Command Line Cheat Sheet

This is by no means a complete list -- if you see need to add another command, please do so.

The commands are separated into two tables based on category -- whether it is a "normal user" command (a command that can be run as a normal user without root (administrative) privileges) and root "root" commands (commands the require root (administrative) privileges"). Keep in mind that the apt commands listed below as normal user commands will be root commands on other distributions (Ark is unique in the fact that it can run apt as a normal user).

Normal User Commands:

Command	Type of Command	Description	Example	What the example means
alias	Commands	Allows you to set an "alias" for another command; not permanent	alias dir cd	Makes it so that the dir command does the same thing as cd
apt-cache	Software installation	Search for installable software
apt-get	Software installation	Installs and uninstalls software	apt-get install kdegames	Installs kde-based games
cal	Time Tracking	Shows a Calendar	cal -3	Shows a calendar for the current month
cd	Directory browsing	Change Directory	cd /home/arklinux/Desktop	Takes you to your Desktop directory
chmod	File management	Changes the permissions on a file or directory (requires -r to work on subdirectories)	chmod 777 ~/file	Changes the permissions to read/write/execute on a file or directory called file in your home directory
chown	File Management	Changes the own and/or group of a file or directory (requires -r to work on subdirectories)	chown user:group ~/file	Changes the owning user to user and the owning group to group on a file or directory called file in your home directory
date	Time Tracking	Tells you when a day is	date --date='25 Dec' +%A	What day is christmas this year?
echo	Printing to screen or file	Shows what you type on your screen, or exports it to a file	Echo "Hello World" > helloworld.txt	Puts Hello World into a file called hellworld.txt
kinfocenter	System information	Brings up a GUI hardware information center	kinfocenter	Brings up a GUI hardware information center
mkdir	Directories	Makes a directory	mkdir ~/directory	Makes a directory called directory in your home directory
mv	File management	Moves or renames file or directory (requires -r to move a directory)	mv ~file1.text ~/Desktop/file2.txt	Moves a file called file1.txt from your home directory to your desktop and renames it to file2.txt
nano	Text Editing	Edits a text file	nano ~/file.txt	Creates or edits a file called file.txt in your home directory
passwd	Password Management	Allows you to change your password	passwd	Asks you to enter your old password, then asks for a new one
pwd	Directory browsing	Prints the directory you are currently in into your terminal	pwd	Prints the directory you are currently in into your terminal
rm	File Management	Deletes (removes) a file or directory (requires -r for a directory)	rm ~/file1.txt	Deletes a file called called file.txt from your home directory
rsync	Downloading	Synchronize two files	rsync -P rsync://rsync.server.com/path/to/file file	Download the differences between local and downloaded file
ssh	Remote Login	Log in to a remote machine	ssh user@something.com	Connects to something.com and allows you to log in to something.com as user
uptime	System Management	Shows how long your computer has been on	uptime
vi	Text Editing	Edits a text file	vi ~/file.txt	Creates or edits a file called file.txt in your home directory
wget	Downloading	Downloads a file from the command line	wget http://location.com/file_to_download	Downloads a file from http://location.com/file_to_download

Root Commands:

Command	Type of Command	Description	Example	What the example means
df	System Information	Shows free space and used space	df -h	Shows free space only
lspci	System Information	Shows pci devices	lspci -tv	Shows detailed pci information
lsusb	System Information	Shows usb devices	lsusb -tv	Shows detailed usb information
mount	Disc Loading	Mounts a CD or ISO image into your file system	mount -o loop file.iso /mnt/iso	Mounts an ISO image called file.iso to /mnt/iso
passwd	User Management	Changes the password for a user	passwd user	Changes the password for a user called user
useradd	User Management	Adds a user	useradd user	Adds a user called user