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{{Related|Command-line shell}}
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{{Related|pacman}}
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{{Related|GNU}}
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{{Related|Securely wipe disk#shred}}
{{Related|File permissions and attributes}}
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This article deals with so-called ''core'' utilities on a GNU/Linux system, such as ''less'', ''ls'', and ''grep''. The scope of this article includes, but is not limited to, those utilities included with the GNU {{Pkg|coreutils}} package. What follows are various tips and tricks and other helpful information related to these utilities.
''Core utilities'' are the basic, fundamental tools of a [[GNU]]/[[Linux]] system. On Arch Linux they are found in the {{Grp|base}} group. This article provides an incomplete overview of them, links their documentation and describes useful alternatives. The scope of this article includes, but is not limited to, the [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/coreutils.html GNU coreutils]. Most core utilities are traditional [[Wikipedia:Unix|Unix]] tools (see [[Heirloom]]) and many were standardized by [[Wikipedia:POSIX|POSIX]] but have been developed further to provide more features.


Most command-line interfaces are documented in [[man page]]s, utilities by the [[GNU Project]] are documented in [[Info manual]]s, some [[shell]]s provide a {{ic|help}} command for [[shell]] builtin commands. Additionally most commands print their usage when run with the {{ic|--help}} flag.
Most command-line interfaces are documented in [[man page]]s, utilities by the [[GNU Project]] are documented in [[Info manual]]s, some [[shell]]s provide a {{ic|help}} command for [[shell]] builtin commands. Additionally most commands print their usage when run with the {{ic|--help}} flag.


== File management ==
== Essentials ==


{| class="wikitable"
The following table lists some important commands, Arch Linux users should be familiar with. See also {{man|1|intro}}.
! Command
 
! Description
{| class=wikitable
! Manual page
! Package !! Command !! Description !! Documentation !! Alternatives
! Example
|-
| shell built-ins || cd || change directory || {{man|1p|cd}}
|-
|rowspan=12| GNU {{Pkg|coreutils}}
| ls || list directory || {{man|1|ls}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/ls-invocation.html info] || {{Pkg|exa}}, {{Pkg|tree}}
|-
| cat || concatenate files to stdout || {{man|1|cat}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/cat-invocation.html info] || {{man|1|tac}}
|-
| mkdir || make directory || {{man|1|mkdir}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/mkdir-invocation.html info]
|-
| rmdir || remove empty directory || {{man|1|rmdir}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/rmdir-invocation.html info]
|-
| rm || remove files or directories || {{man|1|rm}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/rm-invocation.html info] || [[shred]]
|-
| cp || copy files or directories || {{man|1|cp}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/cp-invocation.html info]
|-
| mv || move files or directories || {{man|1|mv}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/mv-invocation.html info]
|-
| ln || make hard or symbolic links || {{man|1|ln}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/ln-invocation.html info]
|-
| [[chown]] || change file owner and group || {{man|1|chown}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/chown-invocation.html info] || {{man|1|chgrp}}
|-
|-
| cd
| [[chmod]] || change file permissions || {{man|1|chmod}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/chmod-invocation.html info]
| Change directory (shell built-in command)
| {{man|1p|cd}}
| cd /etc/pacman.d
|-
|-
| mkdir
| [[dd]] || convert and copy a file || {{man|1|dd}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/dd-invocation.html info]
| Create a directory
| {{man|1|mkdir}}
| mkdir ~/newfolder
|-
|-
| rmdir
| df || report file system disk space usage || {{man|1|df}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/df-invocation.html info]
| Remove empty directory
| {{man|1|rmdir}}
| rmdir ~/emptyfolder
|-
|-
| rm
| GNU {{Pkg|tar}} || [[tar]] || tar archiver || {{man|1|tar}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/tar/manual/html_chapter/index.html info] || [[archive]]rs
| Remove a file
| {{man|1|rm}}
| rm ~/file.txt
|-
|-
| rm -r
| GNU {{Pkg|less}} || less || terminal pager || {{man|1|less}} || [[terminal pager]]s
| Remove directory and contents
|
| rm -r ~/.cache
|-
|-
| ls
| GNU {{Pkg|findutils}} || find || search files or directories || {{man|1|find}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/findutils/manual/html_node/find_html/index.html info], [[GregsWiki:UsingFind|GregsWiki]] || [[#find alternatives]]
| List files
| {{man|1|ls}}
| ls *.mkv
|-
|-
| ls -a
| GNU {{Pkg|diffutils}} || diff || compare files line by line || {{man|1|diff}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/diffutils/manual/html_node/Invoking-diff.html info] || [[#diff alternatives]]
| List hidden files
|
| ls -a /home/archie
|-
|-
| ls -al
| GNU {{Pkg|grep}} || grep || print lines matching a pattern || {{man|1|grep}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/grep/manual/html_node/index.html info] || [[#grep alternatives]]
| List hidden files and file properties
|
|
|-
|-
| mv
| GNU {{Pkg|sed}} || sed || stream editor || {{man|1|sed}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/sed/manual/html_node/index.html info], [http://sed.sourceforge.net/sed1line.txt one-liners]
| Move a file
| {{man|1|mv}}
| mv ~/compressed.zip ~/archive/compressed2.zip
|-
|-
| cp
| GNU {{Pkg|gawk}} || awk || pattern scanning and processing language || {{man|1|gawk}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/manual/html_node/index.html info] || {{Pkg|nawk}}, {{AUR|mawk}}
| Copy a file
| {{man|1|cp}}
| cp ~/.bashrc ~/.bashrc.bak
|-
|-
| chmod +x
|rowspan=5| {{Pkg|util-linux}}
| Make a file [[executable]]
| [[lsblk]] || list block devices || {{man|8|lsblk}}
| {{man|1|chmod}}
| chmod +x ~/.local/bin/myscript.sh
|-
|-
| cat
| [[mount]] || mount a filesystem || {{man|8|mount}}
| Show file contents
| {{man|1|cat}}
| cat /etc/hostname
|-
|-
| find
| [[umount]] || unmount a filesystem || {{man|8|umount}}
| Search for a file
| {{man|1|find}}
| find ~ -name myfile
|}
 
