5 Things To Know About the Linux File System

[@RESPEKTOS]

these videos are peak comfy for me, no fakeness, no over the top youtube shenanigans, just a dude that looks like me sitting in a room that looks like mine talking normal people words

[@starkmouth]

I really like your video thumbnail previews/title cards/whatever you wanna call 'em. No stupid gaping "OMG!" face, the title and appropriate icon is right there, solid colored background, easy to find your videos in my own feed and easy to find a certain topic on your channel page.

[@TheLinuxCast]

Yeah I don't like those thumbnails. And no one really wants to see my face on a thumbnail. Lol

[@stevenwiltrout4130]

I enjoyed this explination about "5 Things To Know About the Linux File System." Good job. In response to your question. Yes, I would enjoy a deepdive into the filesystem.

[@TheLinuxCast]

Want more Linux content? Follow me on Mastodon: fosstodon.org/@thelinuxcast

[@Error_00101]

Would love to have an deepdive into the filesystem! nonetheless a realy great overview.

[@Keizer_Soze]

Yes please! 👍

[@TheLinuxCast]

I think I'm going to make a series. :)

[@Keizer_Soze]

@@TheLinuxCast, Thank you 🙂

[@donaldmickunas8552]

Actually, the term, directory, has been around for many years. It was used in the early days of the IBM PC and DOS. Folders came into use with the GUI based systems like Windows probably to make them easier to understand for the typical computer user. I’m probably over generalizing but that is the basic idea.

[@fernandobernardo6324]

dir DOS command speaks for itself.

[@donaldmickunas8552]

@@fernandobernardo6324 It does for those who know what a directory is. I spent a lot of time back in the DOS days building menus for people who didn’t want to deal with the command line.

[@Timm2003]

I would also really like a whole playlist about the linux filesystem, thats pretty interesting and u explained it very well, thx.

[@SpyderGamer]

Thanks for helping me and other Linux newbies understand! It really helps us know what to do and not do when we navigate our system, especially when we just migrated from Windows. Great video :)

[@anon_y_mousse]

I'm old enough to remember mounting IDE hard drives where the device names were /dev/hd[a-z]. You should've gone more in-depth about devices, such as being able to mount a drive to anywhere you want. For that matter, talk about loopback devices and being able to mount disc images. As for /boot /dev and /proc I'd say don't avoid them, just treat them as read-only until you know what you're doing. As for directory versus folder, I'd say it's a style choice. I personally refer to them by both names and I don't care which anyone prefers.

[@vaisakh_km]

Even though i am not old enough, my prev computer is old enough to remind me of it

[@BytebroUK]

Good answer. All of that stuff is available and helpful, but *treat it as read only* unless you really know what you're doing. Also (and if it's been done her I apologise!) but I'd love to see a slow thoughful run through of one of the popular installers (Ubuntu? Calimares?) specifically to get the BIOS/EFI and / on the nvme/SSD and /home onto the HDD, all with boot-level encryption. Don't recall having seen that one yet (possibly because it can't be done).

[@anon_y_mousse]

@@BytebroUK I'm not sure if I've seen a video on boot level encryption. I mostly consider that a potential vector for data loss. But there are plenty of videos detailing how to install grub for UEFI booting. OldTechBloke has a series of videos on installation that might help you with a starting point which you could adapt, just be warned that he uses Slackware, so it might not be your cup of tea.

[@Go.el_Hadam]

Great explanation. Love your work.

[@FrasSmith]

There are no folders on Linux… until you open any graphical file manager and, oh look, folders. Folders are just the graphical abstraction of directories. Arguably that applies to Windows too.

[@ArniesTech]

Exactly. Folders everywhere.

[@johnandmegh]

Love this summary - really nice for beginners like me, for whom written guides on this topic often get into low level detail too quickly. One super minor note, at around 8:45 you mention that Program Files is created on a per user basis on Windows, but as far as I’ve ever seen Program Files is created right below the root directory, once for 64-bit and once for 32-bit apps. There is the AppData directory for configuration, cache, etc. though, which will be created once in each user’s home directory. Again super minor, someone correct me if I’m off on that - and while IMO the Windows approach does solve part of the challenge, making it easier to find the executables and assets, there’s still no standardization on where config files and caches and things like that are actually stored (AppData, Documents, the program’s own folder, etc.)

[@TheLinuxCast]

Yeah my experience with Windows is pretty rusty. Thanks for the comment 😎

[@gregcampwriter]

Linux Mint's Nemo shows folder icons, likely to provide familiarity for converts.

[@ArniesTech]

Nothing to do with Mint or converts. Any desktop environment on any distro calls them folders.

[@eriksiers]

Re: capitalization, if your Linux box has Samba shares that are accessed by Windows machines, having multiple items with names that only differ by capitalization, Windows gets confused and treats them as the same thing. (I don't know how it decides which one to use.)

[@TheLinuxCast]

That is an excellent point.

[@colbybraden]

Must be getting chilly up there :)

[@elderberry-hamster]

Great overview. Thanks so much!

[@wyfyj]

Thanks for the content Matt

[@-someone-.]

