Commands used in Linux Operating System

Objectives
In this lesson, you will learn to:
 Create a directory using the mkdir command

 Delete a directory using the rmdir command

 List the contents of a directory using the ls command

 Copy a file using the cp command

 Move and renaming a file using the mv command

 Delete a file using the rm command

 Displaying the page content using more command

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

Objectives (contd:)
 Using Wildcard characters

 Use man command to get online help

 Functions of an Editor

 Create and Edit documents using the vi editor

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 2 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System

Directory Commands in Linux

 Identifying the Current Directory Path

 The pwd (print working directory) command is used

to display the full path name of the current
directory
 Changing the Current Directory
 The cd (change directory) command changes the
current directory to the directory specified
 Creating a Directory
 The mkdir (make directory) command is used to
create directories

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

Directory Commands in Linux (contd.)

 Removing a Directory

 The rmdir (remove directory) command removes

the directory specified
 Listing the Contents of a Directory
 The ls command is used to display the names of
the files and sub-directories in a directory

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 4 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System

File Commands in Linux

 The cat (concatenate) command displays the
contents of the specified file
 Copying Files
 The cp (copy) command duplicates the contents of
the source file into a target file
 cp [options] <source file/s> <destination
directory/file>
 Removing Files
 The rm (remove) command is used to delete files
or directories
 rm [options] file/s

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

File Commands in Linux (contd.)

 Moving and Renaming Files
 The mv (move) command is used to move a file or
directory from one location to another or to change
its name
 mv [option] source destination
 Displaying the Contents Page–Wise
 The more command is used to display data one
screen-full at a time. While viewing a file using the
more command, once you have scrolled down, you
cannot move up
 more [options] <filename>

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

File Commands in Linux (contd.)

 Displaying the Contents Page–Wise (contd.)
 The less command is similar to the more
command except that you can scroll upwards also
while viewing the contents of a file
 less [options] <filename>
Wildcard Characters
 The shell offers the facility to perform an operation on
a set of files by the use of certain special characters in
the command in place of the actual file names

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

File Commands in Linux (contd.)

Wildcard Characters (contd.)
 The * Wildcard
 The * wildcard is interpreted as a string of none,
one, or more characters
 The ? Wildcard
 The ? wildcard matches exactly one occurrence of
any character
 The [ ] Wildcard
 The [ ] wildcard can be used to restrict the
characters to be matched

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

Getting Online Help

 The man command is used to get online help to a
user about the various options for any command in
Linux
 man <command name>

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

Editors
 A text editor is used to create and manage text files
and documents. An editor is an application software
that is usually bundled with an operating system (OS).
 Functions of an Editor
 Create a file
 Open an existing file
 Copy and Paste text
 Search for text
 Handle a large amount of data

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

The vi Editor

The vi editor is a visual editor used to create and edit

text files, documents, and programs. In Red Hat Linux,
vi is a symbolic link to the vim editor, which is an
improved version of the vi editor.

Getting Started with vi

 The vi editor is invoked by giving the following
command at the Linux prompt:
 vi filename <Enter>

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 11 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System

Editors
 A text editor is used to create and manage text files
and documents. An editor is an application software
that is usually bundled with an operating system (OS).
 Functions of an Editor
 Create a file
 Open an existing file
 Copy and Paste text
 Search for text
 Handle a large amount of data

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 12 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System

The vi Editor

The vi editor is a visual editor used to create and edit

text files, documents, and programs. In Red Hat Linux,
vi is a symbolic link to the vim editor, which is an
improved version of the vi editor.

Getting Started with vi

 The vi editor is invoked by giving the following
command at the Linux prompt:
 vi filename <Enter>

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Commands used in Linux Operating System

Vi Editor(contd:)
 You can use the following commands to exit vi editor
 :x
 ZZ
 :q!

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 14 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System
Summary
In this lesson, you learned that:
 some of the common directory commands used in
Linux are:
• pwd
• cd
• mkdir
• rmdir
• ls

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 15 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System
Summary (contd.)
 some of the common file commands used in Linux
are:
• Cat
• Cp
• Rm
• Mv
• More
• less
 The shell offers the facility to perform an operation on a set
of files by using the wildcard pattern.

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 16 of 17

Commands used in Linux Operating System
Summary (contd.)
 Some of the commonly used wildcard characters are:
• ? – Matches one character in a file
• * - Matches zero, one, or more than one character in a
file name
• [ ] – Matches one character from the enclosed list
 The man command is used to get online help to a
user about the various options for any command in
Linux
 The vi editor is used to create and edit documents

©NIIT Linux/Lesson 2/Slide 17 of 17