10 command linux newbie

So you are planning to switch from Windows to Linux, or have just switched to Linux? Oops!!! what I am asking! For what else reason would you have been here. From my past experience when I was new to Nux, commands and terminal really scared me, I was worried about the commands, as to what extent I have to remember and memorise them to get myself fully functional with Linux. No doubt online documentation, books, man pages and user community helped me a lot but I strongly believed that there should be an article with details of commands in easy to learn and understand language.These Motivated me to Master Linux and to make it easy-to-use. My this article is a step towards it.

1. Command: ls

The command “ls” stands for (List Directory Contents), List the contents of the folder, be it file or folder, from which it runs.

root@tecmint:~# ls

Android-Games                     Music
Pictures                          Public
Desktop                           Tecmint.com
Documents                         TecMint-Sync
Downloads                         Templates

The command “ls -l” list the content of folder, in long listing fashion.

root@tecmint:~# ls -l

total 40588
drwxrwxr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May  8 01:06 Android Games
drwxr-xr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May 15 10:50 Desktop
drwxr-xr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May 16 16:45 Documents
drwxr-xr-x 6 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May 16 14:34 Downloads
drwxr-xr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 Apr 30 20:50 Music
drwxr-xr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May  9 17:54 Pictures
drwxrwxr-x 5 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 May  3 18:44 Tecmint.com
drwxr-xr-x 2 ravisaive ravisaive     4096 Apr 30 20:50 Templates

Command “ls -a“, list the content of folder, including hidden files starting with ‘.’.

root@tecmint:~# ls -a

.           .gnupg          .dbus           .goutputstream-PI5VVW       .mission-control
.adobe                  deja-dup                .grsync                 .mozilla                    .themes
.gstreamer-0.10         .mtpaint                .thumbnails             .gtk-bookmarks              .thunderbird
.HotShots               .mysql_history          .htaccess       .apport-ignore.xml          .ICEauthority           
.profile                .bash_history           .icons                  .bash_logout                    .fbmessenger
.jedit                  .pulse                  .bashrc                 .liferea_1.8                .pulse-cookie            
.Xauthority     .gconf                  .local                  .Xauthority.HGHVWW      .cache
.gftp                   .macromedia             .remmina                .cinnamon                       .gimp-2.8
.ssh                    .xsession-errors    .compiz                 .gnome                          teamviewer_linux.deb          
.xsession-errors.old    .config                 .gnome2                 .zoncolor

Note: In Linux file name starting with ‘.‘ is hidden. In Linux every file/folder/device/command is a file. The output of ls -l is:

d (stands for directory).
rwxr-xr-x is the file permission of the file/folder for owner, group and world.
The 1st ravisaive in the above example means that file is owned by user ravisaive.
The 2nd ravisaive in the above example means file belongs to user group ravisaive.
4096 means file size is 4096 Bytes.
May 8 01:06 is the date and time of last modification.
And at the end is the name of the File/Folder.

For more “ls” command examples read 15 ‘ls’ Command Examples in Linux.
2. Command: lsblk

The “lsblk” stands for (List Block Devices), print block devices by their assigned name (but not RAM) on the standard output in a tree-like fashion.

root@tecmint:~# lsblk

NAME   MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda      8:0    0 232.9G  0 disk 
├─sda1   8:1    0  46.6G  0 part /
├─sda2   8:2    0     1K  0 part 
├─sda5   8:5    0   190M  0 part /boot
├─sda6   8:6    0   3.7G  0 part [SWAP]
├─sda7   8:7    0  93.1G  0 part /data
└─sda8   8:8    0  89.2G  0 part /personal
sr0     11:0    1  1024M  0 rom

The “lsblk -l” command list block devices in ‘list‘ structure (not tree like fashion).

root@tecmint:~# lsblk -l

NAME MAJ:MIN RM   SIZE RO TYPE MOUNTPOINT
sda    8:0    0 232.9G  0 disk 
sda1   8:1    0  46.6G  0 part /
sda2   8:2    0     1K  0 part 
sda5   8:5    0   190M  0 part /boot
sda6   8:6    0   3.7G  0 part [SWAP]
sda7   8:7    0  93.1G  0 part /data
sda8   8:8    0  89.2G  0 part /personal
sr0   11:0    1  1024M  0 rom

Note: lsblk is very useful and easiest way to know the name of New Usb Device you just plugged in, especially when you have to deal with disk/blocks in terminal.
3. Command: md5sum

The “md5sum” stands for (Compute and Check MD5 Message Digest), md5 checksum (commonly called hash) is used to match or verify integrity of files that may have changed as a result of a faulty file transfer, a disk error or non-malicious interference.

root@tecmint:~# md5sum teamviewer_linux.deb 

47790ed345a7b7970fc1f2ac50c97002  teamviewer_linux.deb

Note: The user can match the generated md5sum with the one provided officially. Md5sum is considered less secure than sha1sum, which we will discuss later.
4. Command: dd

