This article is a 1 minute read
To see hidden files in the Mac Terminal make use of the ls (list directory) command with -a option,
Syntax:
ls -a
Example:
% ls -la
-r-------- 1 code2care staff 7 Mar 19 21:28 .CFUserTextEncoding
-rw-r--r--@ 1 code2care staff 18436 Sep 11 09:53 .DS_Store
drwx------+ 2 code2care staff 64 Sep 10 08:50 .Trash
drwxr-xr-x 15 code2care staff 480 Aug 21 19:18 .android
drwxr-xr-x 4 code2care staff 128 May 23 00:36 .aws
-rw-------@ 1 code2care staff 4412 Sep 9 00:09 .bash_history
drwxr-xr-x 3 code2care staff 96 May 28 12:29 .bitnami
drwxr-xr-x 4 code2care staff 128 Jun 16 18:26 .cache
drwxr-xr-x 3 code2care staff 96 Mar 18 23:10 .config
drwx------ 10 code2care staff 320 Sep 9 14:40 .docker
drwxr-xr-x 8 code2care staff 256 Jun 16 18:26 .eclipse
-rw------- 1 code2care staff 16 Mar 18 18:28 .emulator_console_auth_token
-rw-r--r-- 1 code2care staff 238 Sep 8 10:53 .gitconfig
drwxr-xr-x 9 code2care staff 288 Apr 16 00:00 .gradle
drwx------@ 5 code2care staff 160 Sep 11 09:47 Desktop
drwx------+ 12 code2care staff 384 Sep 7 13:29 Documents
drwx------+ 62 code2care staff 1984 Sep 9 22:24 Downloads
drwxr-xr-x 8 code2care staff 256 Sep 7 16:42 IdeaProjects
drwx------@ 98 code2care staff 3136 Aug 22 10:28 Library
drwx------ 4 code2care staff 128 Dec 25 2021 Movies
drwx------+ 4 code2care staff 128 Dec 25 2021 Music
drwxr-xr-x@ 27 code2care staff 864 Sep 10 08:51 My Files
drwx------+ 6 code2care staff 192 Aug 23 17:19 Pictures
Examples of hidden files
As you may see in the above example, all the files that are hidden start with a dot prefix, and they are denoted by a dash (-) in the file permission at the start,
-rw-r--r--@ 1 code2care staff 18436 Sep 11 09:53 .DS_Store
-rw-------@ 1 code2care staff 4412 Sep 9 00:09 .bash_history
-rw-r--r-- 1 code2care staff 238 Sep 8 10:53 .gitconfig
Examples of hidden directories
All the entries denoted by a letter d as the first letter in the permission and the name starts with a dot are hidden directories,
drwxr-xr-x 3 code2care staff 96 May 28 12:29 .bitnami
drwxr-xr-x 4 code2care staff 128 Jun 16 18:26 .cache
drwxr-xr-x 3 code2care staff 96 Mar 18 23:10 .config
drwx------ 10 code2care staff 320 Sep 9 14:40 .docker
![Show Hidden Files Mac Terminal Show Hidden Files Mac Terminal](https://code2care.org/macos/show-hidden-files-mac-terminal/images/Show Hidden Files Mac Terminal.jpg)
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Author Info:
Rakesh (He/Him) has over 14+ years of experience in Web and Application development. He is the author of insightful How-To articles for Code2care.
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