Brief overview of Unix and Linux commands

Below is a listing of each of the Unix and Linux commands currently listed on Computer Hope and a brief explanation of what each of the commands do. This is a full listing which means not all the below commands will work with your distribution and may also not work because of your privileges. Clicking on any of the commands will display additional help and information about that command. Command a2p ac access agrep alias apropos apt-cache apt-get aptitude ar arch arp as aspell at awk basename bash bc bdiff bfs bg biff break bs bye cal calendar cancel cat Description Creates a Perl script from an awk script. Prints statistics about users' connect time. Checks real user's permissions for a file. Version of the grep utility which also matches approximate patterns. Create a name for another command or long command string. Searches the manual pages for a keyword or regular expression. Queries the APT software package cache. Command line tool for working with APT software packages. Text-based front-end for the APT package management system. Maintain portable archive or library. Display the architecture of the current host. Manipulate the system ARP cache. An assembler. Interactive spell checker. Command scheduler. Awk script processing program. Deletes any specified prefix from a string. Command Bourne interpreter Calculator. Compare large files. Editor for large files. Continues a program running in the background. Enable and disable incoming mail notifications. Break out of while, for, foreach, or until loop. Battleship game. Alias often used for the exit command. Calendar. Display appointments and reminders. Cancels a print job. View or modify a file.

cc cd chdir checkeq checknr chfn chgrp chkey chmod chown chroot chsh cksum clear cls cmp col comm compress continue copy cp cpio crontab crypt csh csplit ctags cu curl cut date dc dd df depmod

C compiler. Change directory. Change directory. Language processors to assist in describing equations. Check nroff and troff files for any errors. Modify your own information or if super user or root modify another users information. Change a groups access to a file or directory. Change the secure RPC key pair. Change the permission of a file. Change the ownership of a file. Run a command or shell from another directory, and treats that directory as root. Change login shell. Display and calculate a CRC for files. Clears screen. Alias often used to clear a screen. Compare files. Reverse line-feeds filter. Compare files and select or reject lines that are common. Compress files on a computer. Break out of while, for, foreach, or until loop. Copy files. Copy files. Creates archived CPIO files. Create and list files that you wish to run on a regular schedule. Function used to encrypt passwords. Execute the C shell command interpreter Split files based on context. Create a tag file for use with ex and vi. Calls or connects to another Unix system, terminal or non-Unix system. Transfer a URL. Cut out selected fields of each line of a file. Tells you the date and time in Unix. An arbitrary precision arithmetic package. Convert and copy a file. Display the available disk space for each mount. Generates a list of kernel module dependences, modules.dep, and associated map files.

deroff dhclient diff dig dircmp dirname dmesg dos2unix dpkg dpost du echo ed edit egrep eject elm emacs enable env eqn ex exit expand expr fc fg fgrep file find findsmb finger fmt fold for foreach

Removes nroff/troff, tbl, and eqn constructs. Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol Client. Displays two files and prints the lines that are different. DNS lookup utility. Lists the different files when comparing directories. Deliver portions of path names. Print or control the kernel ring buffer. Converts text files between DOS and Unix formats. Queries, installs, removes, and maintains Debian software packages and their dependencies. Translates files created by troff into PostScript. Tells you how much space a file occupies. Displays text after echo to the terminal. Line oriented file editor. Text editor. Search a file for a pattern using full regular expressions. Ejects removable media. Program command used to send and receive e-mail. Text editor. Enables and disables LP printers. Displays environment variables. Language processors to assist in describing equations. Line-editor mode of the vi text editor. Exit from a program, shell or log you out of a Unix network. Expand copies of file s. Evaluate arguments as an expression. The FC utility lists or edits and re-executes, commands previously entered to an interactive sh. Continues a stopped job by running it in the foreground Search a file for a fixed-character string. Tells you if the object you are looking at is a file or if it is a directory. Finds one or more files assuming that you know their approximate filenames. List info about machines that respond to SMB name queries on a subnet. Lists information about the user. Simple text formatters. Filter for folding lines. Shell built-in functions to repeatedly execute action(s) for a selected number of times. Shell built-in functions to repeatedly execute action(s) for a selected number of

