NAME
namei - follow a pathname until a terminal point is found
SYNOPSIS
namei [options] pathname...
DESCRIPTION
namei interprets its arguments as pathnames to any type of Unix file (symlinks, files, directories, and so forth). namei then follows each pathname until an endpoint is found (a file, a directory, a device node, etc). If it finds a symbolic link, it shows the link, and starts following it, indenting the output to show the context.
This program is useful for finding "too many levels of symbolic links" problems.
For each line of output, namei uses the following characters to identify the file type found:
f: = the
pathname currently being resolved
d = directory
l = symbolic link (both the link and its contents are
output)
s = socket
b = block device
c = character device
p = FIFO (named pipe)
- = regular file
? = an error of some kind
namei prints an informative message when the maximum number of symbolic links this system can have has been exceeded.
OPTIONS
-l, --long
Use the long listing format (same as -m -o -v).
-m, --modes
Show the mode bits of each file type in the style of ls(1), for example 'rwxr-xr-x'.
-n, --nosymlinks
Don’t follow symlinks.
-o, --owners
Show owner and group name of each file.
-v, --vertical
Vertically align the modes and owners.
-x, --mountpoints
Show mountpoint directories with a 'D' rather than a 'd'.
-Z, --context
Show security context of the file or "?" if not available. The support for security contexts is optional and does not have to be compiled to the namei binary.
-h, --help
Display help text and exit.
-V, --version
Print version and exit.
BUGS
To be discovered.
AUTHORS
The original namei program was written by Roger Southwick <rogers [AT] amadeus.com>.
The program was rewritten by Karel Zak <kzak [AT] redhat.com>.
SEE ALSO
REPORTING BUGS
For bug reports, use the issue tracker at <https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues>;.
AVAILABILITY
The namei command is part of the util-linux package which can be downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive <https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>;.