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First:
In the most simple terms, the essence of free software and free culture is the freedom to fork, which is to say, to take a work, make a copy of it, and work on it as if it were your own.
The question is:
What is the form of that work?
- code
- configuration
- communication
- documentation
- (some) protocols
- (some) data
Visual programming is rare, but it exists:
- Scratch
- Piet
Usually, though, not just text, but English text with no diacritics or accents
- ASCII
- Unicode
non-Roman alphabets:
- Qalb
- dotfiles
- ini files
- plists
- "plain" text (see Unicode)
- various forms of markup
- reStructuredText
- Markdown
- HTML
- XML
- TeX
- YAML
- JSON
- SMTP
- HTTP
- SQL
- IRC
- markup (see above)
- CSV
- PDB v. mmCIF
Subscribe to my YouTube channel!
Video can be tedious to make, search, index, sit through, annotate, edit.
(maybe difficulty in editing is its one true advantage)
picture == 1K words ?
Note
They say a picture is worth a thousand words, but how many pictures does it take, for instance, to depict a novel? War and Peace miniseries 6 x 60-80 m at 24 fps? That's a lot of pictures (and audio, too!)
command line interface (CLI)
A CLI is a character addressable interface
Sometimes, but often not, linear, as such.
Also known as:
- Console
- terminal
(compare with GUI)
Unix paradigm has survived and adapted for 45 years.
Consistent, constant, stable and widespread way of interacting with the computer.
Efficient and precise. You can issue the commands to the computer, you can record it exactly, you can convey to someone else exactly.
- Editors
- Pagers
- Interpreters
- Compilers
- servers and clients (see protocols above)
- vi/vim
- emacs
- joe
- nano
- pico
- IDLE
- Jupyter/iPython
- Notepad++
- TextMate
- Atom
- pg
- more
- less
- Lisp et al
- BASIC
- Forth
- Python
- Ruby
- Lua
- R
- sqlite3
- mysql
- bash et al
- FORTRAN
- COBOL
- C/C++
- Java(ish)
- Haskell
- Go
- Rust
- Swift
(see protocols above)
- mutt
- elm
- pine
- mh
- bsd-mailx
- browser
- lynx
- w3m
- links
- IRC
- weechat
- irssi
- In Sugar: List view (Ctrl-2) -> choose the start next to Terminal activity
- Generic Linux virtual terminal: Ctrl-Alt-Fn usually for n=1..6. Switch amongst VTs with Alt-Fn. Alt-F7 back to X (the GUI).
- Terminal on MacOS
- Cygwin, gitbash, or babun (Win)
- Remote terminal via ssh, PuTTY (Win)
- Termux (Android >=5)
- pwd -- print working directory -- where am I?
- cd -- change directory -- I want to go somewhere else?
- ls -- list -- what's here?
- more -- run-of-the-mill paging, hit space to continue
- less -- advanced pager with ability to backup (b), doesn't fall off until explicit quit (q)
- pg -- a two-letter command, of course
- man ls
- apropos rename
The simplest programs: pipelines
ls -al | less
STDOUT STDIN STDERR
The pipe character '|' is used to send the output of the preceding command into the following command. Simple programs aka "one-liners".
Several commands can be strung together.
find . -maxdepth 1 -type d -name "*_files" -print0 | \
xargs -0 -n1 -i basename {} _files | \
xargs -n1 -i echo mkdir web-saved/{} \; \
mv {}_files web-saved/{} \; mv {}?* web-saved/{} > web-saved/files_files2.sh
- grep
$ /usr/share/dict/words | grep [A-Z] | less
- ^ start
- $ end
- ? single character
- * glob of characters
history -- show commands you've issued
Use up and down arrows to move around history
Use tab completion to save typing
ctrl-a to beginning of line, ctrl-e to end of line
- !n -- nth from history,
- !! -- previous from history
- !* -- 1st token from previous
- !$ -- all but 1st from previous
- ^f^b^ -- sub b for f in previous
- examples:
- nano/pico
- vi
- emacs
- survival commands: (how to exit)
- ctrl-x
- Esc Esc Esc :q!
- Ctrl-x Ctrl-c
to create or overwrite a file use >
echo foo > bar; cat barto create or add to a file use >>
echo quux >> bar; cat barSee what's going on
* ps -- list processes
* top -- show and compare resource usage
* jobs -- show jobs and their stateChange what's going on
- ctrl-c -- kill (permanent)
- ctrl-z -- suspend (temporary)
- fg -- foreground
- bg -- background
- nice -- lower priority
- time -- how long?
- kill -- end a process
example -- "Help, firefox is out of control!"
- cp -- copy
- rm -- remove -- delete CAUTION NO RECOVERY GONE FOR GOOD
- mv -- move -- also rename
Usage Examples:
- cp a way to make a backup file, say, of /etc/apt/sources.list
- rm the editor's backup files eg foo~
- mv as a way to rename image files, say, a cryptically named image file
"extended" ls commands
- dmesg -- display kernel mesages
- lsmod -- kernel modules
- lspci -- pci bus devices
- lsusb -- usb devices
- lshal -- hardware access layer
- lshw -- hardware
- dpkg -l | less -- show all packages
- dpkg -L nano | less -- show files in a package
- dpkg -S /usr/bin/nano -- this file belongs to which package?
- apt-cache search foo
- apt-get install foo
- rpm -qa -- show all packages
- rpm -ql nano | less -- show files in a package
- rpm -qf /usr/bin/nano -- this file belongs to which package?
- yum search foo
- yum install foo
- dnf
LSB /bin, /sbin, /etc, /home, /lib, /usr/bin, /usr/sbin, /usr/lib ...
System state
- df -- disk free
- du -- disk usage
- netstat -- network status
- less /proc/cpuinfo
- less /proc/meminfo
- ifconfig
- ls /var/log
- ls /etc
- echo $HOME; echo $PATH -- show two most common
- env -- show all environment variables
- set FOO=bar; echo $FOO
- advanced grep (context, case), wc, with lsmod and ps
- less -N -- numbering
- find foo -name "bar*" | xargs -n1 -i echo {} ;
- chown newuser:newuser foo changing ownership
- chmod go+r foo change access mode (permissions)
- rsync -- convergent synchronization (local or over net)
- scp -- remote (secure) copying
- ssh -- remote login
- screen & tmux -- detachable & re-attachable cli session
- others: lynx w3m wget curl links -- CL web tools
- others: head tail split cut -- slicing and dicing text
- alternate shells: csh, tcsh, ksh, zsh, ash, dash