Module 05

Command Line Skills

Exam Objective
2.1 Command Line Basics

Objective Description
Basics of Using the Linux Command Line
Introduction
Introduction
● This module will cover the basics of the command line such as:
○ The command line interface
○ The shell
○ Commands
○ Variables
○ Command Types
○ Quoting
○ Control Statements
Command Line Interface
Command Line Interface
● The Linux community promotes the CLI due to its power, speed and ability to
accomplish a vast array of tasks with a single command line instruction.

● The CLI provides more precise control, greater speed and the ability to automate tasks more
easily through scripting.

● By learning the CLI, a user can easily be productive almost instantly on ANY flavor or
distribution of Linux
The Shell
The Shell
● Once a user has entered a command the terminal then accepts what the user has typed and passes
to a shell.

● The CLI provides more precise control, greater speed and the ability to automate tasks more
easily through scripting.

● The shell is the command line interpreter that translates commands entered by a
user into actions to be performed by the operating system.

● The Linux environment allows the use of many different shells.

● The most commonly used shell for Linux distributions is called the Bash shell.
The Shell
● The Bash shell also has many popular features, a few of which are listed below:
○ Command line history
○ Inline editing
○ Scripting
■ The ability to place commands in a file and then interpret (effectively use Bash to execute the
contents of) the file, resulting in all of the commands being executed.

○ Aliases
■ The ability to create short nicknames for longer commands.

○ Variables
■ Used to store information for the Bash shell and for the user.
The Shell
● When a terminal application is run, and a shell appears, displaying an important part
of the interface — the prompt.
● Typically the prompt contains information about the user and the system. Below is a
common prompt structure:

sysadmin@localhost:~$

● The prompt shown contains the following information:

○ Username (sysadmin)
○ System name (localhost)
○ Current Directory (~)

The ~ symbol is used as shorthand for the user's home directory.

Commands
Commands
● A command is a software program that when executed on the CLI, performs an action
on the computer.

● To execute a command, the first step is to type the name of the command.

● If you type ls and hit Enter. The result should resemble the example below:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls
Desktop Documents Downloads Music Pictures Public Templates Videos
Commands
● Some commands require additional input to run correctly.

● This additional input comes in two forms: options and arguments.

○ Options are used to modify the core behavior of a command.
○ Arguments are used to provide additional information (such as a filename or a username).

● The typical format for a command is as follows:

command [options] [arguments]

Arguments
Commands
command [options] [arguments]

● An argument can be used to specify something for the command to act upon.

● If the ls command is given the name of a directory as an argument, it lists the

contents of that directory:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls /etc/ppp
ip-down.d ip-up.d

● Some commands (such as ls) accept multiple arguments:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls /etc/ppp /etc/ssh

Options
Options
command [options] [arguments]

● Options can be used with commands to expand or modify the way a command behaves.

● For example, using the -l option of the ls command results in a long listing, providing additional
information about the files that are listed.
sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls -l
total 0
drwxr-xr-x 1 sysadmin sysadmin 0 Jan 29 2015 Desktop
drwxr-xr-x 1 sysadmin sysadmin 0 Jan 29 2015 Documents
Output Omitted...

● Often the character is chosen to be mnemonic for its purpose, like choosing the letter l for long
or r for reverse.
Options
● Options can be used in conjunction with other options:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls -lr

● Options are often single letters; however, sometimes they are words or phrases as well.
● Typically, older commands use single letters while newer commands use complete words for
options.
○ Single-letter options are preceded by a single dash - character, like the -h option.
○ Full-word options are preceded by two dash -- characters like the full-word form of the -h option, the --
human-readable option
Command History
● When a command is executed in the terminal, it is stored in a history list.

● This makes it easy to execute the same command later eliminating the need to
retype the entire command.
● Pressing the Up Arrow ↑ key displays the previous command on the prompt line.
● To view the entire history list of a terminal, use the history command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ history
1 date
2 ls
3 cal 5 2030
4 history
Command History
● If the desired command is in the list that the history command generates, it can be executed
by typing an exclamation point ! character and then the number next to the command (i.e., !3)

● If the history command is passed a number as an argument, it outputs that number of previous
commands from the history list.
sysadmin@localhost:~$ history 3
6 date
7 ls /home
8 history 3

● To execute the most recent command type !! and hit Enter:

● To execute the most recent iteration of a specific command, type !command and hit Enter.
Variables
Variables
● A variable is a feature that allows the user or the shell to store data.

● Variables are given names and stored temporarily in memory.

● There are two types of variables used in the Bash shell, local and
environment.
Local Variables
● Local or shell, variables exist only in the current shell. When the user closes a terminal window or
shell, all of the variables are lost.

● To set the value of a variable, use the following assignment expression.

variable=value

● The following example creates a local variable named variable1 and assigns it a value of
Something:
sysadmin@localhost:~$ variable1='Something'

● To display the value of the variable, use a dollar sign $ character followed by the variable name
as an argument to the echo command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo $variable1

Something
Environment Variables
● Environment variables, also called global variables, are available system-wide.

