If you’ve used linux much and your terminal is set to display files and directories in color, you know how frustrating it can be to have dark blue text on a black background like so (I’ve seen it much worse too)…<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

If you would like to modify the output so the colors are a bit more readable, you can add the following to your .bashrc file…<\/p>\n

alias ls='ls --color'\r\nLS_COLORS='di=33:fi=36:ex=31'\r\nexport LS_COLORS<\/code><\/pre>\n
which will produce an easier to read version like so (with directories yellow, files a crayon\/teal, and executable files red)…<\/p>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n
As pointed out in this article<\/a>…<\/p>\n
The first line makes ls use the –color parameter by default, which tells ls to display files in different colours based on the setting of the LS_COLORS variable.<\/p>\n
The second line is the tricky one, and what I have worked out so far has been by trial and error. The parameters (di, fi, etc.) refer to different Linux file types. I have worked them out as shown<\/p>\n
di = directory
\nfi = file
\nln = symbolic link
\npi = fifo file
\nso = socket file
\nbd = block (buffered) special file
\ncd = character (unbuffered) special file
\nor = symbolic link pointing to a non-existent file (orphan)
\nmi = non-existent file pointed to by a symbolic link (visible when you type ls -l)
\nex = file which is executable (ie. has ‘x’ set in permissions).<\/p>\n
The *.rpm=90 parameter at the end tells ls to display any files ending in .rpm in the specified colour, in this case colour 90 (dark grey). This can be applied to any types of files (eg. you could use ‘*.png=35’ to make jpeg files appear purple.) As many or as few parameters as you like can go into the LS_COLORS variable, as long as the parameters are separated by colons.<\/p>\n
Using trial and error (and a little bash script I wrote… my first one ever! \ud83d\ude42 I worked out all the colour codes, at least my interpretation of them –<\/p>\n
0 = default colour
\n1 = bold
\n4 = underlined
\n5 = flashing text
\n7 = reverse field
\n31 = red
\n32 = green
\n33 = orange
\n34 = blue
\n35 = purple
\n36 = cyan
\n37 = grey
\n40 = black background
\n41 = red background
\n42 = green background
\n43 = orange background
\n44 = blue background
\n45 = purple background
\n46 = cyan background
\n47 = grey background
\n90 = dark grey
\n91 = light red
\n92 = light green
\n93 = yellow
\n94 = light blue
\n95 = light purple
\n96 = turquoise
\n100 = dark grey background
\n101 = light red background
\n102 = light green background
\n103 = yellow background
\n104 = light blue background
\n105 = light purple background
\n106 = turquoise background<\/p>\nPlease remember to subscribe to the newsletter<\/a> to stay up to date!<\/i>\n\nYou or someone you know looking to buy or sell?<\/i>\n<\/a>\nDisclaimer: Thoughts and opinions are my own, and do not reflect the views of any employer, family member, friend, or anyone else. Some links may be affiliate links, but I don't link to anything I don't use myself. You would think this should be self evident these days, but apparently not...<\/small><\/i>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
If you’ve used linux much and your terminal is set to display files and directories in color, you know how frustrating it can be to have dark blue text on a black background like so (I’ve seen it much worse too)… If you would like to modify the output so the colors are a bit … Continue reading Linux ls output colors<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[21],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2UXeD-fz","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=965"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":968,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/965\/revisions\/968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=965"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=965"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/markjacobsen.net\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=965"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}