ls color for bad symbolic link

[Tong]

Hi,

I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.

How can I do that in Debian? Thanks

tong

[Adam Aube]

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.

Edit your .bashrc and uncomment this line:

alias ls='ls --color=auto'

Then run:

'. .bashrc'

Adam

[Maurits van Rees]

Post by Tong
Hi,
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.
How can I do that in Debian? Thanks

ls --color=auto

You can set
alias ls='ls --color=auto'
in you .bashrc if you want this to be the standard next time you login.

`vdir' may already have been setup to use colors. Try it.

You can set it up differently. Type
echo $LS_OPTIONS
and
echo $LS_COLORS
and experiment in .bashrc or other bash config files if you feel like
it.

Good luck,

[Tong]

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.
How can I do that in Debian? Thanks

Thanks everyone for the respond... yet I'm still looking for the answer
that I want -- the fact is I have no problem showing colors using ls. Just
need to distinguish bad symbolic link from good ones.

Ok, let's take a look at an example:

touch a
ln -s a l1
ln -s no l2
rm no

ls --color=auto

Do l1 and l2 show up in same color?

In my Debian, they are, but in my RH, l2 show up red.

[Ron Johnson]

Post by Tong

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.
How can I do that in Debian? Thanks

Thanks everyone for the respond... yet I'm still looking for the answer
that I want -- the fact is I have no problem showing colors using ls. Just
need to distinguish bad symbolic link from good ones.
touch a
ln -s a l1
ln -s no l2
rm no
ls --color=auto
Do l1 and l2 show up in same color?
In my Debian, they are, but in my RH, l2 show up red.

Console or an xterm?

[Michael Marsh]

Post by Tong
Thanks everyone for the respond... yet I'm still looking for the answer
that I want -- the fact is I have no problem showing colors using ls. Just
need to distinguish bad symbolic link from good ones.

Check out "info dircolors". Specifically, from the compiled-in
defaults after running "eval `dircolors`" and typing "ls --color"
(which I usually don't use), a good link shows up in cyan while a bad
link shows up as red on black.

[Jason Chambers]

Post by Tong

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.

[snip]

Post by Tong
touch a
ln -s a l1
ln -s no l2
rm no
ls --color=auto
Do l1 and l2 show up in same color?
In my Debian, they are, but in my RH, l2 show up red.

Have you tried doing a eval `dircolors -b` before the ls command? This
defines the LC_COLORS variable that is used to decide what colours are
used. You can get pretty colours for all sorts of things if you want to play
about with dircolors but by default broken links are in red, and
common image file extension in magenta etc.

IIRC it was already in the bashrc file - it just needed uncommenting.

[Tong]

Post by Jason Chambers

Post by Tong

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.

[snip]

Post by Tong
touch a
ln -s a l1
ln -s no l2
rm no
ls --color=auto
Do l1 and l2 show up in same color?
In my Debian, they are, but in my RH, l2 show up red.

Have you tried doing a eval `dircolors -b` before the ls command? This
defines the LC_COLORS variable that is used to decide what colours are
used. You can get pretty colours for all sorts of things if you want to play
about with dircolors but by default broken links are in red, and
common image file extension in magenta etc.
IIRC it was already in the bashrc file - it just needed uncommenting.

Thank you very much Jason!

Of all the replies, only yours give the correct answer to my problem

Just for the archive, as the result, before the eval, both my l1 and l2
are in magenta, whereas after the eval, l2 show up red.

[Wayne Topa]

Post by Tong

Post by Jason Chambers

Post by Tong

Post by Tong
I remember that my previous distro can distinguish symbolic links as good
or bad: good links are show as normal link color whereas bad links are
shown as red.

[snip]

Post by Tong
touch a
ln -s a l1
ln -s no l2
rm no
ls --color=auto
Do l1 and l2 show up in same color?
In my Debian, they are, but in my RH, l2 show up red.

Have you tried doing a eval `dircolors -b` before the ls command? This
defines the LC_COLORS variable that is used to decide what colours are
used. You can get pretty colours for all sorts of things if you want to play
about with dircolors but by default broken links are in red, and
common image file extension in magenta etc.
IIRC it was already in the bashrc file - it just needed uncommenting.

Thank you very much Jason!
Of all the replies, only yours give the correct answer to my problem
Just for the archive, as the result, before the eval, both my l1 and l2
are in magenta, whereas after the eval, l2 show up red.

I have had this snippit in my .bash_profile for 10-12 years.

# set up the color-ls environment variables:
if [ "$SHELL" = "/bin/zsh" ]; then
eval `dircolors -z ~/.dircolors`
elif [ "$SHELL" = "/bin/ash" ]; then
eval `dircolors -s ~/.dircolors`
else
eval `dircolors -b ~/.dircolors`
fi

Hope this helps somone.

WT