ls

Lists the contents of a directory. Its argument will tell it which

directory to list the contents. No argument will use the current working

directory. -a lists all files in the desired directory, including hidden

files and -l gives a long listing of the files with permissions, sizes,

ownerships, groups, modification dates and file names.

lightning:~>ls

Lists the files and in the working directory.

lightning:~>ls -al ~

Lists all the files in the user's home directory in long format.