regarding hidden files

[Ragni Singh]

hey guys,

when I type the ls command, why do I show my hidden files. I see my hidden files wheather I type ls or ls -asl. What am I doing wrong? Any help is greatly appreciated.

[A. Clay Stephenson]

I suspect that you have an alias defined. Do an 'alias' to list your currently defined aliases.

[Helen French]

Hi Sanman,

It could be an 'alias' issue. Check your global and local profiles for any alias settings. Also 'alias' command will list you the current defined aliases.

HTH,
Shiju

[harry d brown jr]

There is no such thing as a "hidden" file. Protected maybe, and unviewable through permissions.

live free or die
harry

[harry d brown jr · Accepted solution]

If you are talking about files like:

.blah+

then yes they are "hidden" from non owners using "ls", but if you are root, you will always see them, and if you use "ls -la" you will always see them, regardless of the user.

live free or die
harry

[SHABU KHAN]

Sanman,

Type:
alias ls

You must have an alias set to ls as ls -la...which will display all your . (dot files)

-Shabu

[Frank Slootweg]

Do you mean filenames starting with a dot (".")? If so, are you doing this as root?

If so, then this is the normal behaviour. The ls(1) manual page is not very specific about this, but does somewhat mention it:

> -A The same as -a, except that the current directory "." and
> parent directory ".." are not listed. For a user with
> appropriate privileges, this flag defaults to ON, and is
> turned off by -A.

[Darrell Allen]

Hi Sanman,

It appears your answer was just the difference in how ls works for superusers and non-superusers. Hidden files (beginning with ".") are displayed when root runs ls.

For later readers, if you are using the posix shell, enter "whence -v ls" to see what the shell intreprets "ls" to be. See man sh-posix for more info.

Darrell