=== ls ===
 
[[Wikipedia:ls|ls]] lists directory contents.
 
See the {{ic|ls}} [[Info manual]] ([https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/ls-invocation.html#ls-invocation online version]) for more information.
 
[https://the.exa.website exa] is a modern, and more user friendly alternative to {{ic|ls}} and {{ic|tree}}, that has more features, such as displaying [[Git]] modifications along with filenames, colouring differently each columnn in {{ic|--long}} mode, or displaying {{ic|--long}} mode metadata along with a {{ic|tree}} view. ''exa'' is available as the {{Pkg|exa}} package.
 
==== Long format ====
 
The {{ic|-l}} option displays some metadata, for example:
 
{{hc|$ ls -l ''/path/to/directory''|
total 128
drwxr-xr-x 2 archie users  4096 Jul  5 21:03 Desktop
drwxr-xr-x 6 archie users  4096 Jul  5 17:37 Documents
drwxr-xr-x 2 archie users  4096 Jul  5 13:45 Downloads
-rw-rw-r-- 1 archie users  5120 Jun 27 08:28 customers.ods
-rw-r--r-- 1 archie users  3339 Jun 27 08:28 todo
-rwxr-xr-x 1 archie users  2048 Jul  6 12:56 myscript.sh
}}
 
The {{ic|total}} value represents the total disk allocation for the files in the directory, by default in number of blocks.
 
{{Remove|Unnecessary detail found in man pages}}
 
Below, each file and subdirectory is represented by a line divided into 7 metadata fields, in the following order:
 
* type and permissions:
** the first character is the entry type, see {{ic|info ls -n "What information is listed"}} for an explanation of all the possible types; for example:
*** {{ic|-}} denotes a normal file;
*** {{ic|d}} denotes a directory, i.e. a folder containing other files or folders;
*** {{ic|p}} denotes a named pipe (aka FIFO);
*** {{ic|l}} denotes a symbolic link;
** the remaining characters are the entry's [[permissions]];
* number of [[Wikipedia:Hard link|hard links]] for the entity; files will have at least 1, i.e. the showed reference itself; folders will have at least 2: the showed reference, the self-referencing {{ic|.}} entry, and then a {{ic|..}} entry in each of its subfolders;
* owner [[user]] name;
* [[group]] name;
* size;
* last modification timestamp;
* entity name.
 
==== File names containing spaces enclosed in quotes ====
 
By default, file and directory names that contain spaces are displayed surrounded by single quotes. To change this behavior use the {{ic|-N}} or {{ic|1=--quoting-style=literal}} options. Alternatively, set the {{ic|QUOTING_STYLE}} [[environment variable]] to {{ic|literal}}. [https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/258679/why-is-ls-suddenly-surrounding-items-with-spaces-in-single-quotes]
 
=== cat ===
 
[[Wikipedia:cat_(Unix)|cat]] is a standard Unix utility that concatenates files to standard output.
 
* Because ''cat'' is not built into the shell, on many occasions you may find it more convenient to use a [[Wikipedia:Redirection (computing)|redirection]], for example in scripts, or if you care a lot about performance. In fact {{ic|< ''file''}} does the same as {{ic|cat ''file''}}.
 
* ''cat'' can work with multiple lines:
 
{{bc|
$ cat << EOF >> ''path/file''
''first line''
...
''last line''
EOF
}}
 
Alternatively, using {{ic|printf}}:
 
{{bc|
$ printf '%s\n' 'first line' ... 'last line'
}}
 
* If you need to list file lines in reverse order, there is a coreutil command called [[Wikipedia:tac (Unix)|tac]] (''cat'' reversed).
 
=== less ===
 
{{Expansion|less is a complex beast, and this section should explain some of the basic less commands}}
 
[[Wikipedia:less (Unix)|less]] is a terminal pager program used to view the contents of a text file one screen at a time. Whilst similar to other pagers such as [[Wikipedia:more (command)|more]] and the [https://git.kernel.org/cgit/utils/util-linux/util-linux.git/tree/Documentation/deprecated.txt deprecated] [[Wikipedia:pg (Unix)|pg]], ''less'' offers a more advanced interface and complete [http://www.greenwoodsoftware.com/less/faq.html feature-set].
 
