Files and Folders

Working in the shell requires you to understand how the files on your computer are organised.

Folders…

• are used to organise files.
• can contain other files and folders
• are also known as directories
• (except for the root folder) have a parent folder - the one in which the folder is located.

The shell…

• is situated within a folder - your home folder by default
• can change which folder it is in using the cd command (change directory)
• allows you to access files and folders relative to where it is currently located
• uses . to represent the current folder, and .. to represent its parent folder.

Example

The following illustrates how we can move and work with files and folders in the shell.

macOS

# move into the /Users/andrew/Documents/ folder
cd /Users/andrew/Documents
# or
cd ~/Documents

# Now we are in the Documents folder...
# move into the /Users/andrew/Documents/Code folder
cd Code

## Move back to /Users/andrew - the parent of the parent folder
cd ../..

Windows (WSL) & Linux

# move into the /home/andrew/Documents/ folder
cd /home/andrew/Documents
# or
cd ~/Documents

# Now we are in the Documents folder...
# move into the /home/andrew/Documents/Code folder
cd Code

## Move back to /home/andrew - the parent of the parent folder
cd ../..

Windows (MSYS2)

# move into the /c/Users/andrew/Documents/ folder
cd /c/Users/andrew/Documents

# Now we are in the Documents folder...
# move into the /c/Users/andrew/Documents/Code folder
cd Code

## Move back to /c/Users/andrew - the parent of the parent folder
cd ../..