1TREE(1) General Commands Manual TREE(1)
2
6 tree - list contents of directories in a tree-like format.
7
9 tree [-acdfghilnpqrstuvxACDFJQNSUX] [-L level [-R]] [-H baseHREF] [-T
10 title] [-o filename] [-P pattern] [-I pattern] [--gitignore]
11 [--matchdirs] [--metafirst] [--ignore-case] [--nolinks] [--inodes]
12 [--device] [--sort[=]name] [--dirsfirst] [--filesfirst] [--filelimit #]
13 [--si] [--du] [--prune] [--timefmt[=]format] [--fromfile] [--info]
14 [--noreport] [--version] [--help] [--] [directory ...]
15
18 Tree is a recursive directory listing program that produces a depth in‐
19 dented listing of files, which is colorized ala dircolors if the
20 LS_COLORS environment variable is set and output is to tty. With no
21 arguments, tree lists the files in the current directory. When direc‐
22 tory arguments are given, tree lists all the files and/or directories
23 found in the given directories each in turn. Upon completion of list‐
24 ing all files/directories found, tree returns the total number of files
25 and/or directories listed.
26 By default, when a symbolic link is encountered, the path that the sym‐
28 bolic link refers to is printed after the name of the link in the for‐
29 mat:
30 name -> real-path
32 If the `-l' option is given and the symbolic link refers to an actual
34 directory, then tree will follow the path of the symbolic link as if it
35 were a real directory.
36
39 Tree understands the following command line switches:
40
43 -a All files are printed. By default tree does not print hidden
44 files (those beginning with a dot `.'). In no event does tree
45 print the file system constructs `.' (current directory) and
46 `..' (previous directory).
47 -d List directories only.
49 -l Follows symbolic links if they point to directories, as if they
51 were directories. Symbolic links that will result in recursion
52 are avoided when detected.
53 -f Prints the full path prefix for each file.
55 -x Stay on the current file-system only. Ala find -xdev.
57 -L level
59 Max display depth of the directory tree.
60 -R Recursively cross down the tree each level directories (see -L
62 option), and at each of them execute tree again adding `-o
63 00Tree.html' as a new option.
64 -P pattern
66 List only those files that match the wild-card pattern. You may
67 have multiple -P options. Note: you must use the -a option to
68 also consider those files beginning with a dot `.' for matching.
69 Valid wildcard operators are `*' (any zero or more characters),
70 `**` (any zero or more characters as well as null /'s, i.e. /**/
71 may match a single /), `?' (any single character), `[...]' (any
72 single character listed between brackets (optional - (dash) for
73 character range may be used: ex: [A-Z]), and `[^...]' (any sin‐
74 gle character not listed in brackets) and `|' separates alter‐
75 nate patterns. A '/' at the end of the pattern matches directo‐
76 ries, but not files.
77 -I pattern
79 Do not list those files that match the wild-card pattern. You
80 may have multiple -I options. See -P above for information on
81 wildcard patterns.
82 --gitignore
84 Uses git .gitignore files for filtering files and directories.
85 Also uses $GIT_DIR/info/exclude if present.
86 --ignore-case
88 If a match pattern is specified by the -P or -I option, this
89 will cause the pattern to match without regards to the case of
90 each letter.
91 --matchdirs
93 If a match pattern is specified by the -P option, this will
94 cause the pattern to be applied to directory names (in addition
95 to filenames). In the event of a match on the directory name,
96 matching is disabled for the directory's contents. If the
97 --prune option is used, empty folders that match the pattern
98 will not be pruned.
99 --metafirst
101 Print the meta-data information at the beginning of the line
102 rather than after the indentation lines.
103 --prune
105 Makes tree prune empty directories from the output, useful when
106 used in conjunction with -P or -I. See BUGS AND NOTES below for
107 more information on this option.
108 --info Prints file comments found in .info files. See .INFO FILES be‐
110 low for more information on the format of .info files.
