http://blog.kineticweb.com/articles/2007/07/22/command-line-tips-part-i-simple-key-bindings en-us 40 Musings from a Ruby on Rails development team <p>Working on the command line can seem daunting and slow. With a few handy tips working on the command line can be productive and efficient.</p> <p>This entry is the first of a few to cover some of the command line techniques I use to be more productive on the command line.</p> <p>Before we get started, there are two things I should cover.</p> <ol> <li>It&#8217;s all bash/ sh. Other shells are great, but I don&#8217;t know them. Bash is pretty much the default in Linux distros these days, which is probably why I wound up learning it.</li> <li>This is geared toward the beginner, and is aimed at interactive use as opposed to programming.</li> <li>[ctrl] commands are a simultaenous press. Press both keys at the same time.</li> <li>[esq] commands require that you press escape, then let off, then press the next key.</li> </ol> <p>The most general key bindings used in bash are for history navigation and command editing. The ones I commonly use are:</p> <table> <tr> <td>[arrow up] or [ctrl]-p </td> <td> Move back in command history </td> </tr> <tr> <td>[arrow down] or [ctrl]-n</td> <td> Move forward in command history</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[ctrl]-a</td> <td>move cursor to begining of line</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[ctrl]-e</td> <td>move cursor to end of line</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[ctrl]-k</td> <td>erase to end of line</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[esq]-b</td> <td>skip back one word</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[esq]-f</td> <td>skip forward one word</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[esq]-d</td> <td>erase word to right of cursor</td> </tr> <tr> <td>[ctrl]-r</td> <td>backward history search*</td> </tr> </table> <p>The [ctrl]-r requires some explanation.</p> <p>When you hit [ctrl]-r, you are in a history search mode, typing further characters performs an auto-complete style search of your command history.</p> <p>By typing &#8216;if&#8217; at this prompt, I find that I have a match &#8217;/sbin/ifconfig -a&#8217;, which I&#8217;d recently executed.</p> <pre> (reverse-i-search)`': (reverse-i-search)`if': /sbin/ifconfig -a </pre> <p>Pressing enter then executes the command. Other keys like cursor navigation will bring you back to regular command prompt mode, and allow you to edit the command.</p> <p>Good luck and have fun!</p> Sun, 22 Jul 2007 11:26:00 -0400 urn:uuid:0689e0a6-9f88-436c-b8f7-01704caadb09 Andy Libby http://blog.kineticweb.com/articles/2007/07/22/command-line-tips-part-i-simple-key-bindings CLI http://blog.kineticweb.com/articles/trackback/48 This is a great list! Thanks, Andy. When I first learned a few of these a month or two ago, my command-line productivity skyrocketed!! Thu, 26 Jul 2007 07:14:27 -0400 urn:uuid:083b28f1-27d6-4a48-b56c-d6964d1eb757 http://blog.kineticweb.com/articles/2007/07/22/command-line-tips-part-i-simple-key-bindings#comment-85