Contents

1 Getting started
Introducing Unix
7
8
Discovering the shell 10
Understanding commands 12
Navigating directories 14
Dealing wildcards 16
Recognizing metacharacters 18
Quoting phrases 20
Getting help 22
Summary 24

2 Managing files
Creating folders
25
26
Arranging files 28
Adding links 30
Examining properties 32
Comparing files 34
Finding files 36
Compressing files 38
Making backups 40
Summary 42

3 Handling text
Reading and writing
43
44
Redirecting output 46
Seeking strings 48
Sorting order 50
Arranging columns 52
Matching expressions 54
Editing text 56
Inserting text 58
Summary 60
4 Editing commands
Amending characters
61
62
Changing lines 64
Completing commands 66
Adjusting characters 68
Inserting text 70
Repeating history 72
Fixing commands 74
Expanding history 76
Summary 78

5 Customizing environment
Switching users
79
80
Setting permissions 82
Adding colors 84
Creating aliases 86
Setting options 88
Modifying variables 90
Changing prompts 92
Adjusting paths 94
Summary 96

6 Controlling behavior
Disabling defaults
97
98
Formatting output 100
Reading input 102
Substituting commands 104
Managing jobs 106
Killing processes 108
Communicating routines 110
Relating shells 112
Summary 114

7 Performing operations
Storing values
115
116
Filling arrays 118
Handling strings 120
Doing arithmetic 122
Assigning values 124
Comparing values 126
Assessing logic 128
Matching patterns 130
Summary 132
8 Directing flow
Examining conditions
133
134
Providing alternatives 136
Testing cases 138
Iterating for 140
Selecting options 142
Looping while 144
Looping until 146
Breaking out 148
Summary 150

9 Employing functions 151

Creating scripts 152
Displaying variables 154
Inputting values 156
Providing options 158
Restricting scope 160
Repeating calls 162
Locating bugs 164
Randomizing numbers 166
Summary 168

10 Handy reference
Special characters
169
170
Commands A-D 172
Commands D-F 174
Commands G-L 176
Commands L-S 178
Commands S-U 180
Commands U-Z 182
Date formats 184
Shell variables 186

Index 187
Preface
The creation of this book has been for me, Mike McGrath, an exciting opportunity to
demonstrate the powerful command-line shell functionality available in almost any modern
Unix-family operating system. I sincerely hope you enjoy discovering the exciting possibilities
of the command-line and have as much fun with it as I did in writing this book.
In order to clarify script code listed in the steps given I have adopted certain colorization
conventions. Interpreter directives and comments are colored green, shell components are blue,
literal string and numeric values are black, user-specified variable and function names are red.
Additionally a colored icon and a file name appears in the margin alongside the script code to
readily identify each particular script:

#!/bin/bash

# # A Script To Greet The User.

echo -n ‘Please enter your name: ‘

SH
read username
greet.sh echo “Welcome to $@ , $username ”

The screenshots that accompany each example illustrate the actual output produced by precisely
executing the commands listed in the easy steps:

For convenience I have placed source code files from the examples featured in this book into a
single ZIP archive. You can obtain the complete archive by following these three easy steps:

l 1 Open a web browser and navigate to www.ineasysteps.com then select the menu
entitled “Free Resources” and choose the “Downloads” item

l 2 Next find “Unix in easy steps” in the list then click on the hyperlink entitled
“All Code Examples” to download the archive

l 3 Now extract the contents to any convenient location, such as your home directory
 1 Getting started
8 Introducing Unix
Welcome to the exciting
10 Discovering the shell
world of Unix. This chapter
12 Understanding commands
introduces the Bash
14 Navigating directories
command interpreter shell
16 Dealing wildcards
and demonstrates essential
18 Recognizing metacharacters
basic commands.
20 Quoting phrases
22 Getting help
24 Summary
Getting started

