Linux-Basic Commands

Dr. Suchintan Mishra

Contents

• Introduction to Linux
• History of Linux

• Basic Commands in Linux

History of Linux
Linux Directory Structure
TOP LEVEL DIRECTORIES

● /bin – binary or executable programs.

● /etc – system configuration files.
● /home – home directory. It is the default current directory.
● /opt – optional or third-party software.
● /tmp – temporary space, typically cleared on reboot.
● /usr – User related programs.
● /var – log files.
Linux Terminals

ZSH- Zsh is also an environment that can be used as a command-line interpreter

for shell scripting or as an interactive login shell. Zsh is built on top of bash thus it
has additional features. Zsh is the default shell for macOS and Kali Linux

BASH-Bash, or the Bourne-Again Shell, is by far the most popularly used shell
and it comes installed as the default shell in the most popular Linux distributions.
Bash is the default login shell for most Linux distributions. It is also accessible for
Windows and it is the default user shell in Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Solaris 11, Pop
OS, etc.
ls
ls -a

In Linux, hidden files start with . (dot) symbol and they are not visible in the regular directory. The (ls -a) command will enlist the whole
list of the current directory including the hidden files.

ls -l

It will show the list in a long list format.

ls -lh

This command will show you the file sizes in human readable format. Size of the file is very difficult to read when displayed in terms of
byte. The (ls -lh)command will give you the data in terms of Mb, Gb, Tb, etc.

ls -lhS

If you want to display your files in descending order (highest at the top) according to their size, then you can use (ls -lhS) command.

ls -l - -block-size=[SIZE]

It is used to display the files in a specific size format. Here, in [SIZE] you can assign size according to your requirement.
ls -d */

It is used to display only subdirectories.

ls -g or ls -lG

With this you can exclude column of group information and owner.
ls
ls -n

It is used to print group ID and owner ID instead of their names.

ls --color=[VALUE]

This command is used to print list as colored or discolored.

ls -li

This command prints the index number if file is in the first column.

ls -p

It is used to identify the directory easily by marking the directories with a slash (/) line sign.

ls -r

It is used to print the list in reverse order.

ls -R

It will display the content of the sub-directories also.

ls -lX

It will group the files with same extensions together in the list.

ls -lt

It will sort the list by displaying recently modified filed at top.

ls ~

It gives the contents of home directory.

ls ../

It give the contents of parent directory.

pwd
The pwd command writes to standard output the full path name of your current directory (from the
root directory). All directories are separated by a / (slash). The root directory is represented by the
first /, and the last directory named is your current directory.

pwd : prints the present working directory

pwd -L: Prints the symbolic path.
pwd -P: Prints the actual path.
cd,MKDIR,RM

cd- cd command in linux known as change directory command. It is used to change current working
directory.

cd directory_name

cd

cd /

mkdir- mkdir command in Linux allows the user to create directories (also referred to as folders in some
operating systems ). This command can create multiple directories at once as well as set the permissions
for the directories.

mkdir --version

mkdir -p first/second/third

mkdir directory_name
RM
rm stands for remove here. rm command is used to remove objects such as files, directories, symbolic
links and so on from the file system like UNIX. To be more precise, rm removes references to objects from
the filesystem, where those objects might have had multiple references (for example, a file with two
different names). By default, it does not remove directories.

Removing one file at a time $ rm -r *

$ rm a.txt

$ ls
b.txt c.txt d.txt e.txt

Removing more than one file at a time

$ rm b.txt c.txt

$ rm -i d.txt
rm: remove regular empty file
'd.txt'? y
Cat,VI, NANO

cat-Cat(concatenate) command is very frequently used in Linux. It reads

data from the file and gives their content as output. It helps us to create,
view, concatenate files.

$cat filename $cat file1 file2 $cat -n filename

cat [filename-whose-contents-is-to-be-copied] > [destination-filename]

vi/nano-VI/NANO are text editors for linux that can edit any file regardless
of its extension.
curl, wget

Wget is the non-interactive network downloader which is used to download

files from the server even when the user has not logged on to the system
and it can work in the background without hindering the current process.

wget http://example.com/sample.php

wget -b http://www.example.com/samplepage.php

wget -b http://www.example.com/samplepage.php

curl is a command-line tool to transfer data to or from a server, using any of the supported protocols
(HTTP, FTP, IMAP, POP3, SCP, SFTP, SMTP, TFTP, TELNET, LDAP, or FILE). curl is powered by
Libcurl. This tool is preferred for automation since it is designed to work without user interaction. curl
can transfer multiple files at once.

curl -# -O ftp://ftp.example.com/file.zip
curl --silent ftp://ftp.example.com/file.zip
systemctl
The systemctl command is a utility which is responsible for examining and
controlling the systemd system and service manager. It is a collection of system
management libraries, utilities and daemons which function as a successor to the
System V init daemon. The new systemctl commands have proven quite useful in
managing a servers services. It provides detailed information about specific
systemd services, and others that have server-wide utilization.
kill

kill command in Linux (located in /bin/kill), is a built-in command which is used to terminate processes manually.
kill command sends a signal to a process which terminates the process. If the user doesn’t specify any signal
which is to be sent along with kill command then default TERM signal is sent that terminates the process.

kill -l :To display all the available signals you can use below command option:

ps: Is used to list all processes and their pids.

$kill pid

kill {-signal | -s signal} pid

cp
cp stands for copy. This command is used to copy files or group of files or directory. It creates
an exact image of a file on a disk with different file name. cp command require at least two
filenames in its arguments.

