| Option | Usage |
|---|---|
| cd ~ | Goes to the home directory |
| cd dir | Goes to dir, which is a sub directory located in the current directory |
| cd /dir | Goes to dir, which is a sub directory located in the home directory |
| cd .. | Goes to the parent directory |
| cd - | Goes to the previous directory |
| cd ~username | Goes to the user home directory |
cd changes the current working directory. The syntax is cd new_path, where new_path can be the absolute or relative path of the new working directory.
Absolute paths are file locations with respect to the home directory and start with /. Relative paths are file locations with respect to the current directory.
Go to the parent directory Remember that double points (..) represent the parent directory. If my current working directory is /Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder, after typing cd .. the new working directory will be /Users/user_name/Desktop (one folder up). If you type again cd .., now the working directory will be: /Users/user_name (another folder up), etc.
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/Users/user_name
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/Users
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/
/ represents the home directory and you cannot go up any more folders.
Go to a folder specified by its absolute path In this example, I am using the absolute path of a folder to jump from my current directory to that folder:
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder
$ cd /Volumes/Shared
$ pwd
/Volumes/Shared
Go to the parent directory of my parent directory
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder
$ cd ../..
$ pwd
/Users/user_name
Using other relative paths to change directory
If inside my current directory (/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder) there is another folder (i.e. AnotherFolder), I can go to that folder using its relative path:
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder
$ cd AnotherFolder
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder/AnotherFolder
$ pwd
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder
$ cd ./AnotherFolder
/Users/user_name/Desktop/SomeFolder/AnotherFolder
Jumping to the previous directory
In this example, the first working directory is /Volumes/Shared, then I jump to /Volumes/Shared/Articles using the command cd. Finally, I go back to the first working directory /Volumes/Shared) using cd -.
$ pwd
/Volumes/Shared
$ cd Articles
$ pwd
/Volumes/Shared/Articles
$ cd -
$ pwd
/Volumes/Shared