In order to create a hidden file using a shell (Bash, Zsh, or sh) you can make use of the touch, nano, or vi commands by adding a . (dot) at the start of the file name,
Part 1: Create Hidden Files
Example: Create a hidden file using the touch command# touch .my-hidden-file.txt
# ls
# ls -ltrha
total 8.0K
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 4.0K Apr 2 02:19 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 Apr 2 02:19 .my-hidden-file.txt
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4.0K Apr 2 02:19 .
As you can see I created a hidden file using the touch command touch .{file-name}, you can also add an extension to the file name.
Example: Create a hidden file using the nano command# nano .hidden-file.txt
To view the content of the hidden file you need to make sure you again use . (dot) at the start of your file name.
# cat .hidden-file.txt
This is my hidden file.
Part 2: Create Hidden Directories
![create hidden files and directories using shell commands create hidden files and directories using shell commands](https://code2care.org/linux/create-hidden-file-directory-shell-command/images/create hidden files and directories using shell commands.png)
You can make use of mkdir command with the directory name that starts with a dot just like files.
mkdir .my-hidden-directory
# ls -la
total 16
drwxr-xr-x 3 root root 4096 Apr 2 02:27 .
drwxr-xr-x 1 root root 4096 Apr 2 02:19 ..
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 24 Apr 2 02:23 .hidden-file.txt
drwxr-xr-x 2 root root 4096 Apr 2 02:27 .my-hidden-directory
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 Apr 2 02:19 .my-hidden-file.txt
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