Unix Command List

pwd print current working directory

file determines type of file & its data
cd changes current working directory
ls used to list the contents of a directory
ls -a list all files, including any dot files
ls -F indicates file types: / = dir. | * = executable
ls -m show files as a comma-separated list
ls -s show size of files, in blocks(typically, 1 block =
1024 bytes)
ls -C force multiple-column output on listings
ls -1 force single-column output on listings
ls – l show long-listing format, including permissions,
ownership, size, and date
(.) referenced as the current working directory
(. .) referenced as the parent directory or back once
mkdir will make a new directory
(~) known as the home directory
mkdir -p multiple new directories at once.
- Ex: mkdir–p c/b/a
tree shows the current directory & its subdirectories
cp copies one or more files
more can also be used to examine the contents of a
file
-space bar: page forward
-b: move backwards
-q: quit
|more tame commands/allows to page through text
one page at a time.
- ‘|’ known as the pipe in order to output of one
command into the input of another
-Piping ex:
-myprog | grep “ERROR:” | more
/bin where most of the basic Unix commands are
mv move and/or rename a file
rmdir deletes directories (directory must be empty)
rm removes files
man looks up the manual page for the given
command
man -k looks up the given keyword in an index and lists
the commands that may be relevant
chmod change permissions of files & directories
ex: chmod permissions files
Permission arguments:
1. Category of permission you want to change:
*more than one category ex: ‘go’ or ‘all’ = ‘ugo’
- owner’s permission(user): u
 - group’s permission: g
- other’s permission: o
2. What you would like to do with permission:
- add permission: +
- delete permission: -
- specify it exactly: =
3. What permissions you want to affect:
-read: r/write: w/execute: x
chmod a-w protects a file from accidental editing
ex: chmod a-w filename
chmod u+w you own an unwritable file that you want to
edit, but you want to change other people’s
write permissions
chmod u-w delete your own permission
chmod a-w delete everyone’s write permission
env lists all environment & shell variables active in
your current process
echo prints whatever parameters it is given
who see who is currently logged into the same
machine as you
grep searches for lines containing desired text
-c: list a count of matching lines only
-i: ignore the case of the letters in the pattern
-l: list only the names of files that contain the
specified pattern
-n: include line numbers
-v: show lines that don’t match the specified
pattern
**great for editing & selecting text**
diff will check if text files are similar
(Copy) ctrl + shift + 0
(Paste) shift + 0
nano a text editor
wc(word count) reads text from its input stream & produces as
its outputs stream 3 #’s indicating the # of lines,
words, characters that it saw
focus wc command with:
-c/-w/-1
ex: wc < hello.c
sed(stream editor) scan each line of input for a pattern & to replace
that pattern, wherever it occurs, by some string.
-sed s/pattern/replacement/g
-pattern: describes text to search for in each line
- replacement: text we want to use to replace
the text matching the pattern
-g: indicates the change should take place every
time.(no ‘g’ only the first match is applied).
 - the ‘/’ can be any special character i.e.: @$%*
-can add flag ‘i’ to get rid of case-sensitive
default
-e option allows sed to string together multiple
substitution commands
quoting ( \ ) – backslash place in front of the special character
ex: grep \* foo.txt (can quote themselves)
(single quotes(‘ ‘) – quoting) can enclose all or part of the argument in single
quotation marks
-suppresses all characters
-combines multiple parameters into a single
parameter
(double quotes(“ “) – quoting) suppresses all special characters except ‘$’ &
also gather its contents into a single parameter
-treats $USER as a command in double quotes
(input redirection) use <: operates to make wc command accept a
file as input
(output redirection) >: redirects the standard output into a file
- wc < hello.c > hello.wc
-use >> if we want to add output at the end of
an existing file instead of replacing that file
-ex: wc < hello.c >> hello.wc
(pipes ( | )) sends the output of one command into the input
of another command.
-common ex of a pipe is: | more
(Backticks ( ` ` ) – to left of the “1” key) the shell treats enclosed characters as a
command & replace the whole `-surrounded
string by the output of the command`
-opposite of “Quoting”
-ex: echo Today is `date` .
xargs reads a list of file names from the standard input
& fills those file names into a command of your
choosing
ex: xargs partial-command
- ‘-n’: controls the maximum # of files the xargs
will pack into one command
- ‘-i’: looks in your partial command for the
characters “{}” & places your files there.(one at a
time as if you used “-n 1”
- ex: ls /bin | xargs -i echo Hello {} World
find provides all kinds of ways to select files &
provides a variety of things it can do with
selected files
-general form:
- find list-of-files-&-directories list-of-actions
- find looks at each file and dir. given in the list
- for dir. it also looks at all files & dirs. inside
 those, descending as far as it can from dir. to dir.
- the actions in the command are all given a flag
(-). Some actions will “do something” to a file.
Others are used to select which files will be
passed on to the later commands in the list.
- ‘-name’: given a wildcard expression to match
file names against
-ex: find /usr/include -name ‘w*.h’
- ‘-type’: another way to select files & chooses
different types of files. Dir. are type ‘d’ &
ordinary files are type ‘f’.
-ex: find /usr/include -type d -name ‘u*’
-can also select files based on how long ago
modified:
ex: -mtime +7(more than 7 days)|-mtime -7(less
than 7 days)
- ‘-print’: is the default option if you do nothing
to selected files. May need to use if you want to
print a file name & do something else to a file
- ‘-exec’: allows you to specify an arbitrary Unix
command that you want applied to selected files
-ex:
find ~/xargs -name ‘*.bak’ -print -exec rm {} \;
- the ex. above prints a filename before passing
it on to the command in the -exec action
- ‘-ok’: asks for permission before applying a
command
cat dumps the contents of one or more text files to
your screen
head command expects to find a number
- ‘-n’:
(shell variable) typically begins with an alphabetic character.
When we want to get a value a shell variable, we
add ‘$’ to the front of it.
- ex: give command: A=hello
- next command: echo $A
- can integrate strings as #’s:
- ex: cat 1.txt
- ex: one=1
- ex(cont.): head $one.txt
(shell variables & backticks) backticks used to insert the output of one
command into another, which is exploited to
assign environmental variables
- ex: Today=`date`
- ex(cont): echo $Today
- *we can also use pipes within backticks to alter
the values that would be stored in a variable*
basename (filepath) prints the last part of a path, just after the final /
- ex: basename ~/playing
dirname (filepath) extracts the part of a path just before the final /,
or prints . if the path has no /’s
- ex: dirname .
readlink -f (filepath) prints the “canonical form” of the file path,
which is the absolute path to the file with no
unnecessary steps.
- not only turns relative paths into absolute
paths, it “canonicalizes” the path by getting rid
of steps like “../” or “./”.
sh or csh starts another copy of the shell currently
running & runs as a separate process(the old
one s temporarily suspended)
export shell variable value will be seen by child
processes. done with the sh & bash commands.
- will export a shell variable to other shell.
$PATH(an env. variable) determines what programs you can execute
without typing in a full path name
- ex: you compiled C++ program names
“yourProgram” into your current working
directory.
- ex(cont.): Some people can execute the
program: yourProgram
-ex(cont.): others like this: ./yourProgram
- depends on if your account has been set up so
that your cwd (.) is in your $PATH
- if it is use the first form
- if not use the second form
- used for special directories full of customized &
frequently-used programs.
ps used to display the attributes of processes that
are running currently.
options:
-a (all users)
-f (full list)
-u (user)
-t (terminal)
-e (every)
file (Linux) this is the best way to see what kind of data is in
a file
- prints a description of the file contents
- (In Windows, the best way to see if a file is text
or binary is to open it in a text editor such as
notepad)
converting a Windows-style text file to Linux - use the command “tr”
converting Linux to Windows use ‘unix2dos’
 -ex: unixdos file1
SFTP (Secure File Transfer Protocol) text-based client is launched:
-ex: sftp cs_tmcle012@linux.cs.odu.edu

