How can I export a list of files within a volume or folder?

  1. Open Terminal.app from the utilities folder
  2. Inside the terminal window, type cd then a space
  3. Open the parent window of the directory you want a listing of in finder (One folder / directory up from the one you want a listing of. It should contain the directory you want a listing of)
  4. Drag the directory you want a listing of into the terminal window, then hit the enter key inside the terminal window
  5. Inside the terminal window type ls >> ~/Desktop/listing.txt (making sure that listing.txt isn't the name of a file that already exists on your desktop) then hit enter
  6. listing.txt will get created on your Desktop
  7. Optional: Open listing.txt on your Desktop and confirm the contents match the directory

This is going to produce the contents only for that folder, not it's subfolders. if you want to recursively list the entire contents use ls -R >> ~/Desktop/listing.txt instead in step 5

For a recursive listing in a different format, replace ls with find in step 5 (don't add -R to the end)