Introducing Unix
Unix is a multi-user, multi-tasking computer operating system
developed at AT&T’s Bell Labs. Way back in the mid 1960s Bell
Labs, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and General
Electric co-developed a mainframe multi-tasking operating system
named “Multics”. The Multics operating system became large
and complex so Bell Labs withdrew from the project. A group
from Bell Labs, notably Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie,
wanted to create something with many of the same multi-tasking
capabilities but simpler to use. They named it “Unix” as a joke,
saying “whatever Multics is many of, Unix is just one of ”.
“Multics” (MULTiplexed
Information and In 1973 Kernighan and Ritchie created the “C” high-level
Computing Service) programming language and rewrote Unix in their new language.
was the forerunner This was a huge leap from the assembly code used in all other
to “Unics” (UNiplexed operating system development at that time. The migration from
Information and
assembly code to the C language produced much more portable
Computing Service) –
a.k.a. “Unix”. software that was easily ported to other computing platforms.
AT&T made the Unix source code available to universities,
which created a great amount of academic interest, particularly
at the University of California, Berkeley. Their Computer Science
8

Research Group added new capabilities then released their version

of Unix as “BSD” (Berkeley Software Distribution):

• BSD Unix proved very popular and was adopted by many

commercial startups including Sun Microsystems who used
it as the basis for SunOS. Sun later created the Solaris
Unix operating system and were acquired by the Oracle
Corporation in 2010 - since then that system has been
known as Oracle Solaris.

• BSD Unix was adopted for the development of the Darwin

operating system – providing the core set of components
Only Oracle Solaris, upon which Apple’s OS X and iOS are based.
Apple OS X, HP-UX and
IBM’s AIX systems are
fully recognized as Unix
• BSD Unix also proved interesting to a 21-year old student at
the University of Helsinki. He released his own lightweight
– all others are more Unix variant specifically for PCs. His name was Linus
properly referred to as Torvalds and he named his operating system “Linux” –
“Unix-like” systems.
(LINUs’ uniX). Many variations of this popular release have
subsequently been developed including Red Hat, Ubuntu, and
the Raspbian OS for the Raspberry Pi device.
...cont’d

Meeting the kernel

At the heart of every variant of Unix is the “kernel” – a program
that gets loaded into memory at boot-up time and manages the
system until shutdown. The kernel controls hardware devices,
schedules tasks, and manages memory. All other programs reside
on the hard disk drive and get loaded into memory by the kernel.
The kernel executes them and cleans up the system on completion.

Meeting the shell

The “shell” is a utility program that starts up when you log on to
a Unix system. It allows the user to interact with the kernel by The shell program
interpreting commands that are typed at the command line or allows the user to
read from a script file. communicate with the
kernel at the heart of
their Unix system.
pwd
mkdir echo

sudo who

9
find cd

cp mv

rm man

du
cat
exit clear
ls

The New icon pictured

Over time, several shell programs have above indicates a new
been developed for Unix including or enhanced feature
the Bourne shell (AT&T), the C shell introduced with the
(Berkeley), and the Korn shell latest version of Bash.
(a superset of the Bourne shell).
The most popular shell today is “Bash” – the Bourne again shell.
Bash is an enhanced Bourne shell and is the default shell on
Oracle Solaris, Linux and Mac OS X operating systems. This
book demonstrates how to use the Bash shell to interact with the
kernel from the command line and from scripts.
Getting started

Discovering the shell

When you initially log in to a Unix system, or open a new
terminal window, a command prompt appears indicating that a
shell process has been started for you automatically. This shell will
typically be the Bash shell program.
The name of the shell in use can be seen in information about
the current terminal process by issuing a ps $$ command. The
output from this command should confirm Bash as the current
shell under its COMMAND heading. If another shell is listed you
can switch to the Bash shell simply by issuing a bash command
if it is available. In the event that the Bash program is not already
available it must be installed by you or the system administrator.

Bash is part of the Once you have confirmed that Bash is the current shell you can
“GNU” Unix-like see its version information by issuing a bash --version command:

l
operating system – find
details and download 1 Launch a Terminal window then at the prompt exactly
instructions online at type ps $$ and hit Return to discover the current shell
gnu.org/software/bash.
10

l 2 If Bash is not the current COMMAND shell listed, type

bash at the prompt then hit Return to switch to Bash

l 3 At the prompt, exactly type ps $$ once more and hit

Return to discover if Bash is now the current shell
Unix is case-sensitive so
the commands MUST
be capitalized exactly as
listed. For example, the
ps command must use
only lowercase letters.
...cont’d

l 4 Once you have confirmed you are indeed using the Bash
shell, at the prompt exactly type bash --version then hit
Return to discover the current Bash version

