Everything enclosed in * characters are placeholders for the arguments
that you need in your particular case.
To make a drive, actually a partition on a physical drive, available in Linux you mount it somewhere in the file system. Linux has no notion of drive letters.
In Linux everything starts at the root /, and anything is mounted
in directories under this root. If we were to mount an NTFS (Windows)
partition from the device at /dev/sda1 (the first partition, 1, on the
first disk, /dev/sda, in a standard PC) at the mount point /mnt/Windows,
all files and directories of that partition would be available by changing
to the directory /mnt/Windows/.
The actual Linux :-) The kernel is loaded by the boot loader, and is the OS abstraction layer towards the rest of the system. The kernel is modular, and everything from file system drivers to wireless network drivers are managed and loaded by the kernel.
A pipe is a channel between two programs, the pipe operator is the character |.
In a GUI environment you might save a file in one program, open it in another,
do some stuff, save it and open it in a third program. On the command line the
pipe makes the saving part unnecessary.
Example:
cat foo.txt | grep bar
Cat shows the content of the file foo.txt and sends the output to grep, which
searches for the string bar in the text.
The above example is a common use case for pipes, another is pagination. If
then content of foo.txt is longer that one screen, you can pipe the output
through a pagination program like less, to stop at every screenful.
cat foo.txt | less
/: The root of the system. Everything the system manages is available as a file or a directory somewhere in here./bin: Basic system programs like the shell./boot: Where the kernel and boot loader files live./dev: Device nodes/files. One of the basic concepts of UNIX is that everything is a file. In here a files representing all devices on the system with a loaded kernel module/driver./etc/: System configuration files./home/*: User directories, each named after its user. Stores user files including configuration files, cache, documents and programs. Somewhat similar to the\User\*directories on Windows./lib/modules/*kernel version*/: Kernel modules ("drivers")./media/: Is often where external media is mounted./usr/: User programs an utilities, basically everything that is not needed to boot.
These are useful keys when using the command line.
Up & down arrow: scroll through previously typed commands.Tab: Will complete the current command, or show a list of possible commands if more than one is available. Typingf*Tab*will show a list of all available commands starting withf. Pressingfiref*Tab*will most likely complete tofirefox, if available on the system.
In general every command has an argument for showing a help message. There are unfortunately more than one standard, these are the most commonly used variations:
- --help
- -h
- -help
- -?
Most commands also has a -v switch, verbose mode, which outputs more infos
while the command is running.
Commands with some form of user interface.
man *command*: Show the manual page of the command.qgets you out./lets you search.- 'space' advances one page.
nano *path to file*: Edit a file.- ctrl+x to quit.
- ctrl+c to show the cursor position.
- ctrl+k to delete the current line.
- crtl+w to search for a string.
Commands that just do their thing and exits.
cat *path to file*: Show the content of the file.cp *source path* *destination path*: Copy a file.* `scp-R: copy subdirectories recursively as well.
ls: Show the content of the current directory.- If followed by a path
lswill show the content of that directory.
- If followed by a path
mv *source path* *destination path*: Move a directory or file.rm *path*: Delete a file.-R: Delete subdirectories recursively as well.
ssh *username*@*hostname*: Open an encrypted connection to another machine.- If you leave out the username, ssh will login as the user of the local system.
scp username*@*hostname*:*source path* *destination path*: Copy a file using an SSH connection from a remote machine.scp *source path* username*@*hostname*:*destination path*: Copy a file using an SSH connection from a remote machine.
Every Debian based system uses the apt for managing software. Lately a new
tool has been added called apt but the standard command is called apt-get.
apt-get install *package name*: Install a new package.apt-get remove *package name*: Remove a package.apt-get purge *package name*: Remove a package and all configuration files of the package.apt search *search pattern*: Search for packages containing search pattern in its name.apt-cache search *search pattern*: Search for packages containing search pattern in its name.