What do the symbols like =, * and | in the output of "ls -F" mean?
By Andrew Adams •
I am working on creating a 'cheat sheet' of shell commands. I am currently researching the ls command and its flags. For the -F flag I know what the majority of the appended indicators mean but for; = and | I can't find any information.
Could someone please tell me what these commands mean.
41 Answer
I believe you're talking about indicators presented by ls -F. From the manpage of ls:
-F, --classify append indicator (one of */=>@|) to entries
[...]
--indicator-style=WORD append indicator with style WORD to entry names: none (default), slash (-p), file-type (--file-type), classify (-F)To get an overview of the meaning of these indicators, we have to dive into the info page as suggested at the bottom of the manpage (info coreutils 'ls invocation'):
`-F'
`--classify'
`--indicator-style=classify' Append a character to each file name indicating the file type. Also, for regular files that are executable, append `*'. The file type indicators are `/' for directories, `@' for symbolic links, `|' for FIFOs, `=' for sockets, `>' for doors, and nothing for regular files. Do not follow symbolic links listed on the command line unless the `--dereference-command-line' (`-H'), `--dereference' (`-L'), or `--dereference-command-line-symlink-to-dir' options are specified.Above is an excerpt taken from the 'General output formatting' section. Go there directly using info coreutils 'General output formatting'.
TL;DR
*for executables/for directories@for symbolic links|for FIFOs=for sockets>for doors- (nothing) for regular files