See [[List of applications#Terminal pagers]] for alternatives.
 
==== Vim as alternative pager ====
 
{{Move|Vim|Discusses a ''vim'' specifity}}
 
[[Vim]] includes a script to view the content of text files, compressed files, binaries and directories. Add the following line to your shell configuration file to use it as a pager:
{{hc|~/.bashrc|2=alias less='/usr/share/vim/vim80/macros/less.sh'}}
 
There is also an alternative to the ''less.sh'' macro, which may work as the {{ic|PAGER}} environment variable. Install {{Pkg|vimpager}} and add the following to your shell configuration file:
{{hc|~/.bashrc|2=
export PAGER='vimpager'
alias less=$PAGER
}}
 
Now programs that use the {{ic|PAGER}} environment variable, like [[git]], will use ''vim'' as pager.
 
=== mkdir ===
 
[[Wikipedia:mkdir|mkdir]] makes directories.
 
To create a directory and its whole hierarchy, the {{ic|-p}} switch is used, otherwise an error is printed.
 
Changing mode of a just created directory using ''chmod'' is not necessary as the {{ic|-m}} option lets you define the access permissions.
 
{{Tip|If you just want a temporary directory, a better alternative may be [[Wikipedia:Temporary file|mktemp]]: {{ic|mktemp -d}}}}
 
=== mv ===
 
[[Wikipedia:mv|mv]] moves and renames files and directories.
 
{{Note|"Security aliases" are dangerous because you get used to them, resulting in potential data loss when you use another system / user that does not have these aliases.}}
 
To limit potential damage caused by the command, use an alias:
 
alias mv='mv -iv'
 
This alias asks for confirmation before overwriting any existing files and lists the operations in progress.
 
=== rm ===
 
[[Wikipedia:rm_(Unix)|rm]] removes files or directories.
 
{{Note|"Security aliases" are dangerous because you get used to them, resulting in potential data loss when you use another system / user that does not have these aliases.}}
 
To limit potential damage caused by the command, use an alias:
 
alias rm='rm -Iv --one-file-system'
 
This alias asks confirmation to delete three or more files, lists the operations in progress, does not involve more than one file systems. Substitute {{ic|-I}} with {{ic|-i}} if you prefer to confirm even for one file.
 
Zsh users may want to prefix {{ic|noglob}} to avoid implicit expansions.
 
To remove directories believed to be empty, use ''rmdir'' as it fails if there are files inside the target.
 
=== chmod ===
 
See [[File permissions and attributes#Changing permissions]].
 
=== chown ===
 
See [[File permissions and attributes#Changing ownership]].
 
=== find ===
 
''find'' is part of the {{Pkg|findutils}} package, which belongs to the {{Grp|base}} package group.
 
{{Tip|{{Pkg|fd}} is a simple, fast and user-friendly alternative to {{ic|find}} that provides more sensible defaults (e.g. ignores hidden files, directories and {{ic|.gitignore}}'d files, {{ic|fd PATTERN}} instead of {{ic|find -iname '*PATTERN*'}}). It features colorized output (similar to {{ic|ls}}), Unicode awareness, regular expressions and more.}}
 
One would probably expect a ''find'' command to take as argument a file name and search the filesystem for files matching that name. For a program that does exactly that see [[#locate]] below.
 
Instead, find takes a set of directories and matches each file under them against a set of expressions. This design allows for some very powerful "one-liners" that would not be possible using the "intuitive" design described above. See [[GregsWiki:UsingFind]] for usage details.
 
=== locate ===
 
[[Install]] the {{Pkg|mlocate}} package. The package contains an {{ic|updatedb.timer}} unit, which invokes a database update each day. The timer is enabled right after installation, [[start]] it manually if you want to use it before reboot. You can also manually run ''updatedb'' as root at any time. By default, paths such as {{ic|/media}} and {{ic|/mnt}} are ignored, so ''locate'' may not discover files on external devices. See {{man|8|updatedb}} for details.
 
The ''locate'' command is a common Unix tool for quickly finding files by name. It offers speed improvements over the [[wikipedia:Find (Unix)|find]] tool by searching a pre-constructed database file, rather than the filesystem directly. The downside of this approach is that changes made since the construction of the database file cannot be detected by ''locate''.
 
Before ''locate'' can be used, the database will need to be created. To do this, execute {{ic|updatedb}} as root.
 
See also [http://jvns.ca/blog/2015/03/05/how-the-locate-command-works-and-lets-rewrite-it-in-one-minute/ How locate works and rewrite it in one minute].
 
=== diff ===
 
''diff'' compares files line by line. Its output can be saved to a so-called patch file, which can be applied using the {{man|1|patch}} utility. The default Arch Linux ''diff'' is from the GNU {{Pkg|diffutils}}, which also provides ''cmp'' to compare files byte by byte.
 
