Directory (computing)In computing, a directory is a cataloging structure which contains references to other s, and possibly other directories. On many computers, directories are known as folders, or drawers, analogous to a workbench or the traditional office filing cabinet. The name derives from books like a telephone directory that lists the phone numbers of all the people living in a certain area. Files are organized by storing related files in the same directory.
Path (computing)A path is a string of characters used to uniquely identify a location in a directory structure. It is composed by following the directory tree hierarchy in which components, separated by a delimiting character, represent each directory. The delimiting character is most commonly the slash ("/"), the backslash character (""), or colon (":"), though some operating systems may use a different delimiter. Paths are used extensively in computer science to represent the directory/file relationships common in modern operating systems and are essential in the construction of Uniform Resource Locators (URLs).
Cd (command)The command, also known as (change directory), is a command-line shell command used to change the current working directory in various operating systems. It can be used in shell scripts and s. The command has been implemented in operating systems such as Unix, DOS, IBM OS/2, MetaComCo TRIPOS, AmigaOS (where if a bare path is given, cd is implied), Microsoft Windows, ReactOS, and Linux. On MS-DOS, it is available in versions 2 and later. DR DOS 6.0 also includes an implementation of the and commands.
Unix filesystemIn Unix and operating systems inspired by it, the is considered a central component of the operating system. It was also one of the first parts of the system to be designed and implemented by Ken Thompson in the first experimental version of Unix, dated 1969. As in other operating systems, the filesystem provides information storage and retrieval, and one of several forms of interprocess communication, in that the many small programs that traditionally form a Unix system can store information in files so that other programs can read them, although pipes complemented it in this role starting with the Third Edition.
Root directoryIn a computer , and primarily used in the Unix and Unix-like operating systems, the root directory is the first or top-most directory in a hierarchy. It can be likened to the trunk of a tree, as the starting point where all branches originate from. The root file system is the file system contained on the same disk partition on which the root directory is located; it is the filesystem on top of which all other file systems are mounted as the system boots up.
File systemIn computing, a file system or filesystem (often abbreviated to fs) is a method and data structure that the operating system uses to control how data is stored and retrieved. Without a file system, data placed in a storage medium would be one large body of data with no way to tell where one piece of data stopped and the next began, or where any piece of data was located when it was time to retrieve it. By separating the data into pieces and giving each piece a name, the data are easily isolated and identified.
Working directoryIn computing, the working directory of a process is a of a , if any, dynamically associated with each process. It is sometimes called the current working directory (CWD), e.g. the BSD getcwd function, or just current directory. When the process refers to a file using a simple file name or relative path (as opposed to a file designated by a full path from a root directory), the reference is interpreted relative to the working directory of the process. So for example a process with working directory /rabbit-shoes that asks to create the file foo.
