Some variants of UNIX offer a 'color' option on the ls (directory list)command; OS X doesn't by default.
Chen Jake Zhou has made a version of ls with the color option available on his site.
The program can be downloaded and installed as with any OS X program, but then you'll have to make it executable from a terminal session...
chmod +x ls...from within the directory where the 'new' ls is installed. You can then test the output by typing...
./ls --color...from within that same directory. If you like the output, and want to make it permanent, then Read the Rest of this hint for detailed instructions.
To make your new ls the permanent ls, you'll have to do some basic UNIX command line copying and editing as root. Here are the steps, assuming you've successfully installed the new ls into a given directory, and made it executable:
su
cd /bin
mv ls ls.bak
cp /path/to/newls/ls ls
alias ls 'ls-F'and comment it out by putting a "#" in front of it. Add a new line which reads
alias ls 'ls --color -F'
Mac OS X Hints
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