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
[b] stat command : display file or file system status
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.
2 comment
Hi, I would like to use grep command on a file by mentioning it’s inode number instead of it’s file name. Does grep command has this facility. If yes, how do I do it?
What I want is some thing along the lines of this: grep PATTERN
Thanks in advance.
What I want is some thing along the lines of this: grep [whatever options] PATTERN [inode no.]. I previously wrote them using “>” and “<" instead of [ and ].