Show only hidden files (dot files) in ls alias

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Method 1

Have the shell list the dot files, and tell ls not to see through directories:

ls -d .*

Method 2

Either make the inner pair of quotes double quotes:

alias hidden='ls -a | grep "^."'

Or make the outer pair of quotes double quotes:

alias hidden="ls -a | grep '^.'"

Or make all quotes double quotes and escape the inner pair:

alias hidden="ls -a | grep "^.""

Or make it a function, so you can pass some arguments when calling:

hidden() { ls -a "<a href="https://getridbug.com/cdn-cgi/l/email-protection" class="__cf_email__" data-cfemail="416501">[email protected]</a>" | grep '^.'; }

Method 3

ls -Ad .* #This will list all the hidden files & directories while retaining the color & formatting

To create an alias of the same:

alias lh='ls -Ad .*'

Same thing could be done via grep command and pipe operator; however it would loose the color and formatting:

ls -a|grep "^."

Via alias:

alias lh='ls -a|grep "^."'

Method 4

You can use double quotes:

alias hidden="ls -a | grep '^.'"

or concatenate more single quoted strings

alias hidden='ls -a | grep '''^.''

or remove at all internal quotes

alias hidden='ls -a | grep ^\.'

Method 5

For the record this doesn’t seem to work with me, since ls -a prints two (sometimes more columns). I would recommend using the -1 option to make sure every file is in its own line. Something like this:

alias hidden='ls -a1 | grep "^."'

Method 6

First answer which shows an alias allowing to add a directory path as usual

Try

alias lsh='ls -al --ignore="[^.]*"'

where ls ignores all files and directories which NOT start with a .

alias lsh='ls -Al --ignore="[^.]*"'

to avoid . and .. entries

Then just call

lsh /path/directory/

Method 7

Making it slightly more complicated, but avoiding parsing ls.

llsh () { find "${@:-.}/" -maxdepth 1 -type f -name ".*" -ls; }

lsh () { find "${@:-.}/" -maxdepth 1 -type f -name ".*" -print; }

The two shell function will use find to generate a list of all hidden regular files in the current directory, or in the directory given on the command line.

The llsh function will generate a “long listing” which will be only slightly more verbose than ls -l, while lsh generates a single-column listing like ls -1.

Method 8

Does your ls support -A? From man ls:

    -a, --all
          do not ignore entries starting with .

   -A, --almost-all
          do not list implied . and ..

$ ls --version
ls (GNU coreutils) 8.5
Copyright (C) 2010 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.  
Written by Richard M. Stallman and David MacKenzie.

Method 9

find . -type f -name ".*"

find . -type f -name ".*" | while read file; do basename $file; done

Method 10

# add it to ~/.bashrc

    hidden() {  # lists hidden files and directories
        find . -maxdepth 1 -name '.?*' -exec ls --color -d {} ;
        }

    hiddenfiles() { # lists hidden files
        find . -maxdepth 1 -type f -name '.?*' -exec ls --color -d {} ;
        }

    hiddendirs() { # lists directories
        find . -maxdepth 1 -type d -name '.?*' -exec ls --color -d {} ;
        }

Method 11

Just simply type the below command and dont confuse with above explained stuff.

ls -A -1 -d -F .* | egrep -v '/$'

Method 12

ls -lart | sed -n "/ .[A-Za-z0-9][A-Za-z0-9]*/p"

All methods was sourced from stackoverflow.com or stackexchange.com, is licensed under cc by-sa 2.5, cc by-sa 3.0 and cc by-sa 4.0

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