● Examples include the PATH, HOME, and HISTSIZE variables.

● The command in the example below displays the value of the HISTSIZE variable:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo $HISTSIZE

​ 1000
‌

● The env command outputs a list of the environment variables.

● The export command is used to turn a local variable into an environment variable.
sysadmin@localhost:~$ export variable1
sysadmin@localhost:~$ env | grep variable1
variable1=Something

● Exported variables can be removed using the unset command:

Path Variable
● One of the most important Bash shell variables to understand is
the PATH variable.
● The PATH variable lists all the places that the system can look for programs
to execute.

● The following command displays the path of the current shell:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo $PATH
/
home/sysadmin/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/g
ames

● If the command is not found in any directory listed in the PATH variable,

then the shell returns a command not found error.
Command Types
Command Types
● The type command can be used to determine information about command type.

type command

● There are several different sources of commands within the shell of your CLI:
○ Internal commands
○ External commands
○ Aliases
○ Functions
Internal Commands
● Also called built-in commands, these commands are built into the shell itself.

● A good example is the cd  (change directory) command as it is part of the Bash shell.

● The type command identifies the cd command as an internal command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ type cd
cd is a shell builtin
External Commands
● External commands are stored in files that are searched by the shell.

● It can be beneficial to know where the shell is finding the command or which version
it is using.

● The which command searches for the location of a command by searching

the PATH variable.

sysadmin@localhost:~$ which ls
/bin/ls
sysadmin@localhost:~$ which cal
/usr/bin/cal
External Commands
● External commands can be executed by typing the complete path to the command.
sysadmin@localhost:~$ /bin/ls

Desktop Documents Downloads Music Pictures Public Templates Videos

● For external commands, the type command displays the location of the command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ type cal

cal is /usr/bin/cal

● To display all locations that contain the command name, use the -a option to the
type command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ type -a echo

Aliases
● An alias can be used to map longer commands to shorter key sequences.

● For example, the command ls -l is commonly aliased to l or ll.

● To determine what aliases are set on the current shell use the alias command:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ alias
alias egrep='egrep --color=auto'
alias fgrep='fgrep --color=auto'
Output Omitted...

● The type command can identify aliases to other commands:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ type ll
ll is aliased to `ls -alF'
Functions
● Functions can also be built using existing commands to:

○ Create new commands

○ Override commands built-in to the shell or commands stored in files

● Aliases and functions are normally loaded from the initialization files when the shell first starts.
Quoting
Double Quotes
● Double quotes stop the shell from interpreting some metacharacters, including glob characters.

Glob characters, also called wild cards, are symbols that have special meaning to the shell (i.e, *, ?).

● This is useful when you want to display something on the screen that is normally a
special character to the shell.
● In the example below, the Bash shell doesn't convert the glob pattern into filenames
that match the pattern (like it normally does):

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo "The glob characters are *, ? and [ ]"

The glob characters are *, ? and [ ]
● Double quotes still allow for command substitution, variable substitution, and permit some other
shell metacharacters (i.e., the PATH variable)
Single Quotes
● Single quotes prevent the shell from doing any interpreting of special characters, including
globs, variables, command substitution and other metacharacters.

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo The car costs $100

The car costs 00
sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo 'The car costs $100'
The car costs $100
Backslash Character
● A technique to essentially single quote a single character is to use the backslash character \.
● If the phrase below is placed in single quotes, $1and $PATH are not variables:
sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo "The service costs $1 and the path is $PATH"
‌he service costs and the path is
​T
/usr/bin/custom:/home/sysadmin/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin
:/usr/games

● What if you want to have $PATH treated as a variable and $1 not?

● In this case, use a backslash \ character in front of the dollar sign $ character to prevent the
shell from interpreting it:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo The service costs \$1 and the path is $PATH
The service costs $1 and the path is
/usr/bin/custom:/home/sysadmin/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bi
n:/usr/games
Backquotes
● Backquotes, or backticks, are used to specify a command within a command, a
process called command substitution.

● Note the output of the echo Today is date command line:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo Today is date
Today is date

● To execute the date command so the output of that command is sent to

the echo command, put the date command inside of two backquotes:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ echo Today is `date`

Today is Mon Nov 4 03:40:04 UTC 2030
Control Statements
Control Statements
● Control statements allow you to use multiple commands at once or run additional
commands.

● Control statements include:

○ Semicolon (;)
○ Double ampersand (&&)
○ Double pipe (||)
Control Statements
● The semicolon can be used to run multiple commands, one after the other:
sysadmin@localhost:~$ cal 1 2015; cal 2 2015; cal 3 2015

● The double ampersand && acts as a logical "and" if the first command is successful, then the
second command (to the right of the &&) will also run:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls /etc/xml && echo success

catalog catalog.old xml-core.xml xml-core.xml.old
success

● The double pipe || is a logical "or". It works similarly to &&; depending on the result of the first
command, the second command will either run or be skipped:

sysadmin@localhost:~$ ls /etc/junk || echo failed

ls: cannot access /etc/junk: No such file or directory
failed