You can also use the

command which bash
to detect Bash. This
should respond with the
directory location of the
Bash program if present

l
on the system.
5 Now, issue a clear command (or press Ctrl + L keys) to
clear the terminal screen back to a command prompt

11
Notice that the default Bash command prompt comprises several
pieces of information including the user’s name (shown here
as user) and the host system name (shown here as host). These
details can also be displayed using the whoami and hostname
commands:

l 6 Type whoami then hit Return to see your user name, then
type hostname and hit Return to see your computer name

The whoami and

hostname commands
are mostly useful when
the command prompt
has been customized to

l
hide the user name and
7 Finally issue an exit command (or press Ctrl + D keys) to host name.
end the session and thereby close the Terminal window
Getting started

Understanding commands
When the user hits the Return key after typing a command at
a shell prompt it adds a final invisible newline character. This
denotes the end of the command and indicates to the shell that
it should then attempt to interpret that command. The Bash
interpreter first reads the command line as “standard input” (stdin)
and splits it into separate words broken by spaces or tabs. Each of
these words is known as a “token”. The interpreter next examines
the first token to see if it is one of the shell’s “built-in” commands
or an executable program located on the file system.

Each Unix program When the first token is recognized as a built-in shell command,
can accept standard the interpreter executes that command otherwise it searches
input and can produce through the directories on a specified path to find a program of
standard output that name. The interpreter will then execute a recognized built-in
and standard error command or recognized program and display any result in the
messages. Terminal as “standard output” (stdout). Where neither is found,
the interpreter will display an error message in the Terminal as
“standard error” (stderr).
The Bash type command can be used to determine whether a
12

token is recognized as a built-in shell command, or the location of

a recognized program, or display a message if none can be found:

l 1 At a command prompt, type type clear then hit Return to

see the location of the clear program on the filesystem

l 2 Next, type type exit then hit Return to discover that exit
is in fact a built-in shell command

l 3 Now, type type nosuch then hit Return to see this

token cannot be found to match a built-in command or
program name
You can also use the
built-in command hash
to see a list of your
recently issued program
commands and the
number of times
executed (hits).
...cont’d

The Bash built-in echo command simply reads all following

tokens from standard input then prints them as standard output -
unless they are recognized as a command “option”. Many built-in
commands and programs accept one or more options that specify
how they should be executed. Typically, an option consists of a
dash followed by a letter. For example, the echo command accepts
a -n option that denotes it should omit the newline character that
it automatically prints after other output:

l 4 At a prompt, type echo followed by some text then hit

Return to see that text printed with an added newline You will often want to
suppress the automatic

l 5 Now, type echo -n followed by some text then hit Return

to see that text printed without an added newline
newline with echo -n
when printing a request
for user input.

13
In addition to the built-in shell commands the Bash shell also
contains a number of built-in shell variables. These are named
“containers” that each store a piece of information and their names
use all uppercase characters. To access the information stored
within a variable its name must be prefixed with a $ dollar sign:

l 6 At a prompt, type echo $SHELL to see the location of the

Bash interpreter program on the filesystem

l 7 Now, type echo $BASH_VERSION to see the version

number of the Bash shell interpreter
You can also use the
command echo $PATH
to discover which
directories the Bash shell
searches when you issue
any command.
Getting started

Navigating directories
The Unix filesystem is arranged as a tree-like hierarchical structure
of directories and files with the “root” directory at its base. The
root directory is addressed simply as a forward-slash character /.
Sub-directories within the root directory are addressed by
appending their directory name to the forward-slash. For example,
/dev the “home” directory has the address /home. Directories within
/bin /lib
those sub-directories are addressed by appending another forward-
/sbin slash and their directory name. For example, a “user” directory
/boot /proc
within the “home” directory has the address /home/user.
/initrd /etc
Similarly, files in directories are addressed by appending another
forward-slash and the filename, such as /home/user/filename.
/var
/mnt
/usr /opt /tmp This hierarchical address system can therefore easily describe
the “absolute path” of any directory or file from the root base.
/home /root Additionally, contents of the current directory and its sub-
directories can be addressed by name using their “relative path”.
For example, a sub-directory named “user” within /home can be
addressed from /home simply as user, and a file within that sub-
directory can be addressed as user/filename.
/ When the user launches a Terminal window it conveniently
14

