Notice that I don't use 2>/dev/null in this instance because I'm only listing the contents of a file path within my home directory, so I don't anticipate permission errors. The ls -R command lists the contents of a directory recursively, meaning that it doesn't just list the target you provide for it, but also descends into every subdirectory within that target (and every subdirectory in each subdirectory, and so on.) The find command has that function too, by way of the -ls option: $ find ~/Documents -lsģ554235 0 drwxr-xr-x 05:36 /home/seth/Documents/ģ554224 0 -rw-rw-r- 05:36 /home/seth/Documents/Fooģ766411 0 -rw-rw-r- 05:36 /home/seth/Documents/Foo/foo.txtģ766416 0 -rw-rw-r- 05:36 /home/seth/Documents/Foo/foobar.txt If you can't remember the exact name of the file, or you're not sure whether you capitalized any characters, you can do a partial and case-insensitive search like this: $ find / -iname '*foo*txt' 2>/dev/null Use 2>/dev/null to silence permission errors (or use sudo to gain all permissions). When you know the name of a file but can't remember where you saved it, use find to search your home directory.

Whether you're on your own computer or trying to support someone on an unfamiliar system, here are 10 ways find can help you locate important data. As its name implies, find helps you find things, and not just by filename. The find command is one of the most useful Linux commands, especially when you're faced with the hundreds and thousands of files and folders on a modern computer.

Bash find file by name