times. free Display amount of free and used memory in the system fromdos Converts text files between DOS and Unix formats. fsck Check and repair a Linux file system. ftp Enables ftp access to another terminal. fuser Identify processes using files or sockets. gawk Powerful pattern-matching and processing language. getfacl Display discretionary file information. gethostname System call to get the hostname of the current processor. gpasswd Administer /etc/group and /etc/gshadow. gprof The gprof utility produces an execution profile of a program. grep Finds text within a file. groupadd Creates a new group account. groupdel Enables a super user or root to remove a group. groupmod Enables a super user or root to modify a group. gunzip Expand compressed files. gview A programmers text editor. gvim A programmers text editor. gzip Compress files. halt Stop the computer. hash Remove internal hash table. hashstat Display the hash stats. head Displays the first ten lines of a file, unless otherwise stated. help If computer has online help documentation installed this command will display it. history Display the history of commands typed. host DNS lookup utility. hostid Prints the numeric identifier for the current host. hostname Set or print name of current host system. id Shows you the numeric user and group ID on BSD. ifconfig Sets up network interfaces. ifdown Take a network interface down. ifup Bring a network interface up. info Read Info documents. init Process control initialization. Reports Central Processing Unit (CPU) statistics and input/output statistics for iostat devices and partitions. ip Show and manipulate routing, devices, policy routing and tunnels. isalist Display the native instruction sets executable on this platform.

iwconfig jobs join keylogin kill killall ksh ld ldd less lex link ln lo locate login logname logout losetup lp lpadmin lpc lpq lpr lprm lpstat ls lsof lzcat lzma mach mail mailcompat mailx make man mesg mii-tool

Configure a wireless network interface. List the jobs currently running in the background. Joins command forms together. Decrypt the user's secret key. Cancels a job. Kills processes by name. Korn shell command interpreter. Link-editor for object files. List dynamic dependencies of executable files or shared objects. Opposite of the more command. Generate programs for lexical tasks. Calls the link function to create a link to a file. Creates a link to a file. Allows you to exit from a program, shell or log you out of a Unix network. List files in databases that match a pattern. Signs into a new system. Returns users login name. Logs out of a system. Sets up and controls loop devices. Prints a file on System V systems. Configure the LP print service. Line printer control program. Lists the status of all the available printers. Submits print requests. Removes print requests from the print queue. Lists status of the LP print services. Lists the contents of a directory. Lists open files. View compressed .lzma files. Compress files to .lzma file. Display the processor of the current host. One of the ways that allows you to read/send E-Mail. Provide SunOS 4.x compatibility for the Solaris mailbox format. Mail interactive message processing system. Executes a list of shell commands associated with each target. Display a manual of a command. Control if non-root users can send text messages to you. View, manipulate media-independent interface status.

mkdir mkfs modprobe more mount mt mv nc neqn netstat newalias newform newgrp nice niscat nischmod nischown nischttl nisdefaults nisgrep nismatch nispasswd nistbladm nl nmap nohup nroff nslookup od on onintr optisa pack pagesize passwd paste pax

Create a directory. Build a Linux file system, usually a hard disk partition. Adds and removes modules from the linux kernel. Displays text one screen at a time. Creates a file systems and remote resources. Magnetic tape control. Renames a file or moves it from one directory to another directory. TCP/IP swiss army knife. Language processors to assist in describing equations. Shows network status. Install new elm aliases for user or system. Change the format of a text file. Log into a new group. Invokes a command with an altered scheduling priority. Display NIS+ tables and objects. Change access rights on a NIS+ object. Change the owner of a NIS+ object. Change the time to live value of a NIS+ object. Display NIS+ default values. Utilities for searching NIS+ tables. Utilities for searching NIS+ tables. Change NIS+ password information. NIS+ table administration command. Get the numbers the lines in a file. Network exploration tool and security port scanner. Runs a command even if the session is disconnected or the user logs out. Formats documents for display or line-printer. Queries a name server for a host or domain lookup. Dump files in octal and other formats. Execute a command on a remote system, but with the local environment. Shell built-in functions to respond to (hardware) signals. Determine which variant instruction set is optimal to use. Shrinks file into a compressed file. Display the size of a page of memory in bytes, as returned by getpagesize. Allows you to change your password. Merge corresponding or subsequent lines of files. Read/write and writes lists of the members of archive files and copy directory hierarchies.

pcat perl pg pgrep pico pine ping pkill poweroff pr priocntl printenv printf ps pstree pvs pwd quit rcp readlink reboot red rehash remsh renice repeat replace rgview rgvim rlogin rm rmail rmdir rn route

Compresses file. Perl is a programming language optimized for scanning arbitrary text files, extracting information from those text files. Files perusal filters for CRTs. Examine the active processes on the system and reports the process IDs of the processes Simple and very easy to use text editor in the style of the Pine Composer. Command line program for Internet News and Email. Sends ICMP ECHO_REQUEST packets to network hosts. Examine the active processes on the system and reports the process IDs of the processes Stop the computer. Formats a file to make it look better when printed. Display's or set scheduling parameters of specified process(es) Prints all or part of environment. Write formatted output. Reports the process status. Displays processes in tree format. Display the internal version information of dynamic objects within an ELF file. Print the current working directory. Allows you to exit from a program, shell or log you out of a Unix network. Copies files from one computer to another computer. Prints the value of a symbolic link or canonical file name. Stop the computer. Line oriented file editor. Recomputes the internal hash table of the contents of directories listed in the path. Runs a command on another computer. Alters the priority of running processes. Shell built-in functions to repeatedly execute action(s) for a selected number of times. A string-replacement utility. A programmers text editor. A programmers text editor. Establish a remote connection from your terminal to a remote machine. Deletes a file without confirmation (by default). One of the ways that allows you to read/send E-Mail. Deletes a directory. Reads newsgroups. Show and manipulate the IP routing table.