sets the filesystem location to that user’s home directory. This is

typically a directory bearing that user’s name located in /home.
For example, for a user named “Carole” at /home/Carole. The user
can ascertain their current location at any time with the pwd
(print working directory) command and list the contents of that
directory with the ls command. Contents of sub-directories can be
listed simply by specifying their address to the ls command:

l 1 Launch a Terminal and type pwd at the prompt then hit

Return to see the absolute path address of your location

As Unix is case-sensitive
the names of directories
l 2 Next, type ls then hit Return to see the contents of the
current directory

l
and files in addresses
must be correctly 3 Now, specify the relative address of an immediate child
capitalized. sub-directory to the ls command to see nested directories
– for example, type ls Documents then hit Return

l 4 Then, specify the relative address of a nested sub-directory

to the ls command to see that directory’s contents
– for example, type ls Documents/Pictures then hit Return
...cont’d

The Documents sub-

Repeatedly addressing contents of a sub-directory by path can directory here could
become tedious. It is more convenient to change location into also be addressed by its
that sub-directory so its contents can easily be addressed by absolute path of
their name alone. The directory to move into can be specified to /home/user/Documents.
the cd command as either an absolute or relative path address.
Additionally, the user’s home directory can be addressed using
a tilde ~ alias and the parent of the current directory can be
addressed using a .. alias. By default, the Bash prompt string
displays the current directory just before the $ sign:

15
l 5 Type cd Documents/Pictures then hit Return to see the
prompt change to display the nested sub-directory location

l 6 Next, type pwd then hit Return to confirm the absolute

path address of that new location

l 7 Now, type cd .. then hit Return to move to the parent

directory and see the prompt string change once more

l 8 Finally, type cd ~ then hit Return to go back to your

home directory and see the prompt string change again You can also use the
command cd - to return
to the previous directory
you were located in.
Getting started

Dealing wildcards
The ls command, introduced on the previous page, will list all
files and folders in the current or specified directory, except
special hidden files whose names begin with a . period character.
Typically, these are system files such as a .bashrc hidden file
in the user’s home directory containing the shell configuration
details. Hidden files can be included in the list displayed by the ls
command by adding a -a option, so the command becomes ls -a.
Optionally, a filename pattern can be supplied to the ls command
so it will list only filenames matching the specified pattern.
If you wish to delete a Special “wildcard” characters, described in the table below, can be
directory remember that used to specify the filename pattern to be matched:
it may contain hidden
files – use the ls -a
command to check. Wildcard: Matches:

? Any single character

* Any string of characters
[set] Any character in set
[!set] Any character not in set
16

The ? wildcard is used to specify a pattern that matches filenames

where only one single character may be unknown. For example,
where the ls command lists file.a, file.b, and file.exe the command
ls file.? would list only file.a and file.b – not file.exe.

More usefully, the * wildcard is used to specify a pattern that

matches filenames where multiple characters may be unknown.
For example, where ls lists img.png, pic.png, and pic.jpg the
command ls *.png would list only img.png and pic.png – not
img.jpg.
You can include a The [set] wildcard construct is used to specify a pattern that
hyphen in the set
matches a list or a range of specified characters. For example,
pattern by placing it first
or last in the list within
where the ls command lists doc.a, doc.b, doc.c, and doc.d the
the square brackets. command ls doc.[ac] would list only doc.a and doc.c – as this
pattern specifies a list of two possible extensions to be matched.
In the same directory the command ls doc.[a-c] would, however,
list doc.a, doc.b, and doc.c – as the pattern specifies a range of
three possible extensions to be matched. Placing an exclamation
mark at the start of a set pattern lists files not matched. For
example, here the command ls doc[!a-c] would list only doc.d.
...cont’d

