Fedora Linux

First characters of pathname	Relative to...	Example
Absolute	/	Root directory	/home/chris/book/chapter/one.odt
Relative-to-Home	~	User's home directory	~/book/chapter/one.odt
	~ chris	Home directory of chris	~chris/book/chapter/one.odt
Relative	(Anything other than / or ~)	Current working directory	chapter/one.odt (Assuming that /home/chris/book is the current directory)

The special symbols . (same directory) and .. (parent directory) are useful in pathnames. For example, if your current directory is /home/chris/book , then ../invitation refers to /home/chris/invitation.

4.3.1.2. Key directories

Fedora uses a standard set of directories derived from historical conventions, the Linux Standard Base (LSB) project, and the kernel. Table 4-5 outlines the key directories and their purpose.

Table 4-5. Key directories in Fedora Core

Directory	Purpose
/bin	Basic binaries (programs) needed to start the system.
/boot	Files used during the boot process, including the boot menu and kernel.
/dev	This directory contains special files that are actually connections to devices, such as keyboards, mice, modems, printers, sound cards, and so forth. When you read data from a special file or write data to it, you're actually communicating with the associated device.
/etc	System configuration files (sometimes regarded as the 'home directory for the computer').
/home	Users' home directories, for the storage of personal files.
/lib	Libraries.
/lost+found	A directory used to recover files in the event of filesystem damage. Any file that has been disassociated from its name is placed here during filesystem recovery.
/media	External media (floppy disks, USB drives, digital cameras, optical disks) that have been mounted.
/mnt	Historical location for mounting storage devices, many of which have now moved to /media.
/opt	Optional, add-on software. The definition of add-on software is subjective; if you obtain OpenOffice.org directly from the openoffice.org web site, it will be installed here, but if you install the version distributed with Fedora, it will be installed in /usr/bin.
/proc	Per-process status information plus system information.