Command “dd” stands for (Convert and Copy a file), Can be used to convert and copy a file and most of the times is used to copy a iso file (or any other file) to a usb device (or any other location), thus can be used to make a ‘Bootlable‘ Usb Stick.

root@tecmint:~# dd if=/home/user/Downloads/debian.iso of=/dev/sdb1 bs=512M; sync

Note: In the above example the usb device is supposed to be sdb1 (You should Verify it using command lsblk, otherwise you will overwrite your disk and OS), use name of disk very Cautiously!!!.

dd command takes some time ranging from a few seconds to several minutes in execution, depending on the size and type of file and read and write speed of Usb stick.
5. Command: uname

The “uname” command stands for (Unix Name), print detailed information about the machine name, Operating System and Kernel.

root@tecmint:~# uname -a

Linux tecmint 3.8.0-19-generic #30-Ubuntu SMP Wed May 1 16:36:13 UTC 2013 i686 i686 i686 GNU/Linux

Note: uname shows type of kernel. uname -a output detailed information. Elaborating the above output of uname -a.

“Linux“: The machine’s kernel name.
“tecmint“: The machine’s node name.
“3.8.0-19-generic“: The kernel release.
“#30-Ubuntu SMP“: The kernel version.
“i686“: The architecture of the processor.
“GNU/Linux“: The operating system name.

1. Command: history

The “history” command stands for History (Event) Record, it prints the history of long list of executed commands in terminal.

root@tecmint:~# history

 1  sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa
 2  sudo apt-get update
 3  sudo apt-get install ubuntu-tweak
 4  sudo add-apt-repository ppa:diesch/testing
 5  sudo apt-get update
 6  sudo apt-get install indicator-privacy
 7  sudo add-apt-repository ppa:atareao/atareao
 8  sudo apt-get update
 9  sudo apt-get install my-weather-indicator
 10 pwd
 11 cd && sudo cp -r unity/6 /usr/share/unity/
 12 cd /usr/share/unity/icons/
 13 cd /usr/share/unity

Note: Pressing “Ctrl + R” and then search for already executed commands which lets your command to be completed with auto completion feature.

(reverse-i-search)`if': ifconfig

1. Command: sudo

The “sudo” (super user do) command allows a permitted user to execute a command as the superuser or another user, as specified by the security policy in the sudoers list.

root@tecmint:~# sudo add-apt-repository ppa:tualatrix/ppa

Note: sudo allows user to borrow superuser privileged, while a similar command ‘su‘ allows user to actually log in as superuser. Sudo is safer than su.
It is not advised to use sudo or su for day-to-day normal use, as it can result in serious error if accidentally you did something wrong, that’s why a very popular saying in Linux community is:

    “To err is human, but to really foul up everything, you need root password.”

1. Command: mkdir

The “mkdir” (Make directory) command create a new directory with name path. However is the directory already exists, it will return an error message “cannot create folder, folder already exists”.

root@tecmint:~# mkdir tecmint

Note: Directory can only be created inside the folder, in which the user has write permission. mkdir: cannot create directory `tecmint‘: File exists
(Don’t confuse with file in the above output, you might remember what i said at the beginning – In Linux every file, folder, drive, command, scripts are treated as file).
9. Command: touch

The “touch” command stands for (Update the access and modification times of each FILE to the current time). touch command creates the file, only if it doesn’t exist. If the file already exists it will update the timestamp and not the contents of the file.

 root@tecmint:~# touch tecmintfile

Note: touch can be used to create file under directory, on which the user has write permission, only if the file don’t exist there.
10. Command: chmod

The Linux “chmod” command stands for (change file mode bits). chmod changes the file mode (permission) of each given file, folder, script, etc.. according to mode asked for.

There exist 3 types of permission on a file (folder or anything but to keep things simple we will be using file).

Read (r)=4
Write(w)=2
Execute(x)=1

So if you want to give only read permission on a file it will be assigned a value of ‘4‘, for write permission only, a value of ‘2‘ and for execute permission only, a value of ‘1‘ is to be given. For read and write permission 4+2 = ‘6‘ is to be given, ans so on.

Now permission need to be set for 3 kinds of user and usergroup. The first is owner, then usergroup and finally world.

rwxr-x--x   abc.sh

Here the root’s permission is rwx (read, write and execute).
usergroup to which it belongs, is r-x (read and execute only, no write permission) and
for world is –x (only execute).

To change its permission and provide read, write and execute permission to owner, group and world.

root@tecmint:~# chmod 777 abc.sh

only read and write permission to all three.

root@tecmint:~# chmod 666 abc.sh

read, write and execute to owner and only execute to group and world.

root@tecmint:~# chmod 711 abc.sh

Note: one of the most important command useful for sysadmin and user both. On a multi-user environment or on a server, this command comes to rescue, setting wrong permission will either makes a file inaccessible or provide unauthorized access to someone.