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I want to list all hidden files and directories and then save result to file.

Is there any command for this?

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3 Answers 3

up vote 4 down vote accepted

If using GNU find, you can do

find /path -path '*/.*' -ls | tee output-file


To avoid to show non-hidden items contained in hidden directories

find /path -name '.*' >output-file

(as noted, tee could be avoided if you do not need to see the output, and -ls option should be used only if required).

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Or with >instead of | tee, if one doesn't want to see the whole output on the terminal. –  rozcietrzewiacz Aug 7 '11 at 13:25
You also don't need -ls on this, that might be extra messy information to parse thought. –  Caleb Aug 7 '11 at 17:03
This also lists the contents of hidden directories, which isn't what the question asks for (probably — it is a little ambiguous). –  Gilles Aug 7 '11 at 19:53
@Gilles: indeed it is ambiguous. Edited the answer –  enzotib Aug 7 '11 at 20:00

To list the hidden files and directories in the current directory, including . and ..:

echo .*

To list the hidden files and directories in the current directory and its subdirectories recursively:

find . -name '.*'

If you want to save the results to a file, use a redirection:

find . -name '.*' >output-file.txt
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Simple command to find hidden and non hidden files and directory

$ ls -a 
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This is not recursive, and it does not list only the hidden files. –  terdon Jul 10 '14 at 12:09

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