Simple fle size question - UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

bbbngowc · #1 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008

I'm sure this is a simple one, but I'm new to UNIX and I can't figure it out.

How do I view file size in Megabytes? I have files in a directory and the size is 184710. I think this is in bytes but I'm not usre. How can I view this in MB.

Thanks.

sysgate · #2 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008

for single file : "ls -lh file-name" , for directory - "du -sch /folder-name" # that's the total folder size.
That's on most GNU distros, what is your OS ?

vbe · #3 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008

man du (the arguments depend of OS... but what works on all is du -sk <filename> and result is in KB...)

gus2000 · #4 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008

Code:

# FILE=mybigfile.txt

# ls -l $FILE
-rw-r--r--  1 root    staff     14639794 Aug 22 2006  mybigfile.txt

# awk 'BEGIN{"ls -l " "'$FILE'"|getline;printf "%s %5.2fMiB\n",$NF,$5/2^20}'
mybigfile.txt 13.96MiB

# awk 'BEGIN{"ls -l " "'$FILE'"|getline;printf "%s %5.2fMB\n",$NF,$5/10^6}'
mybigfile.txt 14.64MB

The above should work for any distro, provided that "ls" puts the filesize in column 5.

See Megabyte - Wikipedia for the differences between megabyte (MB) and mebibyte (MiB).

OuterVillage.co · #5 (**permalink**) 02-05-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by bbbngowc

I'm sure this is a simple one, but I'm new to UNIX and I can't figure it out.

How do I view file size in Megabytes? I have files in a directory and the size is 184710. I think this is in bytes but I'm not usre. How can I view this in MB.

Thanks.

Depending on the OS you can use the -h option.
For example: ls -lh or du -sh *

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