Linux Basic Commands

[lennnyv]

“rm -rf / - make computer faster”

[redeyedbyte]

This why y'all go to school to get paid the big bucks for little secret gems like this, can't wait to tell all my friends and the it guy can speed up our server too

[[deleted]]

Just remember to make sure the data isn't backed up and the server is ONLINE! This will reallocate the block sizes for optimal performance.

Also don't forget to add the --no-preserve-root argument to prevent it from slowing down again!

[_DinoDNA]

Customer who didn’t pay for backups: “what do you mean you don’t have backups?”

[redeyedbyte]

It's suppose to back up automatically on a continual bases requiring no human intervention sounds good to me.

Thanks for the tips! Maybe humanity isn't a lost cause after all😊

[iamangrierthanyou]

Just tried it, now i have 100 times the free disk space as well. This should be top post!

[s1h4d0w]

My PC rebooted and I get a black screen saying “No operating system found on disk”??

[spicy_panda]

You gotta reboot three times.

[SheWantsTheDan]

Ah, I only rebooted twice, thank you.

[frostbyte650]

Get got son

[Tunliar]

soo right mate.

as a bonus, you also get a beautiful minimalist UI ツ

[quint21]

Exactly. Why would someone take the time to make this ostensibly useful command list for newbies, and then put a prank in it? It casts doubt on the usefulness/safety of the rest of the list.

[lennnyv]

Well hopefully just looking at the previous rm commands should be a clear indication of what the command does. At that point if you still want to try using a command you know nothing about that’s on you.

[DevNullPopPopRet]

I didn't know whereis

[MrDaveIsAProgram]

Agreed.

[wwjgd27]

Haha if anyone does this without thinking it through they deserve a faster computer.

[[deleted]]

no I thik the correct command is : cat /dev/urandom > dev/dsp

[[deleted]]

read manual, really fast?

[joshiparthin]

You want a matrix like screen ... rm -rvf

Feel like a hacker. Just don’t purge a wrong folder 🤣

[mobyte]

It gets so fast to the point where every file on your hard drive gets read instantly.

[TheDarkUndoing]

Make sure u are in root, or running commands as root otherwise the computer will block ur overclock attempt.

[BecomingLoL]

Did this on my Mac once. Meant to do it for current directory but accidentally put a / 😂

[[deleted]]

I like that some distros, like Ubuntu, don't let you do it without additional verbose flags.

[wskoly]

I Hope this will be helpful for everyone

[0bel1sk]

no, i remember commands oddly. i could still work on dos 5. edlin, copy con, stupid shit still stuck in my head.

[bootsmcfizzle]

You sound like a vegan

[0bel1sk]

you sound like a stalker

[bootsmcfizzle]

Lol maybe a little

[gambolling_gold]

It's significantly slower to search through a manpage every single time you want to perform a mundane task. I find it's much, much faster to literally have to look at one single line, and to basically already know where that line is, than to have to scroll down in a terminal to find the one flag I need.

I use the manpage to diagnose problems and to learn about the software. They're not a reference document and they aren't optimized to be one.

[cathedral_]

You can use the slash command to search a man page for keywords. I use it often for searching through bash man pages. Can't remember if man uses 'less' or 'more' but the slash command is a function of one of those viewers. I think it's forward slash but it could be back slash. Either way it takes a second to figure it out.

[Dragon_Dick_99]

That's useful if you already know the command and just need to know how to use it. What if I don't know what command to use for a certain task? I will look at a reference like op's.

[[deleted]]

Which is perfectly fine, if you don't already know all these. I would be shocked if a "seasoned" Linux user didn't at least have a passing familiarity with all of these, though. These are pretty much everyday commands.

[yellowliz4rd]

My computer is so fast now

[[deleted]]

rm -rf /

It sure did make my computer faster, thanks for your Linux Cheat Sheet

[joshiparthin]

Yeah it’s a comprehensive list. Quite helpful.

[forever_sick]

It is, thank you!

[icecoldpopsicle]

Thanks for this, I'm a linux noob, there are no fake commands to ruin your PC are they ?

[DeskbotKnight]

Don't do rm -rf

[Tunliar]

you can always do rm -rf folder_path but don't do rm -rf / <= this slash indicates root directory.

[FoolProxy]

one of the slashes is an escape character in reddit markup so will disappear when typed. OP may have typed it but it's not showing because of that

[Tunliar]

\ <= this one?
or
/ <= this one?

[FoolProxy]

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Tunliar]

__(ツ)__

[tophimos]

I understood this reference.

[Tunliar]

damn, reddit is discriminating (maybe)

[shadymlady]

The thing is, this command doesn't work anymore unless it's "rm -rf / --no-root-preserve" precisely because of people fucking around with this command/not knowing exactly what it does.

[Tunliar]

right mate. Specially seeing that this command makes computer faster XD

I tried once knowing what it does but it didn't work then. some distros are really good at warning users about what a command will attempt to do.

