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​User and Group Management

●​ useradd - Add a new user​

●​ usermod - Modify user account​

●​ userdel - Delete a user​

●​ groupadd - Add a new group​

●​ groupdel - Delete a group​

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●​ chgrp - Change group ownership of a file​
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●​ passwd - Change user password​

●​ Who - Who is logged in

2. File and Directory Management

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●​ ls - List directory contents​

●​ cd - Change directory​
N

●​ pwd - Print working directory​

●​ mkdir - Make a new directory​

●​ rmdir - Remove a directory​

●​ rm - Remove files or directories​

●​ cp - Copy files or directories​

●​ mv - Move or rename files or directories​

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●​ touch - Create empty files​

●​ find - Search for file in a directory hierarchy​

●​ locate- Find files by name

3. File Management

●​ cat - Concatenate and display file contents​

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●​ more - View file content page by page​
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●​ less - View file content with navigation​

●​ head - View the first part of a file​

●​ tail - View the last part of a file​

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●​ nano - Text editor to edit files​

●​ vi - Text editor to edit files​

●​ touch - Create an empty file or update file timestamp​

N

●​ ln - Create hard or symbolic links​

●​ file - Determine file type​

●​ stat - Display file or file system status​

●​ find - Search for files in a directory hierarchy​

●​ locate - Find files by name (using a database)​

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●​ updatedb - Update the database used by locate​

●​ xargs - Build and execute command lines from standard

input

4. File Permissions and Ownership

●​ chmod - Change file permissions​

●​ chown - Change file owner and group​

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●​ chgrp - Change group ownership​
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●​ umask - Set file creation mask​

●​ getfacl - Get file access control lists (ACL)​

●​ setfacl - Set file access control lists (ACL)​

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●​ ls -l - List files with detailed permissions, owner, and group​

●​ stat - Display file or file system status​

●​ acl - View or modify Access Control Lists (ACL) on files

N

5. Disk Management

●​ df - Display free disk space​

●​ du - Estimate file space usage​

●​ fdisk - Partition table manipulator​

●​ parted - A tool for creating and managing disk partitions​

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●​ lsblk - List information about block devices​

●​ blkid - Find or display block device attributes​

●​ mount - Mount a file system​

●​ umount - Unmount a file system​

●​ mkfs - Create a file system​

●​ fsck - Check and repair file systems​

●​ tune2fs - Adjust tunable file system parameters​

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●​ resize2fs - Resize an ext2, ext3, or ext4 file system​
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●​ lvcreate - Create a logical volume​

●​ vgcreate - Create a volume group​

●​ pvcreate - Prepare a physical volume for LVM​

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●​ lsattr - List file attributes on a file system​

●​ chattr - Change file attributes on a file system

N

6. Process Management

●​ ps - Display current processes​

●​ top - Display dynamic process information​

●​ htop - Interactive process viewer​

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●​ kill - Terminate a process by ID​

●​ killall - Kill all processes by name​

●​ bg - Resume a suspended process in the background​

●​ fg - Bring a process to the foreground​

●​ nice - Set process priority​

●​ renice - Change the priority of running processes​

●​ jobs - List active jobs​

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●​ pgrep - Search for processes by name or other attributes​
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●​ pkill - Kill processes by name or other attributes​

●​ pstree - Display processes in a tree format​

●​ lsof - List open files and the processes that opened them​
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●​ strace - Trace system calls and signals​

●​ timeout - Run a command with a time limit​

●​ watch - Execute a program periodically and show output

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7. Network Management

●​ ifconfig - Display and configure network interfaces​

●​ ip a - Show all network interfaces and their IPs​

●​ ip r - Display the routing table​

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●​ ip link set <interface> up/down - Enable or disable a
network interface​

●​ ping <host> - Send ICMP echo request to check connectivity​

●​ traceroute <host> - Trace the route packets take to a

network host​

●​ netstat -tulnp - Show open ports and listening services​

●​ ss -tulnp - Display socket statistics and listening services​

●​ hostname -I - Show the system’s IP address​

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●​ dig <domain> - Query DNS records​
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●​ nslookup <domain> - Lookup DNS details​

●​ whois <domain> - Get domain registration details​

●​ curl -I <URL> - Fetch HTTP headers from a website​

●​ wget <URL> - Download files from the web​

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●​ scp <file> user@host:/path - Securely copy files over
SSH​

●​ rsync -avz <src> <dest> - Sync files between local and

remote locations​
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●​ tcpdump -i eth0 - Capture network packets on an interface​

●​ nmap <IP> - Scan a network for open ports

8. System and Monitoring

●​ uptime - Show system uptime and load average​

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●​ dmesg - Print system boot and hardware logs​

●​ free -m - Display memory usage in MB​

●​ vmstat - Report system performance statistics​

●​ iostat - Display CPU and disk I/O statistics​

●​ mpstat - Show CPU usage per core​

●​ top - Display dynamic process and system information​

●​ htop - Interactive process and resource monitoring​

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●​ sar -u 5 10 - Monitor CPU usage at 5-second intervals​
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●​ iotop - Display disk read/write usage per process​

●​ lsof - List open files by processes​

●​ watch -n 2 <command> - Run a command every 2 seconds​

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●​ journalctl -xe - View system logs with extended details​

