Questions tagged [bash]

Bash (Bourne-Again SHell), is the default interactive user shell used in Ubuntu. Use this tag for questions specific to Bash, as opposed to generic POSIX shells.

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How to navigate long commands faster?

Is there a way speed up Linux CLI navigation when I must enter long commands? I simply use arrows right now, and - if I have a long command it takes some time to get from start of the command to the ...
Stann's user avatar
  • 15.1k
129 votes
1 answer
145k views

Cannot echo "hello" > x.txt even with sudo? [duplicate]

Possible Duplicate: sudo & redirect output I'm trying to create a file in /var/www, but even with sudo this fails: user@debVirtual:/var/www$ sudo echo "hello" > f.txt -bash: f.txt: ...
Patryk's user avatar
  • 9,136
106 votes
12 answers
135k views

Adding timestamps to terminal prompts?

I was wondering if it was possible to add timestamps to terminal prompts, and if so, how could I achieve this?
Jan Gorzny's user avatar
  • 1,163
97 votes
5 answers
150k views

How to do: underline, bold, italic, strikethrough, color, background, and size in Gnome Terminal?

How to do: underline, bold, italic, strikethrough, and color in Gnome Terminal? Bold Italic u̲n̲d̲e̲r̲l̲i̲n̲e̲ s̶t̶r̶i̶k̶e̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶l̶i̶k̶̶e̶ ̶i̶t̶s̶ ̶h̶o̶t Color background font < (its mono if you ...
Anon's user avatar
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90 votes
5 answers
76k views

How can I undo the last cd command?

Is there any way to jump back to the previous working directory after doing a cd to a different directory? My use-case is that I'm traversing a directory structure for a Java project, and I'm ...
nickb's user avatar
  • 1,003
83 votes
12 answers
137k views

How do I set up an email alert when a ssh login is successful?

Does anyone have a bash script that will email or notify someone in the case of a successful login to a ssh server? I want to be notified if anyone logs into my personal box. I'm using Ubuntu 12.04 ...
Rick T's user avatar
  • 2,213
78 votes
12 answers
236k views

How to remove all files and subdirectories in a directory WITHOUT deleting the directory in bash?

Is there a command to remove all files and subdirectories in a directory without deleting the directory? For example if I have directory dontDeleteMe with subdirectories 1, 2, 3 and each subdirectory ...
user784637's user avatar
  • 10.9k
76 votes
4 answers
113k views

`apt-get` autocompletion of package name is broken

At some moment, the apt-get install autocomplete was broken. It was very useful to me to see the names of packages available for installation when pressing Tab. For example, if I would press the Tab ...
Вячеслав Логинов's user avatar
67 votes
9 answers
147k views

How do I use wget/curl to download from a site I am logged into?

Some parts of wikipedia appear differently when you're logged in. I would like to wget user pages so they would appear as if I was logged in. Is there a way I can wget user pages like this http://...
user784637's user avatar
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60 votes
5 answers
114k views

Tab completion doesn't work for commands

I am trying to use tab completion for commands in Ubuntu 11.04 Beta 1, running all the latest updates, but it doesn't seem to work. (Though package bash-completion is installed) Tab completion works ...
Screatch's user avatar
  • 619
58 votes
10 answers
126k views

Filenames with spaces breaking for loop, find command

I have a script which searches all files in multiple subfolders and archives to tar. My script is for FILE in `find . -type f -name '*.*'` do if [[ ! -f archive.tar ]]; then tar -cpf archive....
Ubuntuser's user avatar
  • 9,816
53 votes
3 answers
159k views

How do you change the default shell for ALL USERS to bash?

I want every new user from now on to have bash as their shell by default. I know that to change your own shell to bash, you would use the command "chsh -s /bin/bash", but how do I automatically set ...
coffee-grinder's user avatar
51 votes
6 answers
78k views

Why is /etc/profile not being loaded during non-login bash shell sessions?

For 11.04, I did a fresh install of my system. Part of that install was to install rvm, which sticks a rvm.sh in /etc/profile.d/. This doesn't work as /etc/profile (which loads each +r in /etc/profile....
Marc's user avatar
  • 513
51 votes
2 answers
20k views

bashrc or bash_profile?

I know the difference between the two bash login scripts: .bashrc is run only by "non-login" shells. .bash_profile (or .bash_login or .profile) is executed by "login" shells. Does anyone have some ...
Don Faulkner's user avatar
51 votes
3 answers
112k views

How to escape file path in SED?

I would like to replace $fileWithPath in $file, however this doesn't work because (I think) path is not escaped. How to escape it? sed -i 's/${fileWithPath}/HAHA/g' $file
UAdapter's user avatar
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39 votes
6 answers
24k views

How do I split a "/proc/*/environ" file in separate lines?

