Copyright © 2009 Canonical Ltd. and members of the Ubuntu Documentation Project
Credits and License
This document is maintained by the Ubuntu documentation team (https://wiki.ubuntu.com/DocumentationTeam). For a list of contributors, see the contributors page
This document is made available under the Creative Commons ShareAlike 2.5 License (CC-BY-SA).
You are free to modify, extend, and improve the Ubuntu documentation source code under the terms of this license. All derivative works must be released under this license.
This documentation is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AS DESCRIBED IN THE DISCLAIMER.
A copy of the license is available here: Creative Commons ShareAlike License.
This chapter introduces you to basic concepts which are useful when getting started with a Kubuntu system.
Table of Contents
In Linux and Unix everything is a file. Directories are files, files are files, and devices are files. Devices are usually referred to as nodes; however, they are still files.
Linux and Unix file systems are organized in a hierarchical, tree-like
structure. The highest level of the file system is the /
or root directory. All other files and directories exist under the root
directory. For example, /home/konqi/kubuntu.odt
shows
the correct full path, or absolute path, to the kubuntu.odt
file that exists in the konqi
directory, which is under
the home
directory, which in turn is under the root
(/
) directory.
Underneath the root (/
) directory is a set of important
directories common to most Linux distributions. The following is a listing of
common directories that are directly under the root (/
)
directory:
/bin
Important commands, which historically have been binary, but may also be shell scripts.
/boot
Boot configuration files, kernels, and other files needed at boot time.
/dev
The device files.
/etc
Configuration files, startup scripts, etc.
/home
Home directories for different users.
/initrd
Used when creating a customized initial RAM Disk.
/lib
System libraries.
/lost+found
Provides a lost+found system for files that exist under the
root (/
) directory.
/media
Automatically mounted (loaded) removable media such as CDs, digital cameras, etc.
/mnt
Manually mounted filesystems on your hard drive.
/opt
Provides a location for optional (3rd party) applications to be installed; these are usually statically compiled and can be used in other versions or Linux distributions.
/proc
Special dynamic directory that maintains information about the state of the system, including currently running processes.
/root
Root user's home directory, pronounced "slash-root".
/sbin
Important system binaries and scripts, usually intended to be run as the root user.
/srv
Can contain files that are served to other systems.
/sys
Similar to the /proc filesystem, but contains system information not related to running processes.
/tmp
temporary files.
/usr
Applications and read-only files that are mostly available for all users to access.
/var
variable files such as logs and databases.
Would you like to make a comment or contribute an update to this page?
Send feedback to the Ubuntu Documentation Project