Linux is an operating system with a powerful shell , which enables you to do almost anything ,even though that couldn’t be done with a GUI. Linux possess a hierarchical, unified filesystem which consist of directories and files. I wrote this tutorial mainly for noobs , keeping things simple . First thing you should remember is that bash commands are case-sensitive . “LS “is not same as ” ls “. Secondly don’t try to learn everything in a single day . Take your own time .. So let’s get started .
Take time to understand the following chart , everything in explained in detail , it shows hierarchical filesystem of Linux os.
To start , fire your terminal , if you are using Ubuntu Linux , take accessories and from it select terminal . Here i mention the usage after the ” -” symbol.
Commands :
list directories -ls
change directory -cd dir
Make a directory – mkdir directory-name
Remove a file -rm filename
To change file-permissions use chmod and chown ( chown for changing owners and chmod for changing mode of file )
Usage – chmod 777 filename .
4-read
2- write
1-write ( for allowing read only functionality to all use chmod 444 , if you need to add write functionality too add (4+2) , ie , chmod 666 .
Remove a directory – rm -R directory
Remove all files in a directory – rm *
To view the contents of a file – cat filename
To rename a file – mv old filename new filename ( same can be used for changing from one directory to another ).
To redirect output to a file you can use the symbol “ > “. For eg : Inorder to paste “reviewglitz.com ” to a file name reviewglitz just issue the command-
reviewglitz.com > reviewglitz.txt in the terminal .
To open a text-editor type “nano filename “, nano is a nice text-editor for beginners .
To view your computer’s ip address and network properties – ifconfig (identical command for windows is ipconfig).
To view open connections in your computer -netstat
Processes in the computer can be listed with the command -ps
To kill a process issue – kill pid , where pid is a number you see when you issue ps command .
To list background jobs -bg
To bring a job to foreground -fg job
To connect to a server issue the Linux command – ssh -l username ipaddress of server
To search text use the “grep” command in bash -grep “pattern “ files
To find files in your computer use the commands – whereis filename and locate filename
To view the date – cal or date
To show disk-usage df
To print the current logged in user – whoami
To show distro name and version -uname
To find whether a host is alive use ping – ping ipaddress
To download a file use wget – wget filename
Press control +C to halt current command and control + Z to take the command to background .
To compress and decompress file use command tar – :
for .tar files – tar cf filename
for tar.gz files – tar czvf filename
for tar.bz2 files -tar cjvf filename
The thing you should note is that compression and decompression commands vary only in the letter ” c ” and ” x “. If you need to decompress use the command combined with ” x ” and for compression use “c “.
Please post your comments , so I can rectify my errors .
