Basic Commands
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Clear terminal screen | clear |
| Show command history | history 20 |
| Display manual page | man ls |
| Print working directory | pwd |
| Show current username | whoami |
File Operations
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| View file contents | cat file.txt |
| Copy files or folders | cp file1.txt file2.txt |
| List directory contents | ls -la |
| Create directories | mkdir new_folder |
| Move or rename files | mv old.txt new.txt |
| Remove files or folders | rm -rf folder/ |
| Create empty file | touch newfile.txt |
| Extract zip archive | unzip archive.zip |
| Create zip archive | zip archive.zip file1.txt |
| Create links | ln -s /target link |
| Change permissions | chmod 755 script.sh |
| Change ownership | sudo chown user:group file |
Text Processing
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Pattern based text processing | awk '{print $1}' file.txt |
| Search text with pattern | grep "error" log.txt |
| Show top lines | head -20 file.txt |
| Stream editor | sed 's/old/new/g' file.txt |
| Generate number sequence | seq 1 10 |
| Sort lines | sort names.txt |
| Show bottom lines | tail -f log.txt |
| Translate characters | echo "HELLO" | tr 'A-Z' 'a-z' |
| Simple text editor | nano config.conf |
| Advanced text editor | vim script.py |
| Compare files line by line | diff file1.txt file2.txt |
| Select columns from lines | cut -d',' -f1 data.csv |
Search Commands
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Find files and directories | find /home -name "*.txt" |
| Find text in files | grep -r "TODO" ./src |
| Locate executable path | which python3 |
| Locate binary and docs | whereis ls |
System and Permissions
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Create command shortcut | alias ll='ls -la' |
| Change permissions | chmod +x script.sh |
| Show command history | history | grep ssh |
| List block devices | lsblk -f |
| Read manual pages | man rsync |
| Shutdown or restart machine | sudo shutdown -h now |
| Run as superuser | sudo apt update |
| Control services | systemctl status ssh |
| Show running processes | ps aux | grep firefox |
| Terminate process | kill -9 12345 |
| Schedule recurring jobs | crontab -e |
Network Commands
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Transfer data from or to server | curl https://api.example.com |
| Control NetworkManager | nmcli device status |
| Download files from internet | wget https://example.com/file.zip |
| Secure shell connection | ssh user@192.168.1.10 |
| Check connectivity | ping google.com |
| Show network stats | netstat -tulpn |
| Manage routes and devices | ip addr show |
Disk and Memory Commands
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| Disk space usage | df -h |
| Directory space usage | du -sh /home |
| List block devices | lsblk |
| Memory usage | free -h |
| Partition table utility | sudo fdisk -l |
| Mount filesystems | mount /dev/sda1 /mnt |
| Fast sync and copy | rsync -avz source/ dest/ |
| Copy disks and files | dd if=/dev/sda of=backup.img |
Package Management
| Command | Description | Examples |
|---|
| APT package manager | sudo apt install firefox |
| Debian package manager | dpkg -i package.deb |
| Snap package manager | snap install vlc |
| Flatpak apps manager | flatpak install flathub org.videolan.VLC |