Let us take a closer look at the fields present in the syntax of the stat command.<\/p>\n
1. <OPTIONS><\/strong><\/p>\n This particular field takes in a variety of options that specify how the comm command must function, format, and print the output. You can also specify more than one option in this field.<\/p>\n 2. <FILE><\/strong><\/p>\n This file specifies the name of the file you want detailed information about. If the file you want to display information about is not in your current working directory, you can specify the file’s path.<\/p>\n Unlike most commands in Linux, the stat command comes with very few options. Let us take a detailed look at each.<\/p>\n 1. -f<\/strong><\/p>\n This option displays the filesystem status instead of the file status. You can also write this option as “–filesystem.”<\/p>\n 2. -c<\/strong><\/p>\n This option uses the format you specified instead of the default one. You can also write this option as “–format.”<\/p>\n 3. -L<\/strong><\/p>\n This option follows links. This option can also be written as “–dereference.”<\/p>\n 4. -Z<\/strong><\/p>\n This option prints the security context of SE Linux. This option can also be written as “–context.”<\/p>\n 5. -t<\/strong><\/p>\n This option prints the information in the terse form. You can also write this option as “–terse”.<\/p>\n 6. –help<\/strong><\/p>\n This option displays the help menu of the stat command.<\/p>\n 7. \u2013version<\/strong><\/p>\n This option displays the version of the stat command you are using.<\/p>\n As we saw, we can use the option “-c” to specify the format we want. Here is a list of all the format specifiers you can use on files:<\/p>\n 1. %A<\/strong> – Access rights in human-readable form Similar to format specifiers for files, we have format specifiers for filesystems that we can use with the option “-c” Here is a list of all the format specifiers you can use on filesystems:<\/p>\n 1. %a –<\/strong> Free blocks available to non-superuser Before we look at how to use the various options of the stat command, let us understand the fields in the output of the stat command.<\/p>\n In the output shown above, there are various fields like file, size, change, birth, etc. Let us take a brief look at each field and what information it gives.<\/p>\n 1. File<\/strong><\/p>\n This particular field displays the name of the file. This name is the same as the name we passed to stat on the command line. However, the name can be different if we look at a symbolic link.<\/p>\n 2. Size<\/strong><\/p>\n This field displays the size of the file. By default, the size is represented in bytes.<\/p>\n 3. Blocks<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the number of filesystem blocks the file requires to be stored on the hard drive.<\/p>\n 4. IO block<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the size of a filesystem block.<\/p>\n 5. File type<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the type of object the metadata describes. It is usually a directory or file. However, we can sometimes deal with links, pipes, sockets, etc.<\/p>\n 6. Device<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the device number in hexadecimal and decimal formats. The device number is the ID of the hard drive on which the file is stored.<\/p>\n 7. Inode<\/strong><\/p>\n As the name suggests, this field represents the inode number. This number is the ID of this inode. A file is uniquely identified using the Inode number and the device number.<\/p>\n 8. Links<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the number of hard links pointed to this file. Every time a hard link is generated or deleted, this number will be adjusted up or down. Whenever it reaches zero, the file itself has been deleted, and the inode is removed.<\/p>\n 9. Access<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the file permissions. Permissions are shown in both octal and traditional “read, write and execute” forms.<\/p>\n 10. UID<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the user identification number and account name of the owner.<\/p>\n 11. GID<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the group identification number and account name of the owner.<\/p>\n 12. Access<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represented the access timestamp when the file was last accessed.<\/p>\n 13. Modify<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represented the modification timestamp when the file’s contents were last modified.<\/p>\n 14. Change<\/strong><\/p>\n This field represents the change timestamp. This was when the file’s attributes or contents were last changed.<\/p>\n 15. Birth<\/strong><\/p>\n This field shows the original creation date of the file.<\/p>\n Now, since we have covered the theory and fundamentals regarding the stat command, let us look at some fantastic examples of the comm command in the terminal of ubuntu 20.04.