UNIX File and Directory Management

last updated 2/8/08

File naming

File names can be any length

Unix is case sensitive. Upper and lower case letters are different. File "A" is different from "a".

Names may include some punctuation: . (period) -(dash), _(underscore), %(percent) and $(dollar sign)

The extension notion is used to some degree. Some common extensions are

.cpp
.h
.o
.out
.a
.java
.class

A filename prog.1.java is okay although discouraged

Directory Structure

Hierarchical or tree-like, similar to the MSDOS, Windows XP, and many other operating systems
You may have named links to other points in the directory structure, (e.g. two names for the same physical file), so the directory is not purely hierarchical--> you may have, as a result, multiple paths to the same file.
/ is the top level directory (note use of forward slash)
/directory/subdir/subdir/..../file (MSDOS just tried to be different \\\\)
If you don't start a file reference with a / then the path is relative to your current directory "working directory"
Many of the DOS/Windows directory access and wildcard rules were borrowed from Unix.

Examples

ls /var/mail
ls /home/rhodes 
cat /etc/hosts 
ls ~rhodes (~ is a shortcut way to someone's login directory)

Some common file management commands

These commands are very basic in function. Be sure you know them well

`cd`	change directory
`cd ..`	change to parent directory
`cd ~user`	change to user's directory
`ls`	list filenames
`cat file`	catenate the file contents
`rm filegroup`	remove (be careful, Unix doesn't have file versions)
`cp file1 file2`	copy files
`mv file1 file2`	move files
`mkdir dir`	make a directory
`rmdir dir`	remove an empty directory
cd dir	change working directory to this one (relative or absolute)
`pwd`	print working directory (actually display it, not to the printer)
`lp file`	print to the default line printer (set to C102)
`lp -dmainlasr file` `enscript -2r file` `enscript -2r -Pmainlasr file`	print file to the A214 laser printer (-ddestination) print file in enscripted format	mainlasr mainlasrb c102 c217 p107 cyber p223
`cancel`	remove job from line printer
`lpstat`	check the line printer queue (-t gives a full listing of all queues)
`vi filename`	start the visual editor on the file designated
`g++ filename.cpp`	compile using the gnu c++ compiler (a.out is the default executable)
`g77 filename.for`	compile using the gnu g77 FORTRAN compiler (a.out is the default exe)
*javac file.java*	compile a java program
java classfile	execute a java class file

The Unix server does not know about other printers on the network. Printers are accessible only if they have their own IP address and can print postscript. Do not expect to print on your personal printer unless you ftp the file to your machine and print it from notepad or the ftp application directly.

You could also use enscript to create a postscript file, and use ftp to pull this file over to a Windows-based machine. Once there, you can use Acrobat Distiller to convert it to a .pdf file.

enscript -2r SOURCEFILE -p OUTPUTFILE

And then, ftp from Windows to pull this file over.