111 --noreport
113 Omits printing of the file and directory report at the end of
114 the tree listing.
115 --charset charset
117 Set the character set to use when outputting HTML and for line
118 drawing.
119 --filelimit #
121 Do not descend directories that contain more than # entries.
122 --timefmt format
124 Prints (implies -D) and formats the date according to the format
125 string which uses the strftime(3) syntax.
126 -o filename
128 Send output to filename.
129
131 -q Print non-printable characters in filenames as question marks
132 instead of the default.
133 -N Print non-printable characters as is instead of as escaped octal
135 numbers.
136 -Q Quote the names of files in double quotes.
138 -p Print the file type and permissions for each file (as per ls
140 -l).
141 -u Print the username, or UID # if no username is available, of the
143 file.
144 -g Print the group name, or GID # if no group name is available, of
146 the file.
147 -s Print the size of each file in bytes along with the name.
149 -h Print the size of each file but in a more human readable way,
151 e.g. appending a size letter for kilobytes (K), megabytes (M),
152 gigabytes (G), terabytes (T), petabytes (P) and exabytes (E).
153 --si Like -h but use SI units (powers of 1000) instead.
155 --du For each directory report its size as the accumulation of sizes
157 of all its files and sub-directories (and their files, and so
158 on). The total amount of used space is also given in the final
159 report (like the 'du -c' command.) This option requires tree to
160 read the entire directory tree before emitting it, see BUGS AND
161 NOTES below. Implies -s.
162 -D Print the date of the last modification time or if -c is used,
164 the last status change time for the file listed.
165 -F Append a `/' for directories, a `=' for socket files, a `*' for
167 executable files, a `>' for doors (Solaris) and a `|' for
168 FIFO's, as per ls -F
169 --inodes
171 Prints the inode number of the file or directory
172 --device
174 Prints the device number to which the file or directory belongs
175
177 -v Sort the output by version.
178 -t Sort the output by last modification time instead of alphabeti‐
180 cally.
181 -c Sort the output by last status change instead of alphabetically.
183 Modifies the -D option (if used) to print the last status change
184 instead of modification time.
185 -U Do not sort. Lists files in directory order. Disables --dirs‐
187 first.
188 -r Sort the output in reverse order. This is a meta-sort that al‐
190 ter the above sorts. This option is disabled when -U is used.
191 --dirsfirst
193 List directories before files. This is a meta-sort that alters
194 the above sorts. This option is disabled when -U is used.
195 --filesfirst
197 List files before directories. This is a meta-sort that alters
198 the above sorts. This option is disabled when -U is used.
199 --sort[=]type
201 Sort the output by type instead of name. Possible values are:
202 ctime (-c), mtime (-t), size, or version (-v).
203
206 -i Makes tree not print the indentation lines, useful when used in
207 conjunction with the -f option. Also removes as much whitespace
208 as possible when used with the -J or -x options.
209 -A Turn on ANSI line graphics hack when printing the indentation
211 lines.
212 -S Turn on CP437 line graphics (useful when using Linux console
214 mode fonts). This option is now equivalent to `--charset=IBM437'
215 and may eventually be depreciated.
216 -n Turn colorization off always, over-ridden by the -C option, how‐
218 ever overrides CLICOLOR_FORCE if present.
219 -C Turn colorization on always, using built-in color defaults if
221 the LS_COLORS or TREE_COLORS environment variables are not set.
222 Useful to colorize output to a pipe.
223
225 -X Turn on XML output. Outputs the directory tree as an XML format‐
226 ted file.
227 -J Turn on JSON output. Outputs the directory tree as a JSON for‐
229 matted array.
230 -H baseHREF
232 Turn on HTML output, including HTTP references. Useful for ftp
233 sites. baseHREF gives the base ftp location when using HTML
234 output. That is, the local directory may be `/local/ftp/pub',
235 but it must be referenced as `ftp://hostname.organization.do‐
236 main/pub' (baseHREF should be `ftp://hostname.organization.do‐
237 main'). Hint: don't use ANSI lines with this option, and don't
238 give more than one directory in the directory list. If you wish
239 to use colors via CSS style-sheet, use the -C option in addition
240 to this option to force color output.
