Linux / UNIX: Display file inode (index number)

Q. How do I display file inode number using command line?

A. An inode is a data structure on a Unix / Linux file system. An inode stores basic information about a regular file, directory, or other file system object. You can use following two commands to display an inode:
[a] ls command : list directory contents

ls command

Type ls command with -i ( print the index number of each file ) option:
$ ls -i /etc/passwd
Output:

752010 /etc/passwd

752010 is index number (inode) for /etc/passwd file.

stat command

$ stat /etc/passwd
Output:

  File: `/etc/passwd'
  Size: 2026            Blocks: 8          IO Block: 4096   regular file
Device: 811h/2065d      Inode: 752010      Links: 1
Access: (0644/-rw-r--r--)  Uid: (    0/    root)   Gid: (    0/    root)
Access: 2007-08-20 23:19:20.000000000 +0530
Modify: 2007-07-07 00:06:56.000000000 +0530
Change: 2007-07-07 00:06:56.000000000 +0530

You can use inode number to delete or search a file.