In executing commands containing wildcards, the shell first

expands the wildcard matches and substitutes them as a list of
“arguments” to the command. So the command ls doc.[a-c] might,
in effect, become ls doc.a doc.b doc.c before the list gets printed.
This is apparent in the error message that gets displayed when no
matches are found. For example, ls non* might produce the error
message non*: No such file or directory – as non* is the argument:

l 1 Type ls at the prompt then hit Return to see all unhidden

files in the current working directory
The process of pattern

l 2 Next, type ls doc.? then hit Return to see all files named
“doc” that have a single-letter file extension
matching with wildcards
demonstrated here is
commonly known as

l
“globbing” – a reference
3 Now, type ls *.c then hit Return to see all files of any to global wildcard
name that have a “.c” file extension expansion.

l 4 Type ls *.[a-c] then hit Return to see all files of any name
that have a “.a”, “.b” or “.c” file extension

17
l 5 Now, type ls *.[!a-c] then hit Return to see all files of any
name that do not have a “.a”, “.b” or “.c” file extension

l 6 Finally, type ls non* then hit Return to see an error

message reporting no matches

Wildcards can also be

used for pathname
expansion when
specifying addresses –
for example ls ~/D*.
Getting started

Recognizing metacharacters
Just as the special wildcard characters ? * [ ] can be used to
perform pathname expansion, plain strings can be expanded using
{ } brace characters. These may contain a comma-separated list of
substrings that can be appended to a specified prefix, or prepended
to a specified suffix, or both, to generate a list of expanded strings.
The brace expansions can also be nested for complex expansion.
Additionally, brace expansion can produce a sequence of letters or
numbers by specifying a range separated by .. between the braces:
There must be no
spaces within the braces
or between the braces
l 1 At a prompt, type echo b{ad,oy} then hit Return to see
two expanded strings – appended to the specified prefix

l
and each specified prefix
and suffix. 2 Next, type echo {ge,fi}t then hit Return to see two
expanded strings – prepended to the specified suffix

l 3 Now, type echo s{i,a,o}ng then hit Return to see four

expanded strings – both appended and prepended

l 4 Type echo s{tr{i,o},a,u}ng then hit Return to see four

18

complex expanded strings – appended and prepended

l 5 Next, type echo {a..z} then hit Return to see an expanded

letter sequence of the lowercase alphabet

l 6 Finally, type echo {1..20} then hit Return to see an

expanded numeric sequence from 1 to 20

Bash version 4
introduced zero-padded
brace expansion so that
echo {001..3} produces
001 002 003.
...cont’d

The wildcards ? * [ ] and braces { } are just some examples of

“metacharacters” that have special meaning to the bash shell. The
table below lists all metacharacters that have the special meaning
described when used in commands at a shell prompt only – the
same characters can have other meanings when used in other
situations, such as in arithmetical expressions.

Metacharacter: Meaning:

~ Home directory Some of the

` Command substitution (old style) metacharacters in
this table have been
# Comment introduced already but
$ Variable expression others are described
later in this book.
& Background job
* String wildcard
( Start of subshell
) End of subshell

19
\ Escape next character
| Pipe
[ Start of wildcard set
] End of wildcard set
{ Start of command block
} End of command block
; Pipeline command separator
‘ Quote mark (strong)
“ Quote mark (weak)
Notice that the semi-
< Redirect input
colon ; character allows
> Redirect output two commands to be
/ Pathname address separator issued on the same line.
For example, type
? Single-character wildcard echo {a..z} ; echo {1..9}
! Pipeline logical NOT then hit Return.
Getting started

Quoting phrases
The metacharacters that have special meaning to the Bash shell
can be used literally, without applying their special meaning, by
enclosing them within a pair of ‘ ‘ single quote characters to form
a quoted phrase. For example, to include the name of a shell
variable in a phrase without interpreting its value:

l 1 At a prompt, type echo Processed By: $SHELL then hit

Return to see the shell variable get interpreted in output

Always enclose phrases

you want to use literally
within single quotes to
avoid interpretation.
l 2 Now, type echo ‘Processed By: $SHELL’ then hit Return to
see the shell variable printed literally in output
20

Alternatively, the significance of the leading $ metacharacter of a

shell variable can be ignored if preceded by a \ backslash character
to “escape” it from recognition as having special meaning:

l 3 At a prompt type echo Processed By: $SHELL then hit

Return to see the shell variable get interpreted in output

l 4 Now, type echo Processed By: \$SHELL then hit Return to

see the shell variable printed literally in output

The newline \n and

tab \t sequences can
be included in phrases
if preceded by a
backslash. For example,
echo \\nNEWLINE \\tTAB.
...cont’d

