katbow / notes

Notes from various sources about various topics

Command line notes

This is a compilation of commands you can use in terminal to help you navigate & manipulate files and directories. Some terminology to know beforehand:

• Options change the behaviour of a command. It will still do what the command does on its own, but in a slightly different way. There is always a space between the command and the option. The option will always begin with a -.
• Arguments is a value you pass to a command. You will have spaces between the command and arguments.
• Directory can be thought of as another word for folder. The working directory is the folder you are currently in.

Command	Options1	Arguments	Description	Examples
pwd		none	Shows the current working directory
ls		none	Lists files and directories in the current working directory
ls	-a		Also lists hidden content (those beginning with .)
ls	-l		Lists the long format2 of the contents of a directory
ls	-t		Lists contents by date modified
cd		directoryname/	Changes directory to the selected directory
cd	..		Changes to parent directory
mkdir		directoryname	Makes new directory with given name
touch		filename.txt	Makes new file with given name and extension
cp		content to copy	Copies the selected content. Can also include the directory to copy it to with a space after the content to be copied
cp		* directoryname/	Copies all files in working directory to selected directory
cp		m*.txt directoryname/	Copies files that begin with m and end with .txt to the selected directory
mv		filename.txt directoryname/	Moves the selected file(s) to the selected directory
mv		filename1.txt filename2.txt	Renames the filename1 (which is a file that is you already have) to the new filename2.txt
rm		filename.txt	Removes or deletes the selected file
rm	-r	directoryname/	removes the selected directory, and all its child content

1. Options can also be combined. For example, you can use -a, -l, -t all together with ls as: ls -alt . This will a list all files (including hidden files), l in long format, and t sorted by date modified.
2. Long Format includes seven columns separated by spaces. The meaning of each column, in order is:

• Access rights
• Number of child directories and files
• The file owner eg. katbow
• The name of the group that owns the file
• The size of the file in bytes
• Date & time of last modification
• File or directory name