Linux Basics --For those new (or relatively new) to Linux

[Ahau]

**Updated to include information from Captain Picard's links/guide post here: http://www.slax.org/forum.php?action=vi ... ght=nvidia**

Porteus will likely be a popular tool for folks who are new to Linux in general, as it provides an easy way to get up and running in Linux without having to install to a hard drive (no repartitioning or rewriting your HD's MBR required!).

As a relatively unskilled Linux user myself, I think it may be useful to dedicate a thread to providing information on the basics of Linux and the Command Line Interface (CLI).

I am trying to read more so that I can ask less. Here are some links that I have found useful thus far, and I'll come back to add to it as I go:

General Linux Info that is helpful for newbies:
http://tldp.org/, the Linux Documentation Project. In particular, their intro to linux handbook, here: http://www.tldp.org/LDP/intro-linux/html/
http://www.linux-tutorial.info/modules. ... pageid=224, from linux-tutorial.info
http://www.linux.org/lessons/
http://linux.about.com/cs/glossaries/a/aglossary.htm, a glossary of linux terms

Info that is specific to learning linux commands/bash:
http://www.linuxcommand.org/index.php has some good information that will get you started with the command line, and also lists tons of man pages online, so you can browse them while not in linux.
http://oreilly.com/linux/command-directory/
http://www.linfo.org/command_index.html has more information on commands, in a more user-friendly format than the standard man pages (poke around the rest of their site, http://www.linfo.org as well!).
http://www.hypexr.org/bash_tutorial.php

Also, if someone is asking you to enter a command that you aren't familiar with, check the man page for that command. For example, in the terminal, enter "man grep" (without the quotes) to see a brief description of what this command does, and the modifiers that can be used with it.

http://www.linuxquestions.org/ is also a great resource, you can search their forums to find answers to lots and lots of questions.

http://www.slackbook.org/html/index.html has a lot of great info that is specific to slackware (on which Porteus is based), as well as general info for linux usage and the CLI.

If these links fail to provide the guidance you need, please keep the following in mind as you post on this forum:
How to ask questions the smart way:http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html

Captain Picard's post http://www.slax.org/forum.php?action=vi ... ght=nvidia has a lot more links that may be useful, which I've not included here, to keep the focus of this post on general linux info and an intro to the CLI.

Thanks!

[brokenman]

I have a text file full of useful commands. A small script allows me to search for a command i need. For example: cmd unpack initrd would bring up results for any lines with 'unpack initrd' and give me the code. I use it everyday!!

[X-Factor]

This would be my home for most of my time next year ...... hope more links to common command appear here.

[Ahau]

I've updated the original post to include more information...

[francois]

@ahau:
Very good idea to get captain picard's famous thread in a place where it will not move.

I have a text file full of useful commands. A small script allows me to search for a command i need. For example: cmd unpack initrd would bring up results for any lines with 'unpack initrd' and give me the code. I use it everyday!!

It would be a great idea to post such a list. I like the copy paste method for cli mode. This way there are lot less errors. And it might be faster also.

Posted after 3 days 21 hour 9 minutes 36 seconds:
Re: Linux Basics --For those new (or relatively new) to Linux
Here is a list of useful commands:
http://vectorlinux.osuosl.org/Uelsk8s/test/

[Rava]

I have a text file full of useful commands. A small script allows me to search for a command i need. For example: cmd unpack initrd would bring up results for any lines with 'unpack initrd' and give me the code. I use it everyday!!

Late reply is laaate, but that sound's like a neat script. Do you share it?


I went another approach, I created some scripts all named help.*, while the * is either simple the command name that it's about, or more than just one command.

Here is the full list:

Code: Select all

root@porteus:/mnt/sda2/iso# help.
help.7z              help.find            help.realpath
help.COLUMNS+LINES   help.firefox         help.rename
help.EMPTY           help.growisofs       help.ripit
help.aria2c          help.gvfsd-metadata  help.shred
help.cdda2wav        help.less            help.slackyd
help.cdparanoia      help.mkisofs         help.stat
help.cdrdao          help.mlabel          help.swap
help.cdrecord        help.mmv             help.tar
help.ctorrent        help.mount           help.time
help.date+hwclock    help.mplayer         help.toupper
help.dd.random+cp    help.mtpaint         help.truecrypt
help.diff            help.nero            help.unset
help.digest          help.opera           help.wget
help.fdupes_clone    help.perl            help.xzip
help.ffmpeg          help.qiv 

help.EMPTY sure im my template for a new file, since by standard the info output is dark blue, and the name of the script is like it's title and in colour as well.