It is necessary to precede a single quote character with a \

backslash when it is used as an apostrophe, so it is not interpreted
as an incomplete quoted phrase. An incomplete quoted phrase or
a \ backslash at the end of a line allows a command to continue
on the next line as they escape the newline when you hit Return:

l 5 At a prompt, type echo It\’s escaped then hit Return to

see the apostrophe appear in output

l 6 Next, type echo Continued \ then hit Return, type text

written along \ then hit Return, and type several lines
then hit Return to see the continued phrase in output
Notice that the shell
prompt string changes
to a > to indicate it is
awaiting further input.

21
Double quote marks “ “ are regarded as weak by the Bash shell
as they do allow the interpretation of shell variables they enclose.
They can, however, be useful to print out a quoted string if the
entire string (and its double quotes) are enclosed in single quotes:

l 7 Type echo “Interpreted With $SHELL” then hit Return to

see the shell variable get interpreted in unquoted output

l 8 Type echo ‘“Interpreted With $SHELL”’ then hit Return to

see the shell variable printed literally in quoted output
You could alternatively
escape double quote
characters with a
backslash to print them
in output. For example,
echo \”With \$SHELL\”.
Getting started

Getting help
Bash includes an online help system for its built-in commands.
Information on all its built-in commands can be displayed using
the help command and help | more can be used to display just
one screen at a time. A command name can be specified to
discover information about that particular command:

l 1 At a prompt, type help | more then hit Return to see all

built-in bash commands and their options

The | character is a
“pipe” that allows
output to be redirected
– here output is sent
to the more command.
Pipelines are described
in detail on page 46.
22

l2 Hit Return to scroll down the screen one line at a time or

type q and hit Return to quit help and return to a prompt

Bash version 4
l3 Now, type help echo and hit Return to display
information about the Bash shell built-in echo command

introduced two new

help options; help
-d displays a short
description and help
-m displays information
in a manual page-like
format.
...cont’d

Information about all commands, both shell built-in commands

and those other commands that are actually programs located on
the filesystem, can be found on any Unix-based operating system
in the famous Manual Pages. The name of any command can
be specified to the man command to display the manual page
describing that command and its options. Alternatively, a -f option
can be used to display the location and brief description:

l 4 At a prompt, type man ps then hit Return to see the

manual page for the ps command automatically paginated
You can use the type
command, described
on page 12, to discover
whether a command
is a shell built-in or its
filesystem location.

23
l 5 Hit Return to scroll down the screen one line at a time or
type q and hit Return to return to a prompt

l 6 Now, type man -f ps and hit Return to display the

filesystem location and description of the ps command
You can also use the
info command as an
alternative to man.
Getting started

Summary
• Bash is a command interpreter shell that enables the user to
interact with the kernel of any Unix-based operating system

• and
The command displays the current process information
ps $$
can be used to confirm Bash as the current shell

• User and host

hostname
names can be displayed with the
commands
andwhoami

• AandTerminal window can be cleared using the

closed using the command
exit
command
clear

• The command can be used to determine whether a token

type
is a built-in shell command or a recognized program

• Standard input can be printed on standard output using the

shell built-in echo command

• Shell variables and

$SHELL $BASH_VERSIONstore the
filesystem location and version number of the Bash program

• The pwdcommand displays the current working directory

24

address and the command can be used to list its contents

ls

• Absolute and relative addresses, or and aliases, can be

specified to the
~ ..
command to change directory location
cd

• Wildcards , , and can be used to specify filename

? * []
patterns to match a single character, a string, or a set

• Brace expansion combines each item in a comma-separated

list within {}characters to a specified outer prefix and suffix

• Brace expansion can also produce a sequence of letters or

numbers from a range separated by within .. characters
{}

• Wildcards , , and braces

? * [] are just some examples of
{}
metacharacters that have special meaning to the Bash shell

• allows
Enclosing with single quotes or prefixing with a backslash
‘‘
metacharacters to be displayed literally
\

• Surrounding phrases with weak double quote characters

allows the shell to perform interpretation
““

• Onlinecommands
info
help can be found for any command using the
and for built-ins using the command
help
or man