A similar command, which lets you compare two sorted files line by line is ''comm'', see {{man|1|comm}}.
 
When comparing text files a word per word diff is often more desirable:
 
* [[git]]'s {{ic|git diff}} can do a word diff with {{ic|--color-words}}, using {{ic|--no-index}} it can also be used for files outside of Git working trees.
* {{App|dwdiff|A word diff front-end for the diff program; supports colors.|https://os.ghalkes.nl/dwdiff.html|{{Pkg|dwdiff}}}}
* {{App|GNU wdiff|A wordwise implementation of GNU diff; does not support colors.|https://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/|{{Pkg|wdiff}}}}
* {{App|cwdiff|A GNU wdiff wrapper that colorizes the output.|https://github.com/junghans/cwdiff|{{AUR|cwdiff}}, {{AUR|cwdiff-git}}}}
 
== Text streams ==
 
Shell [[Wikipedia:Pipeline (Unix)|pipelines]] operate on stdout by default. To operate on {{man|3|stderr}} you can redirect ''stderr'' to ''stdout'' with {{ic|''command'' 2>&1 {{!}} ''othercommand''}} or, for Bash 4, {{ic|''command'' {{!}}& ''othercommand''}}. See also [http://www.tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/io-redirection.html I/O Redirection].
 
=== grep ===
 
[[Wikipedia:grep|grep]] is a command line text search utility originally written for Unix. The ''grep'' command searches files or standard input for lines matching a given regular expression, and prints these lines to standard output.
 
* Remember that ''grep'' handles files, so a construct like {{ic|grep ''pattern'' < ''file''}} is replaceable with {{ic|grep ''pattern'' ''file''}}.
* To include file line numbers in the output, use the {{ic|-n}} option.
* ''grep'' can also be used for hexadecimal search in a binary file, to look for let say the {{ic|A1 F2}} sequence in a file, the command line is: {{bc|1=$ LANG=C grep --text --perl-regexp "\xA1\xF2" ''/path/to/file''}}
 
For color support, see [[Color output in console#grep]].
 
See {{man|1|grep}} for more details.
 
{{Tip|There are ''grep'' alternatives optimized for VCS source code, such as {{Pkg|ripgrep}}, {{Pkg|the_silver_searcher}}, and {{Pkg|ack}}. There also is {{AUR|mgrep}}, a multiline grep.}}
 
=== sed ===
 
[[Wikipedia:sed|sed]] is stream editor for filtering and transforming text.
 
Here is a handy [http://sed.sourceforge.net/sed1line.txt list] of ''sed'' one-liners examples.
 
{{Tip|More powerful alternatives are [[#awk|awk]] and the [[Perl]] language.}}
 
=== awk ===
 
[[Wikipedia:AWK|AWK]] is a pattern scanning and processing language. There are multiple implementations:
 
* {{App|gawk|GNU version of awk, see {{man|1|gawk}}.|https://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/|{{Pkg|gawk}} (part of {{Grp|base}})}}
* {{App|nawk|The one, true implementation of AWK, see {{man|1|nawk}}.|https://www.cs.princeton.edu/~bwk/btl.mirror/|{{Pkg|nawk}}}}
* {{App|mawk|A very fast AWK implementation.|http://invisible-island.net/mawk/|{{AUR|mawk}}}}
* [[BusyBox]] also includes an AWK implementation.
 
== System administration ==
 
{| class="wikitable"
! Command
! Description
! Manual page
! Example
|-
|-
| mount
| [[su]] || substitute user || {{man|1|su}} || [[sudo]]
| Mount a partition
| {{man|8|mount}}
| mount /dev/sdc1 /media/usb
|-
|-
| df -h
| kill || terminate a process || {{man|1|kill}} || {{man|1|pkill}}, {{man|1|killall}}
| Show remaining space on all partitions
| {{man|1|df}}
|
|-
|-
| ps -A
|rowspan=3| {{Pkg|procps-ng}}
| Show all running processes
| pgrep || look up processes by name or attributes || {{man|1|pgrep}} || {{man|1|pidof}}
| {{man|1|ps}}
|
|-
|-
| killall
| ps || show information about processes || {{man|1|ps}} ||rowspan=2| {{man|1|top}}, {{Pkg|htop}}
| Kill all running instances of a process
| {{man|1|killall}}
|
|-
|-
| ss -at
| free || display amount of free and used memory || {{man|1|free}}
| Display a list of open TCP sockets
| {{man|8|ss}}
|
|}
|}


=== sudo ===
=== Preventing data loss ===
 
See [[Sudo]].
 