rpcinfo rsh rsync rview rvim s2p

Report RPC information. Runs a command on another computer. Faster, flexible replacement for rcp. A programmers text editor. A programmers text editor. Convert a sed script into a Perl script. Graphically displays the system activity data stored in a binary data file by a sag previous sar run. sar Displays the activity for the CPU. screen Screen manager with VT100/ANSI terminal emulation. script Records everything printed on your screen. sdiff Compares two files, side-by-side. sed Allows you to use pre-recorded commands to make changes to text. sendmail Sends mail over the Internet. service Runs a System V init script. set Set the value of an environment variable. setenv Set the value of an environment variable. setfacl Modify the Access Control List (ACL) for a file or files. sethostname System calls or set the hostname of the current processor. settime Change file access and modification time. sftp Secure file transfer program. sh Runs or processes jobs through the Bourne shell. shred Delete a file securely, first overwriting it to hide its contents. shutdown Turn off the computer immediately or at a specified time. sleep Waits a x amount of seconds. slogin OpenSSH SSH client (remote login program). smbclient An ftp-like client to access SMB/CIFS resources on servers. sort Sorts the lines in a text file. Looks through a text file and reports any words that it finds in the text file that are spell not in the dictionary. split Split a file into pieces. stat Display file or filesystem status. stop Control process execution. strftime Formats strings that represent the system date and time. strip Discard symbols from object files. stty Sets options for your terminal. su Become super user or another user. sysinfo Get and set system information strings.

sysklogd tabs tail talk tac tar tbl tcopy tcpdump tee telinit telnet test time timex todos top touch tput tr traceroute troff tty ul umask unalias unhash uname uncompress uniq unlink unlzma unmount unpack untar until unxz unzip

Linux system logging utilities. Set tabs on a terminal. Delivers the last part of the file. Talk with other logged in users. Concatenate and print files in reverse. Create tape archives and add or extract files. Preprocessor for formatting tables for nroff or troff. Copy a magnetic tape. Dump traffic on a network. Read from an input and write to a standard output or file. Process control initialization. Uses the telnet protocol to connect to another remote computer. Check file types and compare values. Used to time a simple command. The timex command times a command; reports process data and system activity. Converts text files between DOS and Unix formats. Display Linux tasks. Change file access and modification time. Initialize a terminal or query terminfo database. Translate characters. Print the route packets take to network host. Typeset or format documents. Print the file name of the terminal connected to standard input. Reads the named filenames or terminal and does underlining. Get or set the file mode creation mask. Remove an alias. Remove internal hash table. Print name of current system. Uncompressed compressed files. Report or filter out repeated lines in a file. Call the unlink function to remove the specified file. Decompress .lzma file. Disconnects a file systems and remote resources. Expands a compressed file. Create tape archives and add or extract files. Execute a set of actions while/until conditions are evaluated TRUE. Decompress .xz files. List, test and extract compressed files in a ZIP archive.

useradd userdel usermod vacation vedit vgrind vi vim view w wait wall wc whatis whereis while which who whoami whois write X xfd xhost xlsfonts xset xterm xrdb xz xzcat yacc yes yppasswd yum zcat zip

Create a new user or updates default new user information. Remove a users account. Modify a users account. Reply to mail automatically. Screen-oriented (visual) display editor based on ex. Grind nice program listings Screen-oriented (visual) display editor based on ex. A programmers text editor. A programmers text editor. Show who is logged on and what they are doing. Await process completion. Send a message to everybody's terminal. Displays a count of lines, words, and characters in a file Displays short manual page descriptions. Locate a binary, source, and manual page files for a command. Repetitively execute a set of actions while/until conditions are evaluated TRUE. Locate a command. Displays who is on the system. Print effective userid. Internet user name directory service. Send a message to another user. Execute the X windows system. Display all the characters in an X font. Server access control program for X. Server font list displayer for X. User preference utility for X. Terminal emulator for X. X server resource database utility. Compress files to .xz files. View compressed .xz files. Short for yet another compiler-compiler, yacc is a compiler. Repeatedly output a line with all specified STRING(s), or 'y'. Changes network password in the NIS database. Interactive rpm based package manager. Compress files. Compression and file packaging utility.