The structure and a short explanation of it’s content.
/bin
Contains various executable programs required to make the system usable – application binaries./boot
Files required for the Linux boot process, such as vmlinuz – the Linux kernel file./dev
Device files required for interfacing with hardware – device drivers./etc
Configuration files for various programs are stored here./home
User account directories. Each user created will have a subdirectory under /home with the name of the account. This is the default Linux behaviour./lib
Shared libraries files that are necessary to boot the system as well as containing files required by various programs. It also contains modules (located in /lib/modules) which can be loaded into the kernel./lost+found
Used to store restored files after a filesystem check. If data appears to have been lost mysteriously, it is a good idea to check here./mnt
Used for mounting temporary file systems. When mounting a CD-ROM for instance, the standard mount point location is /mnt/cdrom. Some system have /media directory for similar purposes./opt
Random data that has no other logical location – optional software./proc
Pseudo-filesystem (not really a filesystem) with information running processes and the kernel. There is a subdirectory for each active process. For example, if you are interested in CPU or memory info, just show the content of the “files” – cat /proc/cpuinfo or cat /proc/meminfo./root
Home directory for the super user – root, usually filled with system administration files. Sometimes a symbolic link to the home directory./sbin
System binaries – similar to /bin, but it contains programs that are essential to the system – system maintenance programs./selinux
To be explained./srv
Location of data files for a particular services (FTP, WWW, or CVS). Data for a specific user should go in the /home/ directory. Data files currently located in /var should move to /srv in future./sys
To be explained./tmp
Temporary storage space. Often cleaned out either at boot time or by a regular job process./usr
User related sub-directories, but mostly used to store applications. When installing an application, the typical path to install would be /usr/local./var
Files that change (vary) as the system runs, such as log and status files. Some directories located within /var include: /var/spool (files in the print queue), /var/log (logging information), /var/run (the process ID’s for each current process).
Directories found on some distributions, or simply mentioned somewhere.
/net
To be explained./misc
To be explained./media
Mount point for removeable media./data
Common location for shared data files.
More detailed information about Filesystem Hierarchy Standard can be found at the www.pathname.com.