=== which ===
 
[[wikipedia:Which_(Unix)|which]] shows the full path of shell commands. In the following example the full path of {{ic|ssh}} is used as an argument for {{ic|journalctl}}:
 
# journalctl $(which sshd)
 
=== lsblk ===
 
{{man|8|lsblk}} will show all available [[Wikipedia:Device file#Block devices|block devices]] along with their partitioning schemes, for example:
 
{{hc|$ lsblk -f|
NAME  FSTYPE  LABEL      UUID                                MOUNTPOINT
sda
├─sda1 vfat                C4DA-2C4D                            /boot
├─sda2 swap                5b1564b2-2e2c-452c-bcfa-d1f572ae99f2 [SWAP]
└─sda3 ext4                56adc99b-a61e-46af-aab7-a6d07e504652 /
}}
 
The beginning of the device name specifies the type of block device. Most modern storage devices (e.g. hard disks, [[SSD]]s and USB flash drives) are recognised as SCSI disks ({{ic|sd}}). The type is followed by a lower-case letter starting from {{ic|a}} for the first device ({{ic|sda}}), {{ic|b}} for the second device ({{ic|sdb}}), and so on. ''Existing'' partitions on each device will be listed with a number starting from {{ic|1}} for the first partition ({{ic|sda1}}), {{ic|2}} for the second ({{ic|sda2}}), and so on. In the example above, only one device is available ({{ic|sda}}), and that device has three partitions ({{ic|sda1}} to {{ic|sda3}}), each with a different [[file system]].
 
Other common block device types include for example {{ic|mmcblk}} for memory cards and {{ic|nvme}} for [[NVMe]] devices. Unknown types can be searched in the [https://www.kernel.org/doc/html/latest/admin-guide/devices.html kernel documentation].


=== ip ===
rm, mv, cp and shell redirections happily delete or overwrite files without asking. rm, mv and cp all support the {{ic|-i}} flag to prompt the user before every removal / overwrite. Some users like to enable the {{ic|-i}} flag by default using [[alias]]es. Such shell settings are however dangerous because you get used to them, resulting in potential data loss when you use another system or user that does not have them. The best way to prevent data loss is to do [[backup]]s.


[[Wikipedia:Iproute2|ip]] allows you to show information about network devices, IP addresses, routing tables, and other objects in the Linux [[Wikipedia:Internet Protocol|IP]] software stack. By appending various commands, you can also manipulate or configure most of these objects.
== Nonessentials ==


{{Note|The ''ip'' utility is provided by the {{Pkg|iproute2}} package, which is included in the {{Grp|base}} group.}}
This table lists core utilities that often come in handy.


{| class="wikitable"
{| class=wikitable
! Object !! Purpose !! Manual page
! Package !! Command !! Description !! Documentation !! Alternatives
|-
| ip addr || protocol address management || {{man|8|ip-address}}
|-
|-
| ip addrlabel || protocol address label management || {{man|8|ip-addrlabel}}
|rowspan=3| shell built-ins
| alias || define or display aliases || {{man|1|alias}}
|-
|-
| ip l2tp || tunnel Ethernet over IP (L2TPv3) || {{man|8|ip-l2tp}}
| type || print the type of a command || {{man|1|type}} || {{man|1|which}}
|-
|-
| ip link || network device configuration || {{man|8|ip-link}}
| time || time a command || {{man|1|time}}
|-
|-
| ip maddr || multicast addresses management || {{man|8|ip-maddress}}
|rowspan=9| GNU {{Pkg|coreutils}}
| tee || read stdin and write to stdout and files || {{man|1|tee}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/tee-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip monitor || watch for netlink messages || {{man|8|ip-monitor}}
| mktemp || make a temporary file or directory || {{man|1|mktemp}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/mktemp-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip mroute || multicast routing cache management || {{man|8|ip-mroute}}
| od || dump files in octal and other formats || {{man|1|od}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/od-invocation.html info] || {{man|1|hexdump}}, [[vim]]'s {{man|1|xxd}}
|-
|-
| ip mrule || rule in multicast routing policy db ||
| sort || sort lines || {{man|1|sort}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/sort-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip neigh || neighbour/ARP tables management || {{man|8|ip-neighbour}}
| uniq || report or omit repeated lines || {{man|1|uniq}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/uniq-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip netns || process network namespace management || {{man|8|ip-netns}}
| comm || compare two sorted files line by line || {{man|1|comm}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/comm-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip ntable || neighbour table configuration || {{man|8|ip-ntable}}
| head || output the first part of files || {{man|1|head}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/head-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip route || routing table management || {{man|8|ip-route}}
| tail || output the last part of files, or follow files || {{man|1|tail}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/tail-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip rule || routing policy database management || {{man|8|ip-rule}}
| wc || print newline, word and byte count || {{man|1|wc}}, [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/wc-invocation.html info]
|-
|-
| ip tcp_metrics || management for TCP Metrics || {{man|8|ip-tcp_metrics}}
| GNU {{Pkg|binutils}} || strings || print printable characters in binary files || {{man|1|strings}}, [https://sourceware.org/binutils/docs/binutils/strings.html info]
|-
|-
| ip tunnel || tunnel configuration || {{man|8|ip-tunnel}}
| GNU {{Pkg|glibc}} || iconv || convert character encodings || {{man|1|iconv}} || {{Pkg|recode}}
|-
|-
| ip tuntap || manage TUN/TAP devices ||
| {{Pkg|file}} || file || guess file type || {{man|1|file}}
|-
| ip xfrm || manage IPsec policies || {{man|8|ip-xfrm}}
|}
|}


The {{ic|help}} command is available for all objects. For example, typing {{ic|ip addr help}} will show you the command syntax available for the address object. For advanced usage see the [http://www.policyrouting.org/iproute2.doc.html iproute2 documentation].
The {{Pkg|moreutils}} package provides useful tools like {{man|1|sponge}} that are missing from the GNU coreutils.


