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Tutorials

Whether you're organizing files, peeking into system stats, or just feeling like a hacker in a movie, these commands have your back.

Quick Command Guide​

File Management​

  • ls → List directory contents.
  • cd → Change directory.
  • mkdir → Create a new directory.
  • rm → Remove files/directories.
  • cp → Copy files/directories.
  • mv → Move/rename files.
  • touch → Create an empty file.

File Viewing​

  • cat → Display file contents.
  • less → View file contents page by page.
  • head → Show the first 10 lines of a file.
  • tail → Show the last 10 lines of a file.
  • grep → Search file contents for a keyword.

System Information​

  • pwd → Print the current working directory.
  • whoami → Show the current user.
  • df → Check disk space usage.
  • free → Display memory usage.
  • top → Show running processes.
  • ps → Check process status.

Permissions​

  • chmod → Change file permissions.
  • chown → Change file ownership.

Training Resources​

The Missing Semester of Your CS Education​

  • https://missing.csail.mit.edu ↗
    A course that bridges the gap between programming basics and system-level skills. Topics include:
    • Course overview + the shell
    • Shell Tools and Scripting
    • Editors (Vim)
    • Data Wrangling
    • Command-line Environment
    • Version Control (Git)
    • Debugging and Profiling

Quick Reference Cheat Sheets​

Important

For users on Windows operating system, you will find that these commands won't directly run in your Powershell.

However if you have followed along the Git Installation, you should have Git Bash installed on your system which essentially allows you to have a UNIX terminal within Windows and execute these commands. So go ahead and use that to execute any command or instruction mentioned in the docs.

If you are hacky and know your way around, you can also explore dual booting a Linux Distro like Ubuntu, Zorin OS alongisde your existing Windows installation. Tutorial ↗

Do keep in mind that dual booting is somewhat risky so make sure you have tried this on a spare PC already and we wouldn't advise doing this on your primary machine right now if you don't know your way around this. We might have a session once you all are in office on how to dual boot properly.