Linux — Commands Reference

Linux — Commands Reference

Most Used Linux Commands (ByteByteGo)

File Viewing

| Command | Description | |—|—| | cat file | Print file contents | | less file | Scroll through file | | head -n 10 file | Show first lines | | tail -n 10 file | Show last lines | | echo "text" | Print text | | nano file | Simple terminal editor | | vim file | Advanced text editor |

Text Processing

| Command | Description | |—|—| | grep "pat" file | Search text patterns | | grep -R "pat" path | Recursive search | | awk 'print $1' file | Extract columns/fields | | sort file | Sort text lines | | diff file1 file2 | Compare text files |

File Management

| Command | Description | |—|—| | ls | List directory contents | | pwd | Print current directory | | cd | Change directory | | touch file | Create empty file | | mkdir dir | Create directory | | rmdir dir | Remove empty directory | | cp src dest | Copy files/directories | | mv src dest | Move/rename files | | rm | Remove files/directories | | ln -s target link | Create symbolic link | | clear | Clear terminal screen |

Permissions

| Command | Description | |—|—| | chmod 755 file | Change file permissions | | chown user:group file | Change ownership |

User Management

| Command | Description | |—|—| | whoami | Show current user | | sudo cmd | Run as root | | su - user | Switch user account | | passwd | Change user password | | useradd user | Create user account | | adduser user | Guided user creation | | exit | Exit shell/session |

Networking

| Command | Description | |—|—| | ssh user@host | Remote secure login | | scp file user@host:path | Secure file copy | | curl URL | Fetch headers quickly | | wget URL | Download from web | | ping host | Test reachability | | traceroute host | Trace route hops | | ip a | Show IP addresses | | ss -tulpn | List listening ports | | netstat -tulpn | Network ports (legacy) | | ifconfig | Interface info (legacy) | | ufw status/allow 22 | Simple firewall rules | | iptables -L | List firewall rules |

Disk & System Info

| Command | Description | |—|—| | df -h | Disk space usage | | du -sh dir | Directory size summary | | free -h | Memory usage summary | | uname -a | Kernel/system details | | cal | Show calendar | | neofetch | System info summary |

Process Management

| Command | Description | |—|—| | ps aux | List running processes | | top | Live process view | | htop | Better live process view | | kill PID | Terminate by PID | | pkill name | Kill by process name |

System Control

| Command | Description | |—|—| | systemctl status/start/stop etc | Manage system services | | reboot | Restart system | | shutdown -h now | Power off now |

Archiving

| Command | Description | |—|—| | tar -czf a.tgz dir/ | Create/extract archives | | zip -r a.zip dir/ | Create zip archive | | unzip a.zip | Extract zip archive |

Package Management

| Distro | Command | |—|—| | Debian/Ubuntu | apt | | Fedora/RHEL | dnf | | Legacy RHEL | yum | | SUSE | zypper | | Universal app packages | snap |

Help & Reference

| Command | Description | |—|—| | man cmd | Open manual page | | whatis cmd | One-line description | | which cmd | Show command path | | whereis cmd | Find binary/source | | history | Show command history |

See Also

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