The [[Network configuration]] article shows how the ''ip'' command is used in practice for various common tasks.
== Alternatives ==


{{Note|You might be familiar with the [[Wikipedia:ifconfig|ifconfig]] command, which was used in older Linux systems. It is deprecated in Arch Linux; use ''ip'' instead. }}
Alternatives to the core utilities in the {{Grp|base}} group are [[BusyBox]], the [[Heirloom|Heirloom Toolchest]], {{Pkg|9base}}, {{AUR|sbase-git}} and {{AUR|ubase-git}}.


=== ss ===
=== find alternatives ===


''ss'' is a utility to investigate network ports and is part of the {{Pkg|iproute2}} package in the {{Grp|base}} group. It has a similar functionality to the [https://www.archlinux.org/news/deprecation-of-net-tools/ deprecated] netstat utility.  
* {{App|fd|Simple, fast and user-friendly alternative to find. Ignores hidden and {{ic|.gitignore}}'d files by default.|https://github.com/sharkdp/fd|{{Pkg|fd}}}}
* {{App|fuzzy-find|Fuzzy completion for finding files.|https://github.com/silentbicycle/ff|{{AUR|ff-git}}}}
* {{App|fzf|General-purpose command-line fuzzy finder, powered by find by default.|https://github.com/junegunn/fzf|{{Pkg|fzf}}, {{AUR|fzf-git}}}}
* {{App|[[mlocate]]|Merging locate/updatedb implementation.|https://pagure.io/mlocate|{{Pkg|mlocate}}}}


Common usage includes:
For graphical file searchers, see [[List of applications/Utilities#File searching]].


Display all TCP Sockets with service names:
=== diff alternatives ===
$ ss -at


Display all TCP Sockets with port numbers:
While {{Pkg|diffutils}} does not provide a word-wise diff, several other programs do:
$ ss -atn


Display all UDP Sockets:
* [[git]] diff can do a word diff with {{ic|--color-words}}, using {{ic|--no-index}} it can also be used for files outside of Git working trees.
$ ss -au
* {{App|dwdiff|A word diff front-end for the diff program; supports colors.|https://os.ghalkes.nl/dwdiff.html|{{Pkg|dwdiff}}}}
 
* {{App|GNU wdiff|A wordwise implementation of GNU diff; does not support colors.|https://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/|{{Pkg|wdiff}}}}
For more information see {{man|8|ss}} or {{ic|ss.html}} from the {{Pkg|iproute2}} package.
* {{App|cwdiff|A GNU wdiff wrapper that colorizes the output.|https://github.com/junghans/cwdiff|{{AUR|cwdiff}}, {{AUR|cwdiff-git}}}}
 
== Miscellaneous ==
 
{| class="wikitable"
! Command
! Description
! Manual page
! Example
|-
| strings
| Show printable characters in binary files
| {{man|1|strings}}
| strings /usr/bin/free
|}
 
=== dd ===
 
[[Wikipedia:dd (Unix)|dd]] is a utility for Unix and Unix-like operating systems whose primary purpose is to convert and copy a file.
 
Similarly to ''cp'', by default ''dd'' makes a bit-to-bit copy of the file, but with lower-level I/O flow control features.
 
Some notable applications of ''dd'' are:
 
* [[Disk cloning#Using dd]],
 
* Binary file patching: let say one wants to replace offset {{ic|0x123AB}} of a file with the {{ic|FF C0 14}} hexadecimal sequence, this can be done with the command line: {{bc|1=# printf '\xff\xc0\x14' {{!}} dd seek=$((0x123AB)) conv=notrunc bs=1 of=''/path/to/file''}}
 
For more information see {{man|1|dd}} or the [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/dd full documentation].
 
{{Tip|By default, ''dd'' outputs nothing until the task has finished. To monitor the progress of the operation, add the {{ic|1=status=progress}} option to the command.}}
{{Warning|One should be extremely cautious using ''dd'', as with any command of this kind it can destroy data irreversibly.}}
 
=== iconv ===
 
''iconv'' converts the encoding of characters from one codeset to another.
 
The following command will convert the file {{ic|''foo''}} from ISO-8859-15 to UTF-8, saving it to {{ic|''foo''.utf}}:
 
$ iconv -f ISO-8859-15 -t UTF-8 ''foo'' > ''foo''.utf
 
See {{man|1|iconv}} for more details.
 
==== Convert a file in place ====
 
{{Tip|You can use {{pkg|recode}} instead of iconv if you do not want to touch the mtime.}}
Unlike [[sed]], ''iconv'' does not provide an option to convert a file in place. However, {{ic|sponge}} from the {{pkg|moreutils}} package can help:
 
$ iconv -f WINDOWS-1251 -t UTF-8 ''foobar''.txt | sponge ''foobar''.txt
 
See {{man|1|sponge}} for details.
 