I'm trying to get the content of any /proc/*PID*/environ file in more readable format. I'm able to do that in the way shown below, but I'm sure this isn't the proper way. $ cat "/proc/$(pgrep gnome-...
pa4080's user avatar
  • 29.8k
39 votes
2 answers
45k views

Split a large file into smaller files and then integrate them to get the original file [duplicate]

How do I split a 7GB (movie) file into smaller files of (say) 1GB, and then (in another Ubuntu computer) integrate them to get the original file (using just bash commands)?
Sid's user avatar
  • 10.5k
38 votes
2 answers
34k views

xclip on headless server

I've been using xclip to copy the output of bash commands like so: pwd | tr -d "\n" | xclip -selection c So that I can then paste the output into another terminal session. I was trying to use it on ...
Anake's user avatar
  • 1,905
34 votes
3 answers
34k views

Using grep with pipe and ampersand to filter errors from find

I am using cygwin to find a file on the cygdrive. However I need to suppress the permission denied messages (otherwise the results get hidden in the error messages). The following command works: ...
Henrik K's user avatar
  • 443
34 votes
6 answers
7k views

In what order does the shell execute commands and stream redirection?

I was trying to redirect both stdout and stderr to a file today, and I came across this: <command> > file.txt 2>&1 This apparently redirects stderr to stdout first, and then the ...
Train Heartnet's user avatar
32 votes
2 answers
123k views

What is the difference between 'su -' , 'sudo bash' and 'sudo sh'?

I would like to know what is the difference between su - sudo bash sudo sh I cannot login as root while doing su - because I do not have the root password - I mean I have my user password with ...
Patryk's user avatar
  • 9,136
31 votes
7 answers
38k views

How to start a terminal with certain text already input on the command-line?

Rather than rephrasing my question, let me describe to you the desired user-case: I create a short shell-script to run command "gnome-terminal --someoptionflagname 'my text to be posted'", and ...
emf's user avatar
  • 1,692
26 votes
4 answers
20k views

What is the meaning of ./ before a given path?

I've been told to run this: ./yiic message ./app/messages/config.php But I don't understand the ./ meaning, can anyone clarify please. Note: Believe me, we can't google that. I've tried: ./ ...
MEM's user avatar
  • 11.1k
25 votes
4 answers
50k views

How to save output from command (eg. diff) into a variable

I want to test if there is any output from the diff (test if files are same), if none echo "Passed $x" else echo "Failed $x". I came up with some intermidiate step (save the output from diff to a file ...
Jiew Meng's user avatar
  • 10.3k
23 votes
2 answers
55k views

How can I protect parentheses passed to a cd command? [duplicate]

I asked here how to make cd protect spaces. Tab completion is great, but sometimes you paste the path from the clipboard so this is useful. The solution breaks with parentheses however. No matter how ...
Strapakowsky's user avatar
  • 11.9k
22 votes
2 answers
48k views

Terminal, how to quit --More-- list

I use autocomplete a lot in the terminal, like for example for cp command. But sometimes, when I am putting in the directory for the cp command and I press Tab, the list of files is so long that ...
Mr. Fegur's user avatar
  • 325
20 votes
5 answers
13k views

How (and where) can one change 'user@host $:' pattern in gnome-terminal?

When I start terminal in Ubuntu, I see: ilya@HOST:~$ I need to add a timestamp to this, something like: 2011-10-09T09:32:00 ilya@HOST:~$ How can I configure this?
Ilya Smagin's user avatar
20 votes
2 answers
11k views

Can I enable bash-completion for the new apt command?

The new apt command, present in Ubuntu since 14.04, seems to be a really useful intersection of functionality between apt-get and apt-cache but the current version of bash-completion doesn't know ...
Oli's user avatar
  • 293k
19 votes
5 answers
10k views

Where are commands `fg`, `bg` and `jobs` installed? [duplicate]

fg, bg and jobs are used for job management. And for some reason (maybe it's just me), I'm not able to find where their binaries are nor their manpages (whereis prints no information). which gives no ...
Guildenstern's user avatar
19 votes
3 answers
65k views

Add bash script folder to path?

I have some bash scripts in an application folder that I'd like to use as if they were on my path. If they were straight-up applications, I'd just add the directory to ~/.bashrc, but these are ...
Abe's user avatar
  • 383
18 votes
2 answers
44k views

How do I pause for the specific time between two commands in a script?

I want to do something like following: #!/bin/bash command1 <pause for 30 seconds> command2 exit How can I do it?
Pandya's user avatar
  • 35.7k
16 votes
1 answer
11k views

Why does /bin/sh point to /bin/dash and not /bin/bash? [duplicate]

As far as I understand bash is the default shell in Ubuntu, so why does /bin/sh point to /bin/dash?
Erik B's user avatar
  • 567
16 votes
1 answer
4k views

Why don't custom upstart job names tab complete in the service command?

