How do you determine what bash ls colours mean?

Question

When you perform ls in a bash shell, sometimes there are colours to indicate different resource types, and you can enable/control this with the --color argument.

But neither the man page nor Google is providing an answer to the question:

What do these colours indicate by default, and how do I display what the current system uses?

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UPDATE:

Thanks everyone for answers so far, however to make it easier to pick a winner, can anyone go a step further and provide a method to output descriptions in the colours they apply to.

Hmmm... my example doesn't work when posted (only when previewed), so if you preview this code it'll show what I mean...

<ul style="list-style:none; background:black; margin:0;padding:0.5em; width:10em">
  <li style="color:blue">directory</li>
  <li style="color:aqua">symbolic link</li>
  <li style="color:#A00000;">*.tar files</li>
  <li style="color:white">...</li>
</ul>

Thanks.

Answer 1

The colors are defined by the $LS_COLORS environment variable. Depending on your distro, it is generated automatically when the shell starts, using ~/.dircolors or /etc/DIR_COLORS.

Edit:

To list color meanings, use this script:

eval $(echo "no:global default;fi:normal file;di:directory;ln:symbolic link;pi:named pipe;so:socket;do:door;bd:block device;cd:character device;or:orphan symlink;mi:missing file;su:set uid;sg:set gid;tw:sticky other writable;ow:other writable;st:sticky;ex:executable;"|sed -e 's/:/="/g; s/\;/"\n/g')
{
  IFS=:
  for i in $LS_COLORS
  do
    echo -e "\e[${i#*=}m$( x=${i%=*}; [ "${!x}" ] && echo "${!x}" || echo "$x" )\e[m"
  done
}

Answer 2

You should be able to see the list of mappings in /etc/DIR_COLORS. You can override that by creating .dir_colors in your home directory.

Answer 3

Try "man 5 dir_colors" to see how it's set on your system. Mine doesn't have /etc/DIR_COLORS so it must be set somewhere else.

Answer 4

Google for LS_COLORS for some useful links.

Edit: To list the colors, this simple bash script may give an idea:

IFS=:
set $LS_COLORS
for C in $*
do
    IFS='='
    set $C
    echo -e "\033[$2m$1\033[00m"
done

Answer 5

Running the command dircolors -p will print all default colour settings. See http://linux.about.com/library/cmd/blcmdl1_dircolors.htm.