=== od ===
 
The [[Wikipedia:od (Unix)|od]] (''o''ctal ''d''ump) command is useful for visualizing data that is not in a human-readable format, like the executable code of a program, or the contents of an unformatted device. See the [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/html_node/od-invocation.html#od-invocation manual] for more information.
 
=== seq ===
 
''seq'' prints a sequence of numbers. Shell built-in alternatives are available, so it is good practice to use them as explained on [[Wikipedia:Seq (Unix)|Wikipedia]].
 
=== tar ===
 
As an early Unix archiving format, .tar files—known as "tarballs"—are widely used for packaging in Unix-like operating systems. Both [[pacman]] and [[AUR]] packages are compressed tarballs, and Arch uses [[GNU Project|GNU's]] ''tar'' program by default.
 
For ''.tar'' archives, ''tar'' by default will extract the file according to its extension:
 
$ tar xvf ''file.EXTENSION''
 
Forcing a given format:
 
{| class="wikitable"
!File Type    !! Extraction Command
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar}}     || {{Ic|tar xvf ''file''.tar}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tgz}}    || {{Ic|tar xvzf ''file''.tgz}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar.gz}}  || {{Ic|tar xvzf ''file''.tar.gz}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar.bz}}  || {{Ic|bzip -cd ''file''.bz <nowiki>|</nowiki> tar xvf -}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar.bz2}} || {{Ic|tar xvjf ''file''.tar.bz2}}<br> {{Ic|bzip2 -cd ''file''.bz2 <nowiki>| tar xvf -</nowiki>}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar.xz}}  || {{Ic|tar xvJf ''file''.tar.xz}}<br> {{Ic|xz -cd ''file''.xz <nowiki>| tar xvf -</nowiki>}}
|-
|{{ic|''file''.tar.zst}} || {{Ic|tar -I zstd xvf ''file''.tar.zst}}
|}
 
The construction of some of these ''tar'' arguments may be considered legacy, but they are still useful when performing specific operations. See {{man|1|tar}} for details.
 
{{Note|Although GNU's ''tar'' is installed as the default ''tar'' program, official Arch Linux projects like [[pacman]] and [[mkinitcpio]] use ''bsdtar'' from the {{Pkg|libarchive}} package.}}
 
See also [[Archiving and compression]].
 
=== wipefs ===


{{Expansion|Why would you want to erase magic strings?}}
See also [[List of applications/Utilities#Comparison, diff, merge]].


''wipefs'' can list or erase [[file system]], [[RAID]] or [[partition|partition-table]] signatures (magic strings) from the specified device. It does not erase the file systems themselves nor any other data from the device.
=== grep alternatives ===


See {{man|8|wipefs}} for more information.
The following three tools aim to replace grep for code search. They do recursive search by default, skip binary files and respect {{ic|.gitignore}}.


For example, to erase all signatures from the device {{ic|/dev/sdb}} and create a signature backup {{ic|~/wipefs-sdb-''offset''.bak}} file for each signature:
* {{App|ack|A Perl-based grep replacement, aimed at programmers with large trees of heterogeneous source code.|https://beyondgrep.com/|{{Pkg|ack}}}}
* {{App|ripgrep (rg)|A search tool that combines the usability of ag with the raw speed of grep.|https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep|{{Pkg|ripgrep}}}}
* {{App|The Silver Searcher (ag)|Code searching tool similar to Ack, but faster.|https://github.com/ggreer/the_silver_searcher|{{Pkg|the_silver_searcher}}}}


# wipefs --all --backup /dev/sdb
And then there is also {{AUR|mgrep}}, a multiline grep.


== See also ==
== See also ==


* [http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/idx/utilities.html POSIX Utilities]
* [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html GNU Coreutils documentation]
* [https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/manual/coreutils.html GNU Coreutils online documentation]
* [http://pubs.opengroup.org/onlinepubs/9699919799/idx/utilities.html POSIX utilities]
* [http://www.reddit.com/r/commandline/comments/19garq/a_sampling_of_coreutils_120/ A sampling of coreutils on Reddit] [http://www.reddit.com/r/commandline/comments/19ge6v/a_sampling_of_coreutils_2040/ , part 2] [http://www.reddit.com/r/commandline/comments/19j1w3/a_sampling_of_coreutils_4060/ , part 3] - Overview of commands in coreutils
* [https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linux-newbie-8/learn-the-dd-command-362506/ Learn the DD command]

Revision as of 12:19, 1 September 2018

fa:Core utilities

Related articles

Core utilities are the basic, fundamental tools of a GNU/Linux system. On Arch Linux they are found in the base group. This article provides an incomplete overview of them, links their documentation and describes useful alternatives. The scope of this article includes, but is not limited to, the GNU coreutils. Most core utilities are traditional Unix tools (see Heirloom) and many were standardized by POSIX but have been developed further to provide more features.

