in defense of the command line

[Igor Gueths]

Octavian, since I have been made aware that you are familiar with Pascal, the \t is the bash escape code for toggling a time flag. I don't recall what the other codes are right now. I don't know if escape codes exist in Pascal, but they sure as hell do in C. 
----- Original Message ----- 
From: Janina Sajka <janina at afb.net>
To: <speakup at braille.uwo.ca>
Sent: Tuesday, May 21, 2002 11:38 PM
Subject: Re: in defense of the command line


> Octavian:
> 
> You might want to add the following three commands to the end of
> your /etc/bashrc. You need to be root to do this:
> 
> PS1="[\u@\h \t] \W\\\$"
> alias ls="ls -px"
> alias rm="rm -i"
> 
> The first command will alter your shell prompt to show your login
> name, your host name, the current time of day as of when the
> prompt is printed, and your pwd. That way you don't have to be
> always typing pwd to see where you are, it'll just be part of
> your prompt.
> 
> If you don't want the time as part of this shell prompt, take out
> the \t part.
> 
> The second command will make ls a little friendlier. Any filename
> that's a directory will end in a slash, as in mydir/, and
> symbolic links will end with the @ symbol.
> 
> The third command will help you not delete something you didn't
> mean to delete. Anytime you give out an rm, it will ask if you
> really mean it.
> 
> On Tue, 21 May 2002, Octavian Rasnita wrote:
> 
> > Hi, thanks. Nice explanation.
> > I am not intimidate  by the command lines. I am frightened by the idea of
> > breaking something.
> > Maybe I type rm fILE instead of rm File and I could delete another file. And
> > I don't know the undelete command.
> > The most used command by me is pwd, to be sure that I am in the right
> > directory, and ls, to see the files from there.
> > The other problem I have is that I don't remember very easy the parameters.
> > I usually remember  the command name but I can't remember if I should use
> > the -L parameter or the -l parameter.
> > I've seen that for some commands, the same parameter make the same thing,
> > but for other commands that parameter make another thing.
> > If I remember well, it is the case of -R parameter, but I don't remember
> > exactly in what commands makes what.
> > In some commands, it means Recursive in the directory tree, but  in other
> > commands, it means another thing.
> > 
> > Another problem, and maybe here I can make something to  improve, is that
> > after I give a command like sync, it doesn't tell me if the command was
> > successfully or not, and I don't know what to do.
> > I typed that command from another account than root, and it didn't tell me
> > anything. It didn't tell me if the command  was successfully or not or if I
> > have the right to type that command from another account than root.
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > Teddy,
> > orasnita at home.ro
> > 
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Charles Hallenbeck" <hallenbeck at valstar.net>
> > To: "Speakup Distribution List" <speakup at speech.braille.uwo.ca>
> > Sent: Monday, May 20, 2002 1:50 PM
> > Subject: in defense of the command line
> > 
> > 
> > Octavius and others seem to be intimidated by the command line.
> > Here is what helps me:
> > 
> > Think of a Linux command as a "sentence". The name of the command
> > is the verb of the sentence, it tells what to do. Sometimes that
> > is all there is to a command line. But usually you have to name
> > some objects of the action, what thing or things should be acted
> > on. Often those objects are the names of files. A sentence has a
> > verb and it has objects, so the sentence thing still works.
> > 
> > Example:
> > 
> > wc myfile.txt
> > 
> > The verb is "wc" and the thing the verb acts on is "myfile.txt".
> > 
> > The next step is to modify or qualify the action of the verb.
> > This is usually done on the command line between the verb and its
> > object or objects. These modifiers or qualifiers are called
> > "options" and start with a dash (-) character. Those are the
> > adverbs or adjectives of the sentence.
> > 
> > Example:
> > 
> > ls -t
> > 
> > The verb is "ls" and the adverb is "-t", which lists the files in
> > the order they were last modified or changed (t for time, not
> > hard to remember).
> > 
> > So, if the command line frightens you, think of it as a language,
> > made up of sentences, and sentences made up of a verb (just one
> > verb), maybe one or more adverbs or adjectives, and maybe one or
> > more objects for the verb to act on.
> > 
> > 
> > Now - everybody learn to talk Linux!
> > 
> > Chuck
> > 
> > 
> > 
> > --
> > Visit me at http://www.valstar.net/~hallenbeck
> > The Moon is Waxing Gibbous (57% of Full)
> > 
> > 
> > _______________________________________________
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> > 
> > 
> > 
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> > 
> 
> -- 
> 
> Janina Sajka, Director
> Technology Research and Development
> Governmental Relations Group
> American Foundation for the Blind (AFB)
> 
> Email: janina at afb.net Phone: (202) 408-8175
> 
> Chair, Accessibility SIG
> Open Electronic Book Forum (OEBF)
> http://www.openebook.org
> 
> 
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