I’ve found these commands to be very useful but at the same time I can just as easily forget them. Therefore in this post I wanted to add a cheat sheet so I can refer back to it whenever I need to. These are the common ones I used the most
Useful commands
The Commands below are the ones I also find useful and need to use more. Learning to master grep is definitely one of my priorities.
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| cat | Concatenate and print (display) the content of files |
| chmod | Change access permissions |
| df | Display free disk space |
| echo | Display message on screen |
| env | Environment variables |
| eval | Evaluate several commands/arguments |
| exit | Exit the shell |
| grep | Search file(s) for lines that match a given pattern |
| mkdir | Create new folder(s) |
| passwd | Modify a user password |
| pwd | Print Working Directory |
| ssh | Secure Shell client (remote login program) |
| su | Substitute user identity |
| sudo | Execute a command as another user |
| tail | Output the last part of file |
| tar | Store, list or extract files in an archive |
Exploring and changing files
These commands are the commands I feel improves my workflow the most and overall productivity when working on a project. Easy to remember and definitely a good place to start for beginners
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
| ls | List the files/folders in a directory |
| ls -la | List all the files/folders in a directory (including hidden files) and displays additional information about them |
| cd pathname/directory/subdirectory | To change directory |
| cd ../ | To go up a level of a directory |
| cd ../../themes/images | Or you can chain these commands together to navigate across directories |
| cp filename-to-copy.txt new-file-name.txt | To copy a file with the same directory simply type |
| cp filename.txt ../../new-directory/filename.txt | To copy between directories: |
| cp images/* ../skin/ | To copy all files from one directory to another, use the * character, which unofficially means all |
| mv current-directory/file.txt ../new-directory/file | Move a file |
| mv oldfilename.txt newfilename.txt | To rename a file, use the ‘mv’ but change the name of the file when stating the directory receiving the file. |
| rm filename.txt | To delete a file type |
| rm -r folder | Alternatively if you wish to delete a directory, and all directories and files within that recursively, type |