241 -T title
243 Sets the title and H1 header string in HTML output mode.
244 --nolinks
246 Turns off hyperlinks in HTML output.
247
249 --fromfile Reads a directory listing from a file rather than the file-
250 system. Paths provided on the command line are files to read from
251 rather than directories to search. The dot (.) directory indicates
252 that tree should read paths from standard input. NOTE: this is only
253 suitable for reading the output of a program such as find, not 'tree
254 -fi' as symlinks cannot (at least as yet) be distinguished from files
255 that simply contain ' -> ' as part of the filename.
256
259 --help Outputs a verbose usage listing.
260 --version
262 Outputs the version of tree.
263 -- Option processing terminator. No further options will be pro‐
265 cessed after this.
266
268 .info files are similiar to .gitignore files, if a .info file is found
269 while scanning a directory it is read and added to a stack of .info in‐
270 formation. Each file is composed of comments (lines starting with hash
271 marks (#),) or wild-card patterns which may match a file relative to
272 the directory the .info file is found in. If a file should match a
273 pattern, the tab indented comment that follows the pattern is used as
274 the file comment. A comment is terminated by a non-tab indented line.
275 Multiple patterns, each to a line, may share the same comment.
276
279 /etc/DIR_COLORS System color database.
280 ~/.dircolors Users color database.
281 .gitignore Git exclusion file
282 $GIT_DIR/info/exclude Global git file exclusion list
283 .info File comment file
284 /usr/share/finfo/global_info Global file comment file
285
289 LS_COLORS Color information created by dircolors
290 TREE_COLORS Uses this for color information over LS_COLORS if it is
291 set.
292 TREE_CHARSET Character set for tree to use in HTML mode.
293 CLICOLOR Enables colorization even if TREE_COLORS or LS_COLORS is
294 not set.
295 CLICOLOR_FORCE Always enables colorization (effectively -C)
296 LC_CTYPE Locale for filename output.
297 LC_TIME Locale for timefmt output, see strftime(3).
298 TZ Timezone for timefmt output, see strftime(3).
299 STDDATA_FD Enable the stddata feature, optionally set descriptor to
300 use.
301
304 Steve Baker (ice@mama.indstate.edu)
305 HTML output hacked by Francesc Rocher (rocher@econ.udg.es)
306 Charsets and OS/2 support by Kyosuke Tokoro (NBG01720@nifty.ne.jp)
307
310 Tree does not prune "empty" directories when the -P and -I options are
311 used by default. Use the --prune option.
312 The -h and --si options round to the nearest whole number unlike the ls
314 implementations which rounds up always.
315 Pruning files and directories with the -I, -P and --filelimit options
317 will lead to incorrect file/directory count reports.
318 The --prune and --du options cause tree to accumulate the entire tree
320 in memory before emitting it. For large directory trees this can cause
321 a significant delay in output and the use of large amounts of memory.
322 The timefmt expansion buffer is limited to a ridiculously large 255
324 characters. Output of time strings longer than this will be undefined,
325 but are guaranteed to not exceed 255 characters.
326 XML/JSON trees are not colored, which is a bit of a shame.
328 Probably more.
330 As of version 2.0.0, in Linux, tree will attempt to automatically out‐
332 put a compact JSON tree on file descriptor 3 (what I call stddata,) if
333 present and the environment variable STDDATA_FD is defined or set to a
334 positive non-zero file descriptor value to use to output on. It is
335 hoped that some day a better Linux/Unix shell may take advantage of
336 this feature, though BSON would probably be a better format for this.
337
340 dircolors(1), ls(1), find(1), du(1), strftime(3) gitignore(5)
341Tree 2.0.0 TREE(1)