Other's Files

So that you don't have to type the complete path of someone's home directory, the shell provides a shorthand for getting to people's home directories: the ~ (tilde) character. Precede a user's login name with the ~ character and the shell will expand it to the complete path name. In the special case where you do not give a login name after the ~, the shell will expand it to your home directory, making cd ~ equivalent to cd.

[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ cd ~cs367-1	cd to cs367-1's directory.
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ ls
public/ private/
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ cd private	try to look at a protected directory
private: Permission denied
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ pwd
/afs/cs.wisc.edu/p/course/cs367-1	still in this directory
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ cd ~/private	cd to your own private directory
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ pwd
/afs/cs.wisc.edu/u/b/b/bbadger/private
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ cd ~bucky	cd to bucky's home directory
[bbadger@demo01] (1)$ pwd
/afs/cs.wisc.edu/u/b/u/bucky

Please note that even though you can list the contents of someone's home directory, you cannot always access all these files. Files are protected using AFS and Unix permissions. See chapter , Advanced Topics, for more information.