UNIX
2.0 Working With Files
2.1 Filenames
Regardless of where they reside (see Section 10.0,
"Directory Structure"), your files must have names, and there
are conventions for naming files. Giving your files logical names that describe
their contents will help you identify them. Filenames that contain spaces
are problematic on UNIX; they should be avoided. Several naming conventions
aid organization despite this limitation. One of the most common is using
capitalization or underscores to separate words (for example: fileOfText
or file_of_data). Also, periods are often used to separate files
into categories. For example, two files containing articles of text might
be called article1.text and article2.text. This practice
facilitates dealing with a group of files all at once: if the name of every
file containing text ends with .text, they might all be referenced as a
group by the single name *.text. (The asterisk is a "wildcard"
that stands for any combination of characters.)
2.2 Listing Files
One of the most commonly used commands is ls, which lists information
about files (including their names). The ls command may be used
without any flags or arguments by typing ls and pressing RETURN;
this will print on the screen the list of all files in the current directory.
With the addition of flags and arguments, the ls command can be
made to display more vital information about the files in question. Try using the -l and -a switch. ls -l will display the long file listing (includes important info about the file owner,the group and rwx permissions. ls -a will display any hidden files (usually begining with "." such as .profile or .login)
