Linux Commands
A B C D E F G H I K L M N P Q R S T U V W XYZ
References and answers
back to beginning
A
alias Create your own name for a command
arch print machine architecture
ash ash command interpreter (shell)
awk (gawk) pattern scanning and processing language
B
basename Remove directory and suffix from a file name
bash GNU Bourne-Again Shell
bsh Command interpreter (Shell)
bc Command line calculator
bunzip2 Unzip .bz2 files
C back to commands top
cat Concatenate a file print it to the screen
chgrp Change the group designation of a file
chmod Change file permissions
chown Change the owner of a file
cjpeg Compress an image file to a JPEG file
clear Clear terminal screen (command line)
comm Compare two sorted files
stty cooked Formatting the display of text in a terminal
cp Copy command
cpio Copy files to and from archives
csh C Shell
cut Print selected parts of lines to standard output
D back to commands top
date Display date and time
dc Command line calculator
df Show amount of disk space free
diff Determine difference between two files
diff3 Determine difference between 3 files
dig Interrogate DNS name servers
djpeg Decompress a JPEG file to an image file
dmesg Print or control the kernel ring buffer (print out bootup messages)
dnsdomainname Show the system's DNS domain name
doexec Run an executable with an arbitrary argv
domainname Show or set the system's NIS/YP domain name
dos2unix Converts plain text files in DOS/MAC format to UNIX format
du Show disk useage
dumpkeys Write keyboard driver's translation tables to std output
E back to commands top
echo Display a line of text
ed Line-oriented text editor
egrep Print lines matching a pattern
elinks A text mode WWW browser (supports frames)
env Dislay the path
ex Start Vim in ex mode
eject Eject media from device ( command line )
F back to commands top
factor Display prime factors of a number
false Exit with a status code indicating failure
fdisk The fdisk command with usage examples
fgrep Variant of grep
find Find a file
finger Displays information about the system users
fixps Try to fix common PostScript problems that break postprocessing
free Display free memory
G back to commands top
grep Search for a pattern using regular expression
gtar See the tar command
gunzip Unzip .gz files
gzip Compress using Lempel-Ziv coding (LZ77)
H back to commands top
halt Stop the system
hdparm Get/set harddisk parameters
head Print the first 10 lines of a file to standard output
hostname Show or set the system's host name
history Display entire command history
HISTSIZE Change history size
httpd Start Apache
I back to commands top
identify Describes the format and characteristics of image files.
id Print information for username, or the current user
ifconfig Display network and hardware addresses
igawk Gawk with include files
ipcalc Calculate IP information for a host
K back to commands top
kbd_mode Report or set the keyboard mode (RAW, MEDI- UMRAW or XLATE)
kill Terminate a process
L back to commands top
last Show listing of last logged in users
lastlog Formats and prints the contents of the last login log /var/log/lastlog file
link Call the link function to create a link to a file
links See elinks
ln Create a link to the specified TARGET with optional LINK_NAME
loadkeys Load keyboard translation tables
locate Locate a file
login Sign on
look Displays any lines in file which contain "string" as a prefix.
ls List directory contents
lsmod List loaded kernel modules
lynx Command to start the Lynx browser
M back to commands top
mac2unix Converts plain text files in DOS/MAC format to UNIX format
mail A mail processing system, which has a command syntax like ed
man Display a particular manual entry
manweb Manweb is part of the Netpbm package
mdu Display the amount of space occupied by an MSDOS directory
mkdir Create a directory
mkfs Make a filesystem on a drive
mknod Make block or character special files
mktemp Make temporary filename (unique)
more Page through text one screenful at a time.