I'm used to create upstart services with a file in /etc/init/<service>.conf and it works perfectly fine, the only thing I'd like to is to have tab completion the same way that every service in /...
José F. Romaniello's user avatar
15 votes
4 answers
43k views

How to separate command output to individual lines

list=`ls -a R*` echo $list Inside a shell script, this echo command will list all the files from current directory starting with R, but in one line. How can I print each item on one line? I need a ...
Anony's user avatar
  • 773
13 votes
1 answer
5k views

Select a particular result from completion suggestions

Let's say I have 3 files in a particular directory: abc.txt, aww.txt, ant.txt If I do: cat a (and press tab to see options) terminal will display the 3 file names: abc.txt, aww.txt, ant.txt Is there ...
samsamara's user avatar
  • 397
12 votes
2 answers
3k views

How can I toggle the touchpad depending on whether a mouse is connected?

I want to have my touchpad disabled automatically when an external mouse is connected and enabled when there is none. I have tried using touchpad-indicator but that fails in cases when the computer ...
mekkanizer's user avatar
11 votes
3 answers
10k views

Where is my PATH variable being set?

I'm trying to set my path variable to look like this: /usr/local/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/bin:/usr/games:/usr/local/games:/home/jgrande/android-sdk-linux/platform-tools:/usr/lib/...
user1617942's user avatar
10 votes
2 answers
19k views

Where are files saved when created in a WSL terminal window?

I recently installed Ubuntu in WSL on my Windows 10 system following the steps at How to install Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) on Windows 10 | Windows Central. I created files in a Terminal window ...
Shyman's user avatar
  • 101
10 votes
2 answers
3k views

I permanently changed my PATH variable by mistake, and I am unable to login now. How to change my PATH variable to default?

I used sudo -H gedit /etc/environment command on terminal to permanently change my PATH variable. To correct it, I pressed Ctrl+Alt+F1, and used export PATH command, but access was denied. Many ...
newbie's user avatar
  • 103
10 votes
2 answers
29k views

Rename command not found when running a script

I'm trying to to execute a script, which uses the command rename. When I execute it, I get a message rename: command not found. Any ideas? if [[ -z '$3' ]]; then shopt -s dotglob rename "$...
paweljvn's user avatar
  • 503
9 votes
1 answer
193k views

Run executable file on terminal

I'm new to Ubuntu and currently on it because of assignment. I would like to ask few questions: How do I make new command to run a shell script? For example, when you type passwd on terminal it runs ...
Unknown's user avatar
  • 195
9 votes
2 answers
3k views

using '&' in a directory name [duplicate]

i have a directory name with ISO&Emulator having some Important Files. and this directory is in different partition, and partition not showing in my FileManager(Nautilus). so i mount my partition ...
Praveen Yadav's user avatar
9 votes
1 answer
29k views

How Can I Make /bin/sh point to /bin/bash?

In Ubuntu, /bin/sh points to /bin/dash by default. I want to use /bin/bash as my system-wide shell for /bin/sh. What is the best way to do this?
mkasberg's user avatar
  • 1,364
8 votes
2 answers
4k views

Delete all files except specified files/folders using command line?

I have a folder containing a lot of folders and different files with the following structures : NASA │ ├── a │ ├── doc1 │ ├── doc2 │ ├── doc3 │ ├── folder1 │ └── folder2 │ ├── b │ ├── ...
hg8's user avatar
  • 13.5k
7 votes
1 answer
3k views

.bashrc edit messes up terminal command arrow-up history print

I wanted to give my terminal prompt in Ubuntu a more personal look, and wanted to change the text prior to the '$' when writing a command. From what I've found this is done by editing the .bashrc ...
darksmurf's user avatar
  • 272
6 votes
7 answers
38k views

Can I use fractions/decimals in a bash script?

Is there a certain syntax to use while using fractions or decimals in a bash script? I tried using the following script (in Ubuntu 12.04): #!/bin/bash { n=9 echo "$n" for (( i=.5; $i <10; i++ )); ...
user207701's user avatar
6 votes
3 answers
1k views

Bash built-ins with no manual entries

Why do some bash built-ins (such as dirs, pushd or help) don't have manual entries?
bsky's user avatar
  • 1,309
4 votes
5 answers
8k views

bash: /usr/bin/locale-check: No such file or directory error after i downgraded from ubuntu 18.10 to 18.04

After downgrading my Ubuntu from 18.10 to 18.04 when ever trying to login I am getting the following error: And opening the terminal following error displays bash: /usr/bin/locale-check: No such ...
Ahammed Shamil K's user avatar
4 votes
3 answers
15k views

What is the syntax for IF/ELSE in bash?

I am trying to pull logs and doing few others things directly. written a small line BASH but not working. I am sure thats with IF Condition. sed -rne '/21:25:07/,/21:50:07/ p' server.log.2015-04-...
Raja G's user avatar
  • 102k
4 votes
1 answer
9k views

Open a new terminal and source scripts

I want to write a script to activate a virtual environment and run my server for Django project in a new terminal. My startProject.sh is: #!/bin/bash source virtualenv/bin/activate python manage.py ...
Heuyie's user avatar
  • 169

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