One thing I’m learning now is when to use “system ctl” or “service” ... restart, enable etc I had to enable NORDvpn manually in arch, and learnt through trial and error it was “NORDvpn.service” that I needed to type, when in the arch wiki it said to enable the NORDvpn service (without the . ) I’m still not confident enough to know which app, or program is a service, or whether it needs to have those flags in the “enable or restart” commands Do more of these videos on terminal stuff 👍

[@trajectoryunown]

wait wot? I've used "nordvpnd" since I started running Arch. Did you install nordvpn-bin through the AUR?

[@-someone-.]

@@trajectoryunown yes, through the aur. Then as per the wiki arch Nord it said to do these 2 things gpasswd -a [username] nordvpn groupadd -r nordvpn Then I had to enable and start like this Sudo systemctl enable -now nordvpn.service sudo systemctl start -now nordvpn.service I could then login and connect etc I’ve been using Nord for years, and am familiar with the cli due to installing it on many many raspberry pi os’s. Nord is so fast on arch, much faster than windows, like 5 times at least. (I’m on Windows 8 btw on my dual boot) The only one down side is that the firewall and killswitch play silly buggers sometimes, and you need to disable both to be able to get connectivity and the re enable them Sorry for the late reply👍

[@-someone-.]

@Watcher I tried without, and arch didn’t find it. See my other reply, it shows exactly what I had to type. All good in the end 👍 love learning. 👍

[@-someone-.]

@Watcher well maybe Garuda did something to break that?🧐. Like I said, I tried without and it didn’t recognise the command.

[@donaldmickunas8552]

@@-someone-. Garuda is an Arch based distro. As such, the maintainers have the freedom to alter how the system functions from how Arch does it. Given that, please specify which distribution you are using when making comments or asking for help. Most of the above conversation could have been avoided had you done so. Don’t feel bad. Everyone coming into Linux makes these kinds of mistakes. You’re doing great. Keep on growing and learning and, most of all, have fun. 😀

[@geetsthenerd]

Insert Kylo Ren "More" gif.

[@cameronmoore136]

New to Linux user, here. A little confused on that first point. I'm on Fedora 36 and unless I'm mistaken, when I right click in whatever file manager comes by default with KDE Plasma, I have a "create new folder" option. Is "folder" like a layman's term or something? Like is it not a folder but instead a directory despite being called a folder by the file manager?

[@TheLinuxCast]

Yeah they do that to make it less confusing and because of the icons. Technically they're directories, even though they call them folders. Basically what happens when you right click and select " Create New Folder" is a background mkdir, which is the command you'd run in the terminal. That stand's for make directory.

[@cameronmoore136]

@@TheLinuxCast Okay, I gotcha. I appreciate the clarification. Thanks, Matt!!

[@arisveresies5388]

Hi, just a short comment here. I had a brief encounter with MS-DOS and Windows 3.1. When I switched to Linux I found the file system structure to be very easy to understand because I knew the tree structure of DOS. Of course you have to understand that Windows drive letters are non existent and the way Linux mounts other disks.

[@tonystorcke]

A good overview.

[@bmmartin1684]

I didn't understand a thing you said about sda drives. Btw, how did you make your ls output look that cool?

[@imsuck12]

He used exa instead of ls i think

[@aronwomack359]

Uses exa or something, I have my ls command as alias ls="exa - ahluignmG -snew" in my alias file. Or maybe ls -ahl | lolcat -t. lolcat is like cat but with colors Type neofetch | lolcat -a It will animate the output. lolcat with the t option is just true colors.

[@donaldmickunas8552]

The short answer is that the letters,sd in sad or sdb, refer to the type of disk drive it is. Scuzy (sp) is a disk technology that has been around for years. Mvne is a newer disk technology.

[@zoltan1953]

I could feel you resisting the urge to rant about snaps and how they store files in the home directory in an unhidden directory. 😂

[@ArniesTech]

Actually no. Right click anywhere and you will be able to create a new folder. Those file managers call them folders.

[@nevoyu]

On Linux there's no such thing as a directory. Because everything is a file all a directory is, is essentially just a symlink

[@donaldmickunas8552]

Technically, that is true. However, Linux itself calls that particular “type” of file a directory. An example would be: rm Documents.

[@Winnetou17]

With all due respect, the first part with folders vs directories... that was quite unneccessary. Other than maybe a mention that folder == directory so you don't get confused if you're only used with one of them. But in the context of Linux vs Windows they are EXACTLY the same! GUI apps calls them folders. CLI tools (which most are quite old) calls them directories. mkdir in Linux, mkdir in Windows. Write dir /? in the windows (and MS-DOS) console and you get "Displays a list of files and subdirectories in a directory."

[@TheLinuxCast]

I said it was frivolous. I wasn't lying.

[@Winnetou17]

@@TheLinuxCast True

[@MrKasenom]

"if you go to parties" I don't get invited to them anymore no one wants to hear me talk about FOSS and anime :(

[@donpeer4477]

I understand that folders are actually directories. But, if the term is incorrect, why do so many file managers have a "Create Folder" function?

