Macintosh Terminal Pocket Guide

Name

dirname — stdin  stdout  - file  -- opt  --help  --version

Synopsis

dirname path

The dirname command, given a file path, prints the name of the directory that contains it:

➜ dirname /Users/smith/finances/money.txt
/Users/smith/finances

dirname does not change your current working directory, and it doesn’t care if the path exists. It simply manipulates a file path string, just like basename does.