get (Windows) downloads a file from remote machine onto the

local machine
put (Windows) uploads a file from your local machine to the
remote machine
quit exit also works
File Permissions begins with:
‘-‘ = a file
‘d’ = directory
-r: read
-w: write
-x: execute
Groups:
-u: user (group 1)
-g: group (group 2)
-o: other people(group 3)
3different Groups (drwxrwxr-x):
first group: the owner permissions
second group: the group permissions
third group: Everyone else permissions
ex (if we want to change permissions):
chmod o+w file
o(ex): states what group we want to change
permission for
+w(ex): states what permission we would like to
add to this group (group ‘o’ in this case)
chmod o-w
o(ex2): states the group we want to change
permissions for
-w(ex2): states to take away the write
permission for the outside people. Which us
group 3
To set all groups permission at once:
ex:
chmod 754 File
7, 5, 4 represents the induvial permissions for(in
this order) user, group, other
4 – stands for “read” (allows to do ls)
2 – stands for “write”
1 – stands for “execute” (access files)
0 – stands for “no permission” (will be labeled as
a ‘-‘)
-chmod: means to change permissions
emacs (How to compile code) in order to compile code we must:
- press esc+x
-next type ‘compile’ then press enter
- next compiler we use and source file:
gcc sourcefile
code . - will open up folder on VSCODE
ctrl + ~ - this will open the terminal on VSCODE
./ - this command allows us to test our cpp
compilations.
- ex:
./dividers