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exa a replacement ls

:author:

mcgillij

:category:

Linux

:date:

2021-10-27 22:49

:tags:

Linux, ls, exa, #100DaysToOffload

:slug:

exa-ls-replacement

:summary:

Exa a modern ls replacement, it’s pretty neat.

:cover_image:

pacman.jpg

Contents

• exa a replacement ls

• Installation

• Alias’s

• Screenshots

• *exa** is a modern replacement for ls.

Whats modern mean in the context of *ls*? For instance exa has colors on by default, can show git status, xattrs of files etc.

More information can be found:

website

github

It really is a simple application that does what it says quite well.

Below are the **bash** alias’s that I created for using it on my machines. It’s not only ‘pretty’ but also useful in that you can show the *git* status of files in your directory listing etc. Checkout their documentation to tailor it’s output to your specifications.

I wasn’t ready to drop *ls* entirely, so I created some alias’s below that you can use to check out *exa* without having to *replace* ls entirely.

I suspect that after a couple weeks of using the below alias’s I’ll just replace *ls* as I haven’t really found any downsides yet.

Installation

$ sudo pacman -S exa
# or on debian
$ sudo apt install exa

Alias’s

alias e='exa --icons'
alias el='exa --long --git --header --icons'
alias et='exa --tree --icons'

Screenshots

Sample output from the above alias’s

• *e**

[image: exa e]

• *el**

[image: exa el]

• *et**

[image: exa et]

There you have it, it just basically works as an *ls* replacement whist providing extra functionality. It’s always nice to find modern console utilities.