For these scripts I use my colour coding by using variables that have the one escape sequence, but are named like $bold or $red or $off.

By this, having colours in a script is easy and understandable coding, cause who wants to remember what "\033[5m" or "\033[60G" stands for, and all the others?

The first is flashing, but bash shows me that not as flashing but as underlined, I started that years back, maybe they nowadays even changed flashing to underlined to eliminate nasty flashing script coding. I agree to such change out of that reason...

And the second is flush-right.

Mostly I use a colour, or a colour and bold.

</digress>

[brokenman]

What a great idea! This would have been exactly the thing I was looking for when I started out learning bash scripting.

I went the lazy route and just put useful commands into a single text file in this format.

awk '{print $(NF-1)}' get second last field
sed 's/\(.*\).../\1/' remove last three characters

https://www.dropbox.com/s/yxoxh97wxn1tir7/cmd.txt?dl=0

[Bogomips]

the lazy route and just put useful commands into a single text file in this format.

Even less organised. Upon working out how to use a new command, I would need, put sample input and output of said command in text file of useful info. Upon requiring to use this command some weeks or months later, just need earch of file, narrowing down if necessary, with regular expression.

[Rava]

@Bogomips, @brokenman

We are quite the lazy bunch, eh, quick and dirty coding rules. Well, at times it sucks, like when I created my internal / external hard disc / USB flash drive compressed indexing solution...

It works a okay, but when I would have spend 2 more days really pondering about the way to implement it the best way, it would have been so much better than the solution I now have. It is split between 5 or 7 main executables, at least 2 of these are used as kind of "in-line code" that gets loaded by many other scripts, but also each indexed and numbered device must have its own script, and I have to hard-code in each and every script how many possible devices I have, e.g. does it have to look for externalUSB01 to ..15 or ..17? When I add new ones I have to edit at least 3 scripts...

So you see, at times it is better to work longer and harder prior starting the coding itself to get a better thought out solution, than start coding quicker and have a few days earlier results, but have to work with more work and sucky code for years. Yeah, you can call be Bill G. Rava now.

[Rava]

@ahau:
Very good idea to get captain picard's famous thread in a place where it will not move.

has anyone a version that is still accessable?

Cause all I get is this:
http://old.slax.org/forum.php?action=vi ... ght=nvidia

The page isn’t redirecting properly

Pale Moon has detected that the server is redirecting the request for this address in a way that will never complete.

This problem can sometimes be caused by disabling or refusing to accept cookies.

[francois]

Captain Picard's thread has vanished with the old slax forum info.

Dieu ait son âme.

[Rava]

Captain Picard's thread has vanished with the old slax forum info.

Dieu ait son âme.

Sadly, not even archive.org got a saved copy of the forum.

https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://ol ... ht=nvidia/*

No URL has been captured for this domain.

[Ed_P]

Try this link: https://web.archive.org/web/*/http://ol ... /forum.php

[Rava]

https://web.archive.org/web/20161211181 ... ntID=23220

Captain Picard's thread. The trick was quite easy, one just have to remove the highlight info from the end of the URL, and it works like a charm in https://web.archive.org

[MGarcia]

Listing some of the problems I've personally experienced after so many years that Linux has been in existence and still unable to find too many distros that recognize the hardware and use the proper module and/or setup to use the correct drivers from startup. Shame!

I'm not certain about you all but while typing simple text, the blinker jumps up to a different location, destroying the text already there, therefore, adding more precious time to fix what has already been completed. Shame!

While attempting to search for a fix for not only these but other basic problems found across multiple distros, attempted to follow the links provided by this Linux Basics posting and they are broken/do not work! What's the point if nobody maintains them??? Shame!

Attempted to download the Firefox browser using the Porteus Browser Tool and while doing a simple search the browser collapses and destroys the desktop settings. Shame!

Unfortunately, some of us work in professional settings and do not have time to concentrate and help fix all of these little issues that have been there for years and even though I've used multiple computer systems (desktops, laptops, etc.), nothing, sorry the problem is not on this side. Poor programming code. Shame!

Starting to be convinced that Linux is not that much different that MSWin and Apple OSs!!!

Shame, shame, shame.

Completely disenchanted with computer systems and OSs in general and really wonder where is AI? Nowhere to be found, really! Shame!