.
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr chflags 1 ,
.Xr chmod 1 ,
.Xr sort 1 ,
.Xr xterm 1 Pq Pa x11/xterm ,
.Xr strftime 3 ,
.Xr termcap 5 ,
.Xr symlink 7 ,
.Xr sticky 8
.Sh STANDARDS
With the exception of options
.Fl g ,
.Fl n
and
.Fl o ,
the
.Nm
utility conforms to
.St -p1003.1-2001 .
The options
.Fl B , D , G , I , T , W , b , h , w , y
and
.Fl _
are compatible extensions not defined in
.St -p1003.1-2001 .
.Sh HISTORY
An
.Nm
command appeared in
.At v1 .
.Sh BUGS
To maintain backward compatibility, the relationships between the many
options are quite complex.