File Management Commands in Linux

Once you have a little bit of idea about the terminal, Linux command structure, path and directory hierarchy system, you should know about handling files in Linux.

As a Linux user, you have to deal with all kinds of files and all kinds of file operations.

You should know how to display the contents of files, create new files, change their properties. You should also know how to look for files and edit them.

In this section of Linux Handbook, you'll learn about various Linux commands that you can use for file managements.

I have categorized the commands into sections so that it is easier for you to follow.

Basic file commands

Form listing files to copying them, these commands will help you.

Command	Description	Example
ls	List files in a directory	ls command examples
cp	Copy files and directories	cp command examples
mv	Move (rename) files and directories	mv command examples
ln	Create links to files and directories	ln command examples

Directory operation commands

These commands will handle creating, moving around and removing directories.

Command	Description	Example
cd	Navigate between directories	cd command
mkdir	Create new directories	mkdir command
rmdir	Delete the empty directories	rmdir command

File viewing commands

View the contents of a file in Linux terminal with these commands:

Command	Description	Example
cat	Join several input files by sequentially or display contents	cat command
head	Print a specified number of lines from the beginning of the file	head command
tail	Outputs the last parts of a single file or multiple files	tail command
less	Viewing text files	less command
more	Opens a text file in page views	more command

File editing commands

Edit files in the terminal with these editors:

Command	Description	Example
Vim	Popular command line text editor	Vim commands
Emacs	Popular Text Editor	Emacs commands

File properties commands

Learn about the timestamps, size, number of lines and many more such attributes of files with these commands:

Command	Description	Example
wc	Count the number of lines, words and characters of text file	wc command
chgrp	Changing the group of a file or directory	chgrp command
touch	Changing file timestamps/creating new empty file	touch command
chmod	Changing the mode of access	chmod command
du	Checking the size of directory	du command
file	Determine actual type of file and related information	file command
stat	Get file attribute information	stat command
chown	Change user and group ownership of a file/directory	chown command
chattr	Make a file 'undeletable' even by root	chattr command

File searching commands

These commands will let you search for files on your system.

Command	Description	Example
which	Locates an executable file in your shell’s search path	which command
locate	Preform a super quick search for files	locate command
xargs	Build and execute commands from standard input	xargs command
find	Searching for files and directories	find command

File manipulation commands

Manipulate the output of text files with these commands

Command	Description	Example
grep	Find patterns in files	grep command
cut	Removing “columns” or data on each line of a text file	cut command
paste	Merges several input files to produce a new delimited text file	paste command
tee	Reads from standard input and writes to both standard output and files	tee command
expand	Convert the tabs into spaces	expand command
tr	Translating one type of characters into another	tr command
sort	Sorting the contents of the text files	sort command
uniq	Filtering duplicate text from a file	uniq command