<\/p>\n If you want to display information regarding the filesystem, run the stat command by pairing it with the option “-f” as shown:<\/p>\n Let us understand the different fields in the output shown above.<\/p>\n 1. File:<\/strong> This field displays the name of the file.<\/p>\n 2. ID:<\/strong> This field displays the file system ID in hexadecimal format.<\/p>\n 3. Namelen<\/strong>: This field represents the maximum length of a file name.<\/p>\n 4. Fundamental block size:<\/strong> It is the total size of each block on the file system.<\/p>\n 5. Blocks:<\/strong><\/p>\n 6. Inodes:<\/strong><\/p>\n If you want to get the detailed information for multiple files, all you have to do is specify multiple filenames separated by a space as shown below:<\/p>\n If we provide the stat command with a symlink, it will give the information about the symbolic link instead of the original file. Here is an example:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n However, if u want to follow or dereference the symbolic and display information about the file, execute the stat command by pairing it with the option “-L” as shown:<\/p>\n Here is the same example shown, except this time, we dereference the symlink:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The stat command allows us to customize the output instead of using the default format. There are two ways we can customize the output.<\/p>\n The first method uses the option “-C” or “format”. Providing multiple files to the stat command with the –format option in this method will automatically add a new line after each operand’s output. Use the syntax shown:<\/p>\n In the above output, the format specifier \u201c%n\u201d simply prints the name of the file.<\/p>\n The second method to print a customized output is to use the “–print” option. Using this method, we can also provide trailing characters to the format. For example, if you want to add a new line after each line output, we can use the escape sequence “\\n” following characters with a backslash. Use the following syntax:<\/p>\n If you want to display information in the terse form, all you have to do is to execute the stat command by combining it with the option “-t,” as shown:<\/p>\nOptions used with linux stat command<\/h3>\n
![\"help](\"https:\/\/data-flair.training\/blogs\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/2\/2023\/02\/help-menu-of-the-stat-command.webp\")
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nFormat specifiers for files<\/h3>\n
\n2. %a<\/strong> – Access rights in octal form
\n3. %B<\/strong> – The size in bytes of each block is reported by “%b.”
\n4. %b<\/strong> – Number of blocks allocated
\n5. %C<\/strong> – Security context of SE Linux
\n6. %D<\/strong> – Device number in hex format
\n7. %d<\/strong> – Device number in decimal format
\n8. %F<\/strong> – File type
\n9. %f<\/strong> – Raw mode in hex
\n10. %G<\/strong> – Group name of the owner
\n11. %g<\/strong> – GID of owner
\n12. %h<\/strong> – Number of hard links
\n13. %i<\/strong> – Inode number
\n14. %n<\/strong> – File name
\n15. %o<\/strong> – IO block size
\n16. %s<\/strong> – Total size
\n17. %T<\/strong> – Minor device type in hex format
\n18. %t<\/strong> – Major device type in hex format
\n19. %U<\/strong> – Username of the owner
\n20. %u<\/strong> – UID of the owner
\n21. %X<\/strong> – Time of last access as seconds since Epoch
\n22. %x –<\/strong> Time of last access
\n23. %Y<\/strong> – Time of last modification as seconds since Epoch
\n24. %y<\/strong> – Time of last modification
\n25. %Z<\/strong> – Time of last change as seconds since Epoch
\n26. %z<\/strong> – Time of last change<\/p>\nFormat specifiers for filesystems<\/h3>\n
\n2. %b<\/strong> – Total data blocks in the file system
\n3. %c<\/strong> – Total file nodes in the file system
\n4. %C<\/strong> – security context of SE Linux
\n5. %d –<\/strong> Free file nodes in the file system
\n6. %f<\/strong> – Free blocks in the file system
\n7. %i<\/strong> – File System id in hex
\n8. %l<\/strong> – Maximum length of file names
\n9. %n<\/strong> – File name
\n10. %T<\/strong> – Type in human-readable form<\/p>\nUnderstanding the output of linux stat command<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nDisplaying the filesystem information<\/h3>\n
stat -f <filename><\/pre>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n\n
\n
Using the stat command with multiple files<\/h3>\n
stat <filename1> <filename2><\/pre>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nDereferencing Symlinks<\/h3>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nstat -L <filename><\/pre>\n
<\/a><\/p>\nCustomizing the output<\/h3>\n
stat --format='<format specifier>' <filename><\/pre>\n
<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\nDisplaying information in the terse form<\/h3>\n
stat -t <filename><\/pre>\n