ls showing dot files by default

[l3eastie]

I'm increasingly using my FreeNAS server (rather than a very similar Ubuntu machine) at home.

I've noticed that in csh sessions the ls command is listing dot files by default (this is not consistent with the -a switch as described in the man page).

I can't find any way to switch this off.

There are some comments around the web relating to the fact that this is correct behaviour and ls was never specified to hide dot files in the first place, but I'd nonetheless be grateful for any pointer in how to get rid of this small irritation and will then be happy to use -a where needed.

Many thanks.

 

[dlavigne]

Is there an alias for ls in ~/.cshrc?

 

[l3eastie]

Is there an alias for ls in ~/.cshrc?

Thanks for the reply - there is no alias for ls in .cshrc

 

[rogerh]

I don't didn't know where aliases are specified, but I note ls behaves the same way in my copy of FreeNAS. The command "alias ls" (without quotes and followed by return) reveals that the current alias is "ls -GFa". So that explains our findings. I know nothing about FreeBSD, but it turns out there is a .cshrc in the root directory of the filesystem, "/.cshrc" which contains this alias, as well as one in "/root/.cshrc" which doesn't contain an alias for "ls".

 

[l3eastie]

I don't didn't know where aliases are specified, but I note ls behaves the same way in my copy of FreeNAS. The command "alias ls" (without quotes and followed by return) reveals that the current alias is "ls -GFa". So that explains our findings. I know nothing about FreeBSD, but it turns out there is a .cshrc in the root directory of the filesystem, "/.cshrc" which contains this alias, as well as one in "/root/.cshrc" which doesn't contain an alias for "ls".

Thanks for your reply.

Actually this is not quite the case on my system.

alias ls ​

identified the alias being used e.g. "ls -GFa" and then

find / -xdev -type f -print0 | xargs -0 grep -H "ls -GF"​

located the only causative alias in

/conf/base/etc/csh.cshrc​

System required a reboot (or perhaps just restarting the csh service) before edits can take effect.

 

[rogerh]

Which leaves me wondering why this alias is no longer in "/.cshrc". Either I made an error or they changed it in the update this morning. I also wonder why your command above does not reveal "/etc/csh.cshrc"? It seems to be something to do with "-xdev", but I can't find any evidence about why "/etc/" is not included.

 

[l3eastie]

Which leaves me wondering why this alias is no longer in "/.cshrc". Either I made an error or they changed it in the update this morning. I also wonder why your command above does not reveal "/etc/csh.cshrc"? It seems to be something to do with "-xdev", but I can't find any evidence about why "/etc/" is not included.

In FreeNAS /etc is a mountpoint for a RAM disk the contents of which are created at boot time from the /conf directory
The -xdev option in find prevents the command from crossing boundaries between volumes

Hence you cannot make persistent changes by editing the contents of the /etc folder and the -xdev switch will not search the /etc folder if the find command is executed from elsewhere in the file system.

 

[rogerh]

In FreeNAS /etc is a mountpoint for a RAM disk the contents of which are created at boot time from the /conf directory
The -xdev option in find prevents the command from crossing boundaries between volumes

Hence you cannot make persistent changes by editing the contents of the /etc folder and the -xdev switch will not search the /etc folder if the find command is executed from elsewhere in the file system.

So it is: I looked at the output of "mount" and completely failed to see it. I should clearly carry on using FreeNAS precisely to avoid having to think about such things.
So the answer to your original question is that you need to edit the file in /conf/base/etc/ every time you reboot update FreeNAS to comment out that alias; I am sure you know that, but just for anyone else who is wondering.

Edited re next post.

 

[Bidule0hm]

No, everything in /conf/base/ is the files that are copied when you boot. For example the content of /conf/base/etc/ is copied to /etc/. So if you edit something in /etc/ then yes, it's maybe overwritten at each boot (not all files are overwritten) but if you edit the same file in /conf/base/etc/ it's permanent (unless an update changes it of course) ;)

 

[rogerh]

No, everything in /conf/base/ is the files that are copied when you boot. For example the content of /conf/base/etc/ is copied to /etc/. So if you edit something in /etc/ then yes, it's maybe overwritten at each boot (not all files are overwritten) but if you edit the same file in /conf/base/etc/ it's permanent (unless an update changes it of course) ;)

OK, thanks, I'll re-edit my post!