[@TheLinuxCast]

Because people are used to calling them folders, and Linux devs love confusing people.

[@KeithBoehler]

Gnome calls them folders.

[@trajectoryunown]

Folder and directory are interchangable terms. I think directory is more proper, but folder has been popularized by every common OS and is... well, used to be a commonly understood analogy. Do kids still use folders these days?

[@ArniesTech]

Every desktop environment does.

[@tylerdean980]

Another thing about point 2, SATA drives get sdx, but if you’re using IDE drives or earlier it’s gonna be hdx

[@TheLinuxCast]

Yeah I've not used ide in ages. So I didn't know. 😎

[@tylerdean980]

@@TheLinuxCast Not common these days, I had to interface with one not long ago so that I could install some PS2 games onto it.

[@TheLinuxCast]

@@tylerdean980 I think I still have a few of them buried somewhere in my house. But I'd have no clue how to hook them up to a computer right now. I'd probably have to get an adapter.

[@eriksiers]

I believe what gets assigned is at least partially based on your distro. Slackware, my preferred distro, started calling IDE drives sdx somewhere around v11 or v12. (Maybe when it moved to kernel 2.6? I can't remember, it's been a while.)

[@wisnoskij]

"their are no folders on Linux, only directories" The screenshot you used to illustrate this point is literally filled with folders The icon over `animals` is not an icon of a directory, it is a icon of a folder.

[@ArniesTech]

It's even called folder. Rightclick anywhere and you'll be able to create a new folder.

[@wisnoskij]

@@ArniesTech hahaha. Right Click Desktop > Create New>Folder...

[@TheLinuxCast]

That make new folder is just a front end for mkdir. Make Directory.

[@SlideRSB]

The s in sda stands for SCSI? I thought s was for SATA. 🤔

[@TheLinuxCast]

Every source I found said it stands for SCSI. Because it existed before SATA was a thing. Granted it was only three sources, so who knows?

[@AskarBink29]

If it was for SATA then, I think, there was no sense in USB flash drives being also named sda, sdb, etc.

[@SlideRSB]

@@AskarBink29 Why would that logic be any different with s being for SCSI?

[@AskarBink29]

@@SlideRSB fair enough :)

[@satysin630]

Originally the S was for SCSI and H for IDE (because of course right?). We also had things like SCD for SCSI CD-ROM drives (i.e. /dev/scd0 for the first SCSI CD-ROM drive). When SATA replaced both SCSI and IDE they kept the naming 'sd' as SCSI or SATA it both starts with an S so whatever. Then as USB flash drives became a thing it was just kept within the 'sd' block to make things easier/cleaner. They didn't go with /dev/uda etc because we already have /dev/udp there for networking and it would be messy and confusing and would lead to issues. It may also have been because I believe USB mass storage devices use the same SATA commands to communicate with the USB drive? Or a super-set based on SATA, I think it is something like that. Don't quote me on that though I could be misremembering things :) As Matt mentions you will have noticed for NVMe drives it has an extra letter and number combination in the drive name because NVMe drives have namespaces, something SATA drives don't. So you end up with nvme0n1 for the first nvme drive, namespace 1 and thus nvme0n1p1 (the first partition on that first drive). I have never actually encountered someone using namespaces on NVMe drives so it is is almost always n1.

[@Flackon]

I didn't know about the nuances between folder and directory but, let's be real, the majority of directories are represented as folders when seen on a GUI file browser and, conversely, most folders correspond to directories, so "correcting" someone on this is utter pedantry

[@-someone-.]

Ooh! I’m early! Hey👋

[@blackrosegallade9667]

All you have to know is that Windows has a bad file system.

[@cejannuzi]

And a bad file management interface. It f-ing sucks.

[@martinvandenbroek2532]

Fully agree, the power of the Linux FS is that it does not try to obfuscate things. If that is intimidating to you than just stay in your own $HOME and you'll be safe.

[@blackrosegallade9667]

@Ahmed Shahriar bru H. Microsoft had tabs, took them away, and bow added them back again. That’s not the only mistake either

[@vaisakh_km]

@@blackrosegallade9667 tabs? Are you talking about file manager in windows? Windows file manager is too bad, but here everyone is saying about file system

[@ArniesTech]

Would you mind to specify?

[@Flowxp]

I always was and am annoyed that in Linux is not C,D,E drives ...

[@tylerdean980]

I just mount all my extra drives to /mnt

[@Flowxp]

@@tylerdean980 yes, until you want to do something to the whole disk from terminal so I always have to check it out other software ... what is the partition or the disk that I need

[@tylerdean980]

@@Flowxp Not sure what you mean, you can still do whole disk operations by using the /dev/sda or whatever. Or are you saying that that annoys you?

[@Flowxp]

@@tylerdean980 yes, I still have to use Wincrap at work, but I was always more easy for me to asociate partitions with letters On C:\ I have that, on D:\ I have that ... instead of on sda1 and sdb2 ... :) Some things I find easyer on Windows :))

[@davidhailstone7794]

If you're coming from MacOS, it's not so hard.