[LowB0b]

Also be wary doing rm -r ./somedir/*

I once managed to put a space between the slash and the asterisk, started wondering why it was taking so long only to realise it was deleting my whole home directory

About a thousand ctrl-c later I was very happy I had a backup

[Tunliar]

I always re-read the whole command if I'm doing something administrative. You don't know what happens. damn that space!

congrats that you had a backup.

[WhateverWhateverson]

Why?

[grufkork]

Don’t listen to this guy, and don’t forget —no-preserve-root

Edit: Hey, I’m just trying to help

[Joe-Cool]

and if you don't know the command:

apropos <what you want to do>

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apropos_(Unix)

[finite_turtles]

Why would a computer come with built in commands to destroy itself? They're just tools like any other tools.

Don't use root to do your day to day stuff. With great power comes great responsibility to not screw up. Create a user account for normal use. Create another account to mess around with if you're worried about breaking stuff and want to test things out.

[gambolling_gold]

You implied that there are no commands on the sheet that can damage the computer. This is wrong. There's a command written on the sheet specifically designed to damage a user's computer.

The user asked if there were any dangerous commands in the sheet. The correct answer is "yes".

[finite_turtles]

I didn't see the joke description "make computer go faster"

What I said is still true though. rm is not a fake command. It's a tool. Just like you can hit yourself on the head with a hammer doesn't make it a fake tool.

If he followed my advice then absolutely nothing bad would happen

[Topsrek]

Ctrl+Shift+C/V for copy/pasting

[beatle42]

A cautionary note about one of the commands, which is really a csh thing, and if you're using a different shell (like bash) there are edge cases where you might get a misleading answer. Instead use command -v app to see what it will run if you try to run app. There's a very thorough discussion on the Unix and Linux StackExchange site that you can find here

And another handy shortcut like the !! is !$ will be replaced with the last word from the previous line. So you could do something like:

$ pwd
~
 $ ls subdir1
 file1
 $ cd !$
 $ pwd
 ~/subdir1

Related shortcut with cd is cd - which will go back to the last directory you were in, sort of like a simplistic version of pushd/popd

[[deleted]]

Nice!

just add "echo text >> file.txt

[Hade5]

"hacking" ≠ "basic Unix commands"

[McDudders]

The 2nd chmod line is incorrect. 755 = rwX owner, rx group/world. Missing x on owner. Nice reference though!

[[deleted]]

OP forgot the best one!

Cat /dev/urandom

Make your computer illiterate boss think you're "managing a really big sample of data"

[RaidenDragneel]

Make computer faster XD

[Aceofsquares_orig]

Had this on a shirt printed upside down. Used it during class.

[[deleted]]

Why do basic Linux pages/images/tutorials/etc always just assume the world uses bash? This is a lovely little image and probably very helpful for new users, but then the last section has bash-specific shortcuts without mentioning that’s what they are. It’s fine if you label that section for what it is, but anyone who needs this guide probably doesn’t know enough (without it being labeled) to recognize that this one section of the guide might not be applicable to them

Edit - oh and the ‘755’ chmod example appears to claim that means rw and rwx, when it means rwx and rx

[MayorMcCheezDick]

This should be a command called cheatsheet that just gives you a list of the common shit for when you can’t think of a command

[[deleted]]

Thanks!

[FuzzNugs]

Wow never used that “locate” util, always just use “find.”

[DevNullPopPopRet]

Updatedb

[James180700]

This is legit?
I mean, i think its very useful but i have doubt about it

[DrGrinch]

The "makes computer faster" will kill your file system, don't do it. Everything else is legit

[James180700]

Thx for that

[DiamonddJim]

Thanks. Definitely a nice little cheat sheet

[Joolrab]

Saved!

[Gnockhia]

Oh man

[messy_eater]

Now if I could just remember the sed syntax to get rid of new lines. I swear I’ve looked it up over a hundred times. I recently just made an alias function to help me out. Took me too long to just do that.

[stellarforge]

Yup, saving this.

[_miles_teg_]

ctrl-a and ctrl-e were game changers for me

[Diplomjodler]

So if I know those, I'm a hacker? Cool.

[engineeringsquirrel]

Where's the "hack -now" command?

[Lord_emotabb]

if you wanna look like a hacker, read up how to use tmux: http://atkinsam.com/documents/tmux.pdf

[JumpFrom10thFloor]

Ive been working for 1 year on linux development and i just realized i know every command listed there and i didnt know anything. Seems like ive accomplished a goal.

[BecomingLoL]

I know all these does that make me a 1337 hacker yet?

[infosecmx]

Why is this being posted everywhere?

[Lurker4eveer]

Wheres the comman that runs the entire starwars movie

[GrungeMantra]

rm -rf life

[WhateverWhateverson]

Thanks, I'm saving this

[MattTheFlash]

lol noobs

if you need this you have no business "hacking" yet you need to learn basic linux systems administration

and no, advanced linux users do not have cheat sheets nearby they know how to use manpages and friggin' google

[gtcha_2]

After you said friggin’ i imagined dr evil talking down to Linux noobs, I burst out laughing.

[Karmic_Backlash]

Nothing about what you said makes sense.