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# File System Object

Nix uses a simplified model of the file system, which consists of file system objects. Every file system object is one of the following:

- File

  - A possibly empty sequence of bytes for contents
  - A single boolean representing the executable permission

- Directory

  Mapping of names to child file system objects

- Symbolic link

  An arbitrary string. Nix does not assign any semantics to symbolic links.

File system objects and their children form a tree. A bare file or symlink can be a root file system object.

Nix does not encode any other file system notions such as hard links, permissions, timestamps, or other metadata.

## Examples of file system objects

A plain file:

    50 B, executable: false

An executable file:

    122 KB, executable: true

A symlink:

    -> /usr/bin/sh

A directory with contents:

    ├── bin
    │   └── hello: 35 KB, executable: true
    └── share
        ├── info
        │   └── hello.info: 36 KB, executable: false
        └── man
            └── man1
                └── hello.1.gz: 790 B, executable: false

A directory that contains a symlink and other directories:

    ├── bin -> share/go/bin
    ├── nix-support/
    └── share/