Intro To 'pwd' Command In Linux

2023-04-27 - By Robert Elder

     I use the 'pwd' command to print the current working directory:

cd /home/robert/important

pwd

     Outputs:

/home/robert/important

     The current working directory is one of the most important aspects of using a command-line environment.  The 'pwd' command, as well as the '$PWD' variable will both show you the current working directory:

pwd
echo $PWD

     Outputs:

/home/robert/important
/home/robert/important

     Let's set up some example files and directories to illustrate some uses of the 'pwd' command:

mkdir files
ln -s files indirect-dir
touch files/README.txt
touch files/foo.jpg
touch foo.txt

     Anytime that you specify a relative file name on the command line, it's usually assumed that the full path of the file will be relative to the current working directory.

ls foo.txt

     Outputs:

foo.txt

     If we check the status of all files in the current directory using this command:

ls -latr

     the output is the following:

total 12
drwxr-xr-x 49 robert robert 4096 Apr 28 20:44 ..
lrwxrwxrwx  1 robert robert    5 Apr 28 23:16 indirect-dir -> files
drwxrwxr-x  2 robert robert 4096 Apr 28 23:16 files
-rw-rw-r--  1 robert robert    0 Apr 28 23:20 foo.txt
drwxrwxr-x  3 robert robert 4096 Apr 28 23:20 .

     Note that the 'indirect-dir' is actually a symlink that points to a directory.  Let's move into that symlink:

cd indirect-dir

     I can use the '-P' flag to show the physical path:

pwd -P

     and the output is:

/home/robert/important/files

     I can also use the '-L' flag to show the logical path:

pwd -L

     and the output is:

/home/robert/important/indirect-dir

     These two paths usually have the same value but they can be different if the path includes symlinks.

     And that's why the 'pwd' command is my favorite Linux command.

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