Unix Commands
This document provides examples of the use of
many of the most common Unix commands. The first
thing to remember about Unix commands is that are
case sensitive.
For more details on a command see the man page
for the command. For example, to see more
information about the command 'rm', enter the
command man rm
To display a list of commands related to a
topic enter man -k topic
or apropos topic
Additional information is available on the
C&C Unix mainframes in the form of help notes.
To see a list of all available help notes, enter
the command help -l
To see a specific help note, enter help topic
where 'topic' is a specific topic, such as
'tapes'.
You should also understand that some commands
you may be looking for are not part of the basic
Unix operating system but, instead, belong to the
shell that interprets your commands. The most
commonly used shell is the C-shell, which is
described in the 'man csh' page. For example, the
following commands are described in the 'man csh'
page and do not have separate man pages of their
own: repeat
setenv
history
alias
< << >> > | (I/O redirection and piping)
... and many others.
Remember: UNIX COMMANDS ARE CASE SENSITIVE!
Your Account passwd ... set a new password for your account
assets ... view information on resource use
by your account, including connectivity
time, cpu use, and disk space. (Available
on C&C systems only.)
Directories DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
pwd ... find out what your current working
directory is
mkdir playdir ... create a new subdirectory called
'playdir'
rmdir junkdir ... remove subdirectory 'junkdir' (must be
empty of files and subdirectories)
cd /usr/bin ... change to '/usr/bin' directory
(directory specification is relative to
the root directory)
cd class/cs108 ... change to a subdirectory named
'class/cs108' (directory specification is
relative to current working directory)
cd .. ... change to directory one level above
current working directory
cd ... change to home directory for the account
you are using
du ... display the number of disk blocks in use
(the total combined size of all files)
in each directory and subdirectory.
Files DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
ls ... list files in the current working
directory
ls notes ... list file in the subdirectory
named 'notes'
ls -l ... list all files in the current working
directory, along with each file's
permission, owner, size in bytes and date
of last modification.
ls -a ... list files in the current working
directory, including dot files (those
files with names beginning with a period)
ls -F ... list files in the current working
directory, indicating executable files
with an asterisk (*) and subdirectories
with a /
find docs -name \\*\.memo -print
... list all files in the directory
'docs' and any subdirectories of 'docs'
with filenames ending in '.memo'. The
\ is necessary before the * to insure
that is is interpreted as a wild character.
cp file1 file2 ... copy the file 'file1' to a file named
'file2' (original file remains intact with the
same name)
mv oldf newf ... move the file 'oldfile' to a file named
'newfile' (equivalent to renaming a file)
rm badfile ... remove the file 'badfile' (the file is
permanently removed and cannot be recovered)
rm -i *.c ... remove all files in the current directory
with the suffix '.c' and be asked for
confirmation on each file
chmod a+r resul ... grant read access of the file 'resul'
to all users
cat shortfile ... display the file 'shortfile'
more longfile ... display the file 'longfile', a
screenful at a time
head big ... display the first ten lines of
file 'big'
head -25 big ... display the first 25 lines of file 'big'
tail big ... display the last ten lines of file 'big'
tail -25 big ... display the last 25 lines of file 'big'
grep done tasks ... display all lines within file 'tasks'
containing the string 'done'
Jobs DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
ps ... list the status of your jobs by
process identifier (PID)
ps -aux ... list the status of all jobs by process
identifier (PID)
jobs ... list the status of all jobs by job
number
<CTRL>z ... suspend the job currently running in
the foreground
bg ... resume the most recently suspended job
into the background
bg %2 ... resume job number 2 in the background
fg %2 ... resume job number 2 in the foreground
fg %3 ... bring job number 3, which is running
in the background, into the foreground
kill %2 ... kill job number 2
kill 1234 ... kill job with PID 1234
Printing from C&C Uniform Access
Computers DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
prt -printers ... list available printers
sed 's/^/ /' Memo | prt
... shift the file 'Memo' five columns
and send it to the printer. The following
is a detailed description of the command:
sed 's/^/ /' Memo | prt
^ ^ ----- ^ ^ ^
| | | | | |
substitute | | | | |
at beginning | | | |
of each line | | | |
five spaces | | |
file name | |
pipe to |
print
repeat 5 prt class.notes
... print five copies of the files
'class.notes'. The command 'repeat'
is a C shell command.
Networking DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
telnet becker.u ... establish an interactive session on
computer 'becker'
ftp sun.latin.washington.edu
... transfer a file to or from computer
'sun.latin.washington.edu'
Communicating With Others DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
who ... find out who is logged on to the
computer
w ... find out who is logged on to the
computer and what they are doing
finger suzz ... display information about user 'suzz'
biff y ... be notified if mail arrives. To turn
off notification, enter the command 'biff n'
pine ... start pine mailer. Pine is an alternative
to 'mail' that many people find easier to use
than 'mail'
Miscellaneous DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
cal 6 1990 ... display a calendar of June, 1990.
date ... display current date and time
script ... start recording of all screen
interactions
exit ... stop script recording (text from
recorded session will be in a file named
typescript )
alias dir ls -Fal ... alias 'dir' to represent the command
'ls -Fal'
unalias dir ... remove the alias for 'dir'
alias ... show all current aliases
Control Codes (Used When at Unix Command
Line) DO: TO:
--------------- ---------------------------------------------
<CTRL>u Delete entire line
<CTRL>w Delete the preceding word
<CTRL>h Delete the preceding character
<CTRL>c Abort the program currently running
<CTRL>z Suspend the program currently running (use
fg or bg to resume the program in the
foreground or background, respectively)
Redirecting and Piping cc myprog.c > listing
... run C compiler on 'myprog.c' source file,
redirecting compilation messages to a file
named 'listing'. The resulting file would NOT
include any diagnostic messages.
cc myprog.c >& listing
... run C compiler on 'myprog.c' source file,
redirect compilation messages, including
diagnostic messages, into a file named 'listing'.
ps -aux | more ... list all current jobs on the system,
piping the result to more for viewing one
screen at a time
cat frog >> rat
... concatenate the contents of file 'frog'
onto the end of file 'rat'
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