Syntax: cp Src_file Dest_file

$ ls

a.txt

$ cp a.txt b.txt

$ ls

a.txt b.txt
mv
mv [Option] source destination

mv stands for move. mv is used to move one or more files or directories from one
place to another in a file system like UNIX. It has two distinct functions:

It has two distinct functions:

(i) It renames a file or folder.

(ii) It moves a group of files to a different directory.

$ ls
a.txt b.txt c.txt d.txt

$ mv a.txt geek.txt
mv example.txt ~/Documents
$ ls
b.txt c.txt d.txt
geek.txt
Manage access to the root account
Sudo, the one command to rule them all. It stands for “super user do!” and is pronounced like “sue dough”.

If you prefix “sudo” with any Linux command, it will run that command with elevated privileges. Elevated privileges are
required to perform certain administrative tasks.

The sudoers file

This file is the seedy underbelly of sudo. It controls who can use the sudo command to gain elevated privileges. It is
usually located at /etc/sudoers.

username ALL=(ALL) ALL //gives user "username" sudo access%wheel

ALL=(ALL) ALL //Gives all users that belong to the wheel group sudo access
GREP
Grep command can be used to find or search a regular expression or a string in a text file. To
demonstrate this, let’s create a text file welcome.txt and add some content as shown.

1. Search any line that contains the word in filename on Linux:

grep 'word' filename
2. Perform a case-insensitive search for the word ‘bar’ in Linux and Unix:
grep -i 'bar' file1
3. Look for all files in the current directory and in all of its subdirectories in
Linux for the word ‘httpd’:
grep -R 'httpd' .
4. Search and display the total number of times that the string ‘nixcraft’
appears in a file named frontpage.md:
grep -c 'nixcraft' frontpage.md
search for files

find command options starting/path expression

1. find . -name thisfile.txt
If you need to know how to find a file in Linux called thisfile.txt, it will look for it in
current and sub-directories.
2. find /home -name *.jpg
Look for all .jpg files in the /home and directories below it.
3. find . -type f -empty
Look for an empty file inside the current directory.
4. find /home -user randomperson -mtime 6 -iname ".db"
Look for all .db files (ignoring text case) that have been changed in the preceding 6
days by a user called randomperson.
Users and Groups
A user is the owner of the file. By default, the person who created a file becomes its owner.
Hence, a user is also sometimes called an owner.

A user- group can contain multiple users. All users belonging to a group will have the same
Linux group permissions access to the file. Suppose you have a project where a number of
people require access to a file.

Any other user who has access to a file. This person has neither created the file, nor he
belongs to a usergroup who could own the file. Practically, it means everybody else.
Linux Permissions
Every file and directory in your UNIX/Linux system has following 3 permissions defined for all
the 3 owners discussed above.

● Read: This permission give you the authority to open and read a file. Read permission on a
directory gives you the ability to lists its content.
● Write: The write permission gives you the authority to modify the contents of a file. The
write permission on a directory gives you the authority to add, remove and rename files
stored in the directory. Consider a scenario where you have to write permission on file but
do not have write permission on the directory where the file is stored. You will be able to
modify the file contents. But you will not be able to rename, move or remove the file from
the directory.
● Execute: In Windows, an executable program usually has an extension “.exe” and which
you can easily run. In Unix/Linux, you cannot run a program unless the execute permission
is set. If the execute permission is not set, you might still be able to see/modify the program
code(provided read & write permissions are set), but not run it.
rw- only read and write no execute USER

rw- only read and write no execute GROUP

r– only read no execute no write OTHERS

Provide all permission to user. RW to group and R to others

To check file permissions
ls -l
The characters are pretty easy to remember.

r = read permission

w = write permission

x = execute permission

– = no permission
chmod

Absolute(Numeric) Mode in Linux

In this mode, file permissions are not represented as characters but a three-digit octal number.
The table below gives numbers for all for permissions types.

Number Permission Type Symbol

0 No Permission —

1 Execute –x

2 Write -w-

3 Execute + Write -wx

4 Read r–

5 Read + Execute r-x

6 Read +Write rw-

7 Read + Write +Execute rwx

chmod
chmod 400 filename

chmod 674 filename

>,>>
Command Line Redirection
On a command line, redirection is the process of using the input/output of a file or command to use it as an input for another file. It is similar but different from pipes, as it
allows reading/writing from files instead of only commands.

Redirecting Output
The > symbol is used to redirect output by taking the output from the command on the left and passing as input to the file on the right.

Pipe shell command

The | command is called a pipe. It is used to pipe, or transfer, the standard output from the command on its left into the standard input of the command on its right.

Append Redirect shell command

The >> shell command is used to redirect the standard output of the command on the left and append (add) it to the end of the file on the right.
Archive, backup, compress, unpack, and
uncompress files
The tar command creates tar files by converting a group of files into an archive. It also can extract tar archives, display
a list of the files included in the archive, add additional files to an existing archive, and various other kinds of
operations.

tar [OPERATION_AND_OPTIONS] [ARCHIVE_NAME] [FILE_NAME(s)]

tar -cf archive.tar file1 file2 file3

tar -czf archive.tar.gz file1 file2

tar -cjf archive.tar.bz2 file1 file2

Listing Archive

tar -tf archive.tar

tar -tvf archive.tar

Extracting Archive

tar -xf archive.tar

tar -xvf archive.tar

tar -xf archive.tar -C /opt/files

List, set, and change standard file permissions

Create a file named file1, another file named file2 create a tar archive from files 1
and file 2. Change the permission of the file so that user can (read,write,execute)
and groups can (read) while everyone else has no permissions. Rename the file1 to
sample and copy the contents of sample to another file called sample2 using cat.
List and check the file permissions given to sample, sample2 and the archive.