●​ systemctl status <service> - Check the status of a

service​

●​ service <service> status - View service status (legacy

N

systems)​

●​ df -h - Show disk space usage in a human-readable format​

●​ du -sh <directory> - Display the size of a directory​

●​ ps aux --sort=-%mem - List processes sorted by memory

usage​

●​ netstat -tulnp - Show active network connections and

listening services

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 9. Text Processing

●​ cat <file> - Display file contents​

●​ tac <file> - Display file contents in reverse order​

●​ head -n <num> <file> - Show the first <num> lines of a file​

●​ tail -n <num> <file> - Show the last <num> lines of a file​

●​ tail -f <file> - Continuously display new lines in a file​

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●​ grep '<pattern>' <file> - Search for a pattern in a file​
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●​ grep -r '<pattern>' <directory> - Recursively search
for a pattern in a directory​

●​ awk '{print $1, $2}' <file> - Process and extract

columns from a file​
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●​ sed 's/old/new/g' <file> - Replace text in a file​

●​ cut -d':' -f1 <file> - Extract specific fields from a file​

●​ sort <file> - Sort file contents​

N

●​ uniq <file> - Remove duplicate lines from a file​

●​ wc -l <file> - Count lines in a file​

●​ wc -w <file> - Count words in a file​

●​ wc -c <file> - Count bytes in a file​

●​ tr 'a-z' 'A-Z' <file> - Convert lowercase to uppercase​

●​ diff <file1> <file2> - Compare two files line by line​

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 ●​ cmp <file1> <file2> - Compare two files byte by byte​

●​ tee <file> - Read from standard input and write to both a

file and standard output

10. Package Management

For Debian-based systems (Ubuntu, Debian)

●​ apt update - Update package lists​

●​ apt upgrade - Upgrade all installed packages​

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●​ apt install <package> - Install a package​
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●​ apt remove <package> - Remove a package​

●​ apt purge <package> - Remove a package and its config

files​

●​ dpkg -i <package>.deb - Install a .deb package​

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●​ dpkg -r <package> - Remove a package installed via dpkg​

●​ dpkg -l - List installed packages​

●​ apt-cache search <package> - Search for a package​

N

●​ apt autoremove - Remove unnecessary packages​

●​ apt clean - Clear the package cache​

For RHEL-based systems (CentOS, Rocky Linux, AlmaLinux,

Fedora)

●​ yum update - Update installed packages (for older systems)​

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 ●​ dnf update - Update installed packages (for newer systems)​

●​ yum install <package> - Install a package​

●​ dnf install <package> - Install a package (newer distros)​

●​ yum remove <package> - Remove a package​

●​ dnf remove <package> - Remove a package (newer distros)​

●​ rpm -ivh <package>.rpm - Install an .rpm package​

●​ rpm -e <package> - Remove an installed .rpm package​

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●​ yum list installed - List installed packages​
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●​ dnf list installed - List installed packages (newer
distros)​

●​ yum search <package> - Search for a package​

●​ dnf search <package> - Search for a package (newer

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distros)​

●​ yum clean all - Clean cached package data

11. Archive and Compression

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Working with tar files

●​ tar -cvf archive.tar <files> - Create a tar archive​

●​ tar -xvf archive.tar - Extract a tar archive​

●​ tar -tvf archive.tar - List files in a tar archive​

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 ●​ tar -czvf archive.tar.gz <files> - Create a
compressed tar.gz archive​

●​ tar -xzvf archive.tar.gz - Extract a tar.gz archive​

●​ tar -cJvf archive.tar.xz <files> - Create a tar.xz

archive​

●​ tar -xJvf archive.tar.xz - Extract a tar.xz archive​

Working with zip files

●​ zip archive.zip <files> - Create a zip archive​

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●​ unzip archive.zip - Extract a zip archive​
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●​ unzip -l archive.zip - List contents of a zip file​

●​ zip -r archive.zip <directory> - Zip a directory​

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Working with gzip & bzip2

●​ gzip <file> - Compress a file using gzip​

●​ gunzip <file>.gz - Decompress a gzip file​

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●​ bzip2 <file> - Compress a file using bzip2​

●​ bunzip2 <file>.bz2 - Decompress a bzip2 file

12. Shutdown and Reboot

●​ shutdown -h now - Shutdown the system immediately​

●​ shutdown -h +10 - Shutdown the system in 10 minutes​

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●​ shutdown -h 22:00 - Schedule shutdown at 10:00 PM​

●​ shutdown -c - Cancel a scheduled shutdown​

●​ poweroff - Immediately power off the system​

●​ halt - Halt the system​

●​ reboot - Reboot the system immediately​

●​ shutdown -r now - Reboot the system immediately​

●​ shutdown -r +5 - Reboot the system in 5 minutes​

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●​ systemctl reboot - Reboot using systemd
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13. Task Scheduling

●​ crontab -e - Edit cron jobs for the current user​

●​ crontab -l - List scheduled cron jobs​

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●​ crontab -r - Remove all cron jobs for the current user​

●​ crontab -u <user> -l - List cron jobs for a specific user

●​ at <time> - Schedule a command to run at specified time

N

14. System Diagnostics and Troubleshooting

●​ journalctl -xe - View detailed system logs​

●​ journalctl -f - Follow live logs in real-time​

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●​ journalctl --since "1 hour ago" - View logs from the
last hour​

●​ dmesg | less - View system boot logs​

●​ dmesg | grep error - Check for errors in system logs​

●​ cat /var/log/syslog - View general system logs

(Debian-based)​

●​ cat /var/log/messages - View general system logs

(RHEL-based)​

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●​ uptime - Show system uptime and load​

●​ free -m - Display available and used memory in MB​

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●​ top - Monitor real-time CPU, memory, and process usage​

●​ htop - Interactive system monitoring (if installed)​

●​ vmstat 1 5 - Display system performance stats​

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●​ iostat - Show CPU and disk usage statistics
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