Opening the file browser from terminal

nautilus --browser will ensure that Nautilus is launched in browser mode even if you're normally using it in spatial mode.

You can append the path you want to open to the end:

nautilus --browser ~/some/directory

The gnome-open command will open a directory with the appropriate application, which in this case is Nautilus:

gnome-open PATH

This will open the directory /tmp using the Nautilus file browser.

gnome-open /tmp

Or:

cd /tmp
gnome-open .

I like the gnome-open command because you can use this exact same command to open a file with the appropriate application. No need to remember any funny flags. It just works.

• gnome-open file.pdf will open the PDF in a PDF browser.
• gnome-open file.zip will open a zip file using the Zip archive viewer.

It's also similar in name and function to the Mac OS X open command, for those of us who use Macs.

As of 2018, one can use the GIO commandline tool on Gnome:

gio open some/directory

Edit: Another option is xdg-open. Also take a look at this answer for further details.