fswatch is a cross-platform command-line utility and frontend to libfswatch that reports changes to files and directories as they happen. It’s designed for automation, scripting, and development workflows where commands need to react to filesystem activity, and it uses the most suitable monitoring backend available on the host platform.
This is free and open source software.
Key Features
- Recursive directory monitoring.
- Path filtering with include and exclude regular expressions.
- Customizable record format for scripting and integration.
- Support for periodic idle events.
- Uses native monitoring backends where available, including inotify on Linux.
Website: emcrisostomo.github.io/fswatch/
Support:
Developer: Enrico Maria Crisostomo
License: GNU General Public License v3.0
fswatch is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.
Related Software
| watch alternatives | |
|---|---|
| viddy | Modern watch command. It features in our Top 100 TUI apps |
| hwatch | Results are scrollable and displayed. Also features in our Top 100 TUI apps |
| watchexec | Run a command when files in the current directory change |
| neowatch | Alternative to watch also written in Rust |
| ov | Feature rich terminal pager |
| chokidar | Watch file system changes |
| watcher | Watch files in a directory for changes |
| wfh | Rsync as you edit |
| reflex | Run a command when files change |
| rwatch | Rust implementation of watch |
 Explore our comprehensive directory of recommended free and open source software. Our carefully curated collection spans every major software category.This directory is part of our ongoing series of informative articles for Linux enthusiasts. It features hundreds of detailed reviews, along with open source alternatives to proprietary solutions from major corporations such as Google, Microsoft, Apple, Adobe, IBM, Cisco, Oracle, and Autodesk. You’ll also find interesting projects to try, hardware coverage, free programming books and tutorials, and much more. Discovered a useful open source Linux program that we haven’t covered yet? Let us know by completing this form. |