mount Mount a filesystem/device
mt Control magnetic tape drive operation
mv Move and / or rename files
:
N
namei Follow a pathname until a terminal point is found
nano An enhanced free Pico clone
nc arbitrary TCP and UDP connections and listens
(note that nc is also called the client interface
to the NEdit program but it is not the
command that invokes nedit-nc on current systems)
ncftp Browser program for the File Transfer Protocol
nedit-nc nedit-nc is the client interface to the NEdit text editor
netstat Display verbose info about network processes and ports
nice Run a command with modified priority
nisdomainname Show or set system's NIS/YP domain name
nslookup query internet domain name servers
P
paste Merge lines of files
pdf2dsc Generate a PostScript page list of a PDF document
pdf2ps Convert PDF file "input.pdf" to PostScript(tm) in "output.ps"
pdfinfo Print contents of the 'Info' dictionary (plus some other useful information) from a PDF file
pdftotext Convert pdf files to plain text
perl (start) Practical Extraction and Report Language
pgawk The profiling version of gawk
pico Text editor that comes with Pine (from the University of Washington)
pine Email program used by The University of Washington
ping6 Ping
ping Send ICMP ECHO_REQUEST to network hosts
pinky A lightweight 'finger' program;
pr Format for printing
ps Processes running
ps2ascii Ghostscript translator from PostScript or PDF to ASCII
ps2epsi Generate conforming Encapsulated PostScript
ps2frag Obsolete shell script for the PSfrag system
ps2pdf12 Convert PostScript to PDF 1.2 (Acrobat 3 and later compatible) using ghostscript
ps2pdf13 Convert PostScript to PDF 1.3 (Acrobat 4 and later compatible) using ghostscript
ps2pdf14 Use ps2pdfwr: Convert PostScript to PDF without specifying Compatibility Level, using ghostscript
ps2pdf Convert PostScript to PDF using ghostscript
ps2pdfwr Convert PostScript to PDF without specifying Compatibility Level, using ghostscript
ps2pk creates a TeX pkfont from a type1 PostScript font
ps2ps ps2ps uses gs to convert PostScript(tm) file "input.ps" to simpler and (usually) faster PostScript in "output.ps"
psbook Rearranges pages from a PostScript document into "signatures" for printing books or booklets
pwd Print Working Directory
Q back to commands top
quota display disk usage and limits
R back to commands top
resize Xterm window size
readelf Displays information about ELF files
reboot Stop the system, poweroff, reboot
red red is a restricted ed: it can only edit files in the current directory and cannot execute shell commands
rename Rename files
rmdir Remove a directory
rm Remove files or directories
rpm rpm command options
rundig Sample script to create a search database for ht://Dig
rview The GUI version of Vim in easy mode with restrictions
rvi Vi / Vim editor
S back to commands top
sed Stream editor
setfont Load EGA/VGA console screen font
set gid Set group id
set serial Get / set Linux serial port info
set uid Set user id
sfdisk Modified fdisk program
sftp Secure file transfer protocol (ftp)
sh Shell (BASH)
shred Safely remove data from disk drive
sleep Delay for a specified amount of time
slocate Security Enhanced version of the GNU Locate
sort Sort lines of a text file
ssh Secure shell connection command
stty change and print terminal line settings
stty raw Unformatted output to terminal
su Become super user ( root )
switchdesk Graphical and text mode interface for choosing desktop environment
sync Force changed blocks to disk, update the super block
ssh Secure shell connection command
T back to commands top
tail Print the last 10 Lines of a file standard output
tar Create an Archive
tcsh Enhanced completely compatible version of the Berkeley UNIX C shell, csh
tee Copy standard input to each file, and also to standard output
telnet User interface to the telnet protocol
time Run the specified program command with the given arguments
touch Change file timestamps
tracepath6 See tracepath
tracepath Trace path to a network host discovering MTU along this path
traceroute6 See traceroute
traceroute Print the route packets take to network host
tree Display file tree
true Exit with a status code indicating success
tty Print name of terminal connected to standard output
U back to commands top
umask File creation mask / Bash builtins
umount Detache file system(s) mentioned from file hierarchy
uname Print system information ( kernel version )
unicode_start Put keyboard and console into Unicode (UTF-8) mode
unicode_stop Undo the effect of unicode_start
unlink Call the unlink function to remove the specified file
uniq Remove duplicate lines from sorted file
updatedb Update the slocate database
unset gid Group id change
unset uid User id change
untar Unarchive ( untar ) a file
unzip Unzip .zip files
useradd Add new user
users Output who is currently logged in according to system records
usleep Sleep a given number of microseconds. default is 1
V back to commands top
view Start vim in read-only mode
vi Start the vi editor
W back to commands top
w Show who is logged on and what they are doing
wc Word count of a file
wget Non-interactive download of files from the Web
whatis Search the whatis database for complete words (command names)
whereis Locate a command or file
which Find command path
whoami Print effective userid
who show who is logged on
whois Client for the whois service
X,Y,Z back to commands top
xinit Start Xserver
xpdf Portable Document Format (PDF) file viewer for X windows
xrandr Change resolution running Xwindows ( command line )
ypdomainname show or set the system's NIS/YP domain name
zcat Compress or expand files
zip Compression and file packaging utility for Unix, VMS, MSDOS, OS/2, Windows NT, Minix,
Atari and Macintosh, Amiga and Acorn RISC OS. It is analogous to a
combination of the UNIX commands tar(1) and compress(1) and is
compatible with PKZIP (Phil Katz’s ZIP for MSDOS
systems)
zipinfo List detailed information about a ZIP archive
