Learn All Basic Linux Commands in 5 Minutes With Examples

Being as a sever administrator or DevOps engineer or DBA, you must learn all basic Linux commands. Here I am going to tell you all basic Linux commands which you must know if you are thinking to work on Linux as your primary operating system.

ls

ls command will list all files and folders in current directory.

ll

ll command will also show all the files and folders in current directory but it also tells some extra information(permissions, creation date and time, size, owner etc.) about files/folders. 

pwd
pwd command will tell the path of current directory.

mkdir 
mkdir will create a new folder in current directory.

cp 
cp command will copy and paste your file/folder to destination directory. 

cp targetFile/  PathToDestinationFolder/ 

If you have to copy a directory(folder) then you also need to type ‘-r’ for recursion, it will tell that the directory and all files and folder in that directory will be copied.

cp -r targetFolder/  PathToDestinationFolder/

mv   
mv command will move file/folder from current directory to destination directory.

cp targetFile/  PathToDestinationFolder/ 




rm 
rm command will remove files/folders.

rm fileName

If you have to remove a directory(folder) then you also need to type ‘-r’ for recursion, it will tell that the directory and all files and folder in that directory will be deleted.

rm -r targetFolder/ 

chmod 
Sometimes you have to deal with permission of files and folders so that operations(read, write, execute) could be performed with appropriate permissions.

chmod permissionCode Folder/File 

touch
touch command is used to create a new file.

touch fileName 

vi 
On linux, you can use vi editor to create and edit files.

There are some other commands(Example: wq! | dd | sift+g) you need to learn in order to work with vi editor.

ssh 
This command is frequently used when you work with server. ssh makes connection of your remote device to with servers.

ssh -i privateKey.pem  username@ipAddress

scp 
scp command is used when you have to copy something from remote device to server or server to remote device.

scp -i privateKey.pem fileName.txt  username@public_DNS:~/. ; 

history 
This command will print all commands typed in past.
history

To clear all history type –
history -c

grep
This command will help you in finding a particular data in a group of data. This is really useful command for devops.

Example: I typed ll to list all files and folders in a directory. Now I want to find a particular file.

 

I typed “ll | grep aws”

It will list only those files which contains word “aws”.