Most command-line interfaces are documented in man pages, utilities by the GNU Project are documented in Info manuals, some shells provide a help command for shell builtin commands. Additionally most commands print their usage when run with the --help flag.

Essentials

The following table lists some important commands, Arch Linux users should be familiar with. See also intro(1).

Package Command Description Documentation Alternatives
shell built-ins cd change directory cd(1p)
GNU coreutils ls list directory ls(1), info exa, tree
cat concatenate files to stdout cat(1), info tac(1)
mkdir make directory mkdir(1), info
rmdir remove empty directory rmdir(1), info
rm remove files or directories rm(1), info shred
cp copy files or directories cp(1), info
mv move files or directories mv(1), info
ln make hard or symbolic links ln(1), info
chown change file owner and group chown(1), info chgrp(1)
chmod change file permissions chmod(1), info
dd convert and copy a file dd(1), info
df report file system disk space usage df(1), info
GNU tar tar tar archiver tar(1), info archivers
GNU less less terminal pager less(1) terminal pagers
GNU findutils find search files or directories find(1), info, GregsWiki #find alternatives
GNU diffutils diff compare files line by line diff(1), info #diff alternatives
GNU grep grep print lines matching a pattern grep(1), info #grep alternatives
GNU sed sed stream editor sed(1), info, one-liners
GNU gawk awk pattern scanning and processing language gawk(1), info nawk, mawkAUR
util-linux lsblk list block devices lsblk(8)
mount mount a filesystem mount(8)
umount unmount a filesystem umount(8)
su substitute user su(1) sudo
kill terminate a process kill(1) pkill(1), killall(1)
procps-ng pgrep look up processes by name or attributes pgrep(1) pidof(1)
ps show information about processes ps(1) top(1), htop
free display amount of free and used memory free(1)

Preventing data loss

rm, mv, cp and shell redirections happily delete or overwrite files without asking. rm, mv and cp all support the -i flag to prompt the user before every removal / overwrite. Some users like to enable the -i flag by default using aliases. Such shell settings are however dangerous because you get used to them, resulting in potential data loss when you use another system or user that does not have them. The best way to prevent data loss is to do backups.

Nonessentials

This table lists core utilities that often come in handy.

Package Command Description Documentation Alternatives
shell built-ins alias define or display aliases alias(1)
type print the type of a command type(1) which(1)
time time a command time(1)
GNU coreutils tee read stdin and write to stdout and files tee(1), info
mktemp make a temporary file or directory mktemp(1), info
od dump files in octal and other formats od(1), info hexdump(1), vim's xxd(1)
sort sort lines sort(1), info
uniq report or omit repeated lines uniq(1), info
comm compare two sorted files line by line comm(1), info
head output the first part of files head(1), info
tail output the last part of files, or follow files tail(1), info
wc print newline, word and byte count wc(1), info
GNU binutils strings print printable characters in binary files strings(1), info
GNU glibc iconv convert character encodings iconv(1) recode
file file guess file type file(1)

The moreutils package provides useful tools like sponge(1) that are missing from the GNU coreutils.

Alternatives

Alternatives to the core utilities in the base group are BusyBox, the Heirloom Toolchest, 9base, sbase-gitAUR and ubase-gitAUR.

find alternatives

  • fd — Simple, fast and user-friendly alternative to find. Ignores hidden and .gitignore'd files by default.
https://github.com/sharkdp/fd || fd
  • fuzzy-find — Fuzzy completion for finding files.
https://github.com/silentbicycle/ff || ff-gitAUR
  • fzf — General-purpose command-line fuzzy finder, powered by find by default.
https://github.com/junegunn/fzf || fzf, fzf-gitAUR
  • mlocate — Merging locate/updatedb implementation.
https://pagure.io/mlocate || mlocate

For graphical file searchers, see List of applications/Utilities#File searching.

diff alternatives

While diffutils does not provide a word-wise diff, several other programs do:

  • git diff can do a word diff with --color-words, using --no-index it can also be used for files outside of Git working trees.
  • dwdiff — A word diff front-end for the diff program; supports colors.
https://os.ghalkes.nl/dwdiff.html || dwdiff
  • GNU wdiff — A wordwise implementation of GNU diff; does not support colors.
https://www.gnu.org/software/wdiff/ || wdiff
  • cwdiff — A GNU wdiff wrapper that colorizes the output.
https://github.com/junghans/cwdiff || cwdiffAUR, cwdiff-gitAUR

See also List of applications/Utilities#Comparison, diff, merge.

grep alternatives

The following three tools aim to replace grep for code search. They do recursive search by default, skip binary files and respect .gitignore.

  • ack — A Perl-based grep replacement, aimed at programmers with large trees of heterogeneous source code.
https://beyondgrep.com/ || ack
  • ripgrep (rg) — A search tool that combines the usability of ag with the raw speed of grep.
https://github.com/BurntSushi/ripgrep || ripgrep
  • The Silver Searcher (ag) — Code searching tool similar to Ack, but faster.
https://github.com/ggreer/the_silver_searcher || the_silver_searcher

And then there is also mgrepAUR, a multiline grep.

See also

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