I’ve used Linux full-time since late 2020 and I never knew about ctrl+y and ctrl+u.
I’d also like to contribute some knowledge.
aliases
You can put these into your ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc or whatever shell you use.
###### ls aliases#### ls = colorsaliasls='ls --color=auto'# ll = ls + human readable file sizesalias ll='ls -lh --color=auto'# lla = ll + show hidden files and foldersalias lla='ls -lah --color=auto'###### other aliases#### set color for different commandsalias diff='diff --color=auto'alias grep='grep --color=auto'alias ip='ip --color=auto'# my favourite way of navigating to a far-off folder# this scans my home folder and presents me with a list of# fuzzy-searchable folders# you need fzf and fd installed for this alias to workalias cdd='cd "$(sudo fd -t d . ${HOME} | fzf)"'
recommendations
ncdu - a shell-based tool to analyze disk usage, think GNOME’s baobab or KDE’s filelight but in the terminal
Saving this! Absolutely gold, thanks for writing it up. You’re what makes the Linux community cool. ❤️
tab completion works in more places than you might expect
I’ve found tab to be such a nice “please give me a hint” button.
Bonus tip : Sometimes you won’t get auto complete because there’s too many possibilities and the computer can’t be certain which one you want. Hitting tab multiple times will show the possibilities, so you can type in enough characters to remove ambiguity, hit tab again, and boom auto complete!
…That was a terribly convoluted explanation I’m sorry. Just try hitting tab multiple times for fun if you’re stuck it’s kinda handy. Lol
If you’re looking for a full list of these kind of navigation shortcuts, they all come from readline so read the man page for that. Or just look up the basic navigation of emacs which is what readline is mimicking.
A neat thing is that a lot of command line programs use readline. So learning and configuring it will also be useful in for example the Python REPL and calc.
Here are some neat configuration options you can put in ~/.inputrc
set completion-ignore-case on
set show-all-if-ambiguous on
set completion-prefix-display-length 9
set blink-matching-paren on
set mark-symlinked-directories on
And if you are a sensible person who is used to vim
That’s good to know. It’s interesting that the other commenter thinks emacs shortcuts are illogical. I’ll make my best guesses at the logic
ctrl-a/ctrl-e for start/end of line
a is the beginning of the alphabet; e for end (of line)
ctrl-u to clear the command you’ve typed so far but store it into a temporary pastebuffer
ctrl-y to paste the ctrl-u’d command
No idea here. Seems similar to nano with k-“cut” and u-”uncut”.
ctrl-w to delete by word
w for word obviously.
ctrl-r to search your command history
alt-b/alt-f to move cursor back/forwards by word
r reverse, b back, f forward. Not sure why alt vs control though; presumably ctrl+b and ctrl+f do different things although I know emacs likes to use Alt (“Meta”) a lot.
In the 1980s, Digital Equipment Corporation had a word processor, WPS. Ctrl-u cleared the line you were typing and put it into the paste buffer. Maybe legacy usage?
Explains why they are so illogical! Unfortunately i think its better to just learn the defaults since i remote into lots of servers where i dont carry my config
alt-. also pastes the last argument of the previous command (useful if you need to modify it a bit)
instead of any shortcuts starting with “alt” you can also press “esc” followed by the second key, e.g. pressing “esc”, releasing it and then “a” is the same as pressing “alt-a” (useful if you have only one hand available, or if alt is not availalble)
if you put a space before a command, it will not be saved in history (useful sometimes, e.g. if you pass a password directly as an argument)
sudo !!which footells you where thefooprogram is locatedls -lacdwithout any args takes you to your home dircd -takes you to your previous dirSaved! Thank you so much.
I’ve used Linux full-time since late 2020 and I never knew about
ctrl+yandctrl+u.I’d also like to contribute some knowledge.
aliases
You can put these into your
~/.bashrcor~/.zshrcor whatever shell you use.### ### ls aliases ### # ls = colors alias ls='ls --color=auto' # ll = ls + human readable file sizes alias ll='ls -lh --color=auto' # lla = ll + show hidden files and folders alias lla='ls -lah --color=auto' ### ### other aliases ### # set color for different commands alias diff='diff --color=auto' alias grep='grep --color=auto' alias ip='ip --color=auto' # my favourite way of navigating to a far-off folder # this scans my home folder and presents me with a list of # fuzzy-searchable folders # you need fzf and fd installed for this alias to work alias cdd='cd "$(sudo fd -t d . ${HOME} | fzf)"'recommendations
ncdu - a shell-based tool to analyze disk usage, think GNOME’s baobab or KDE’s filelight but in the terminal
zellij - tmux but easy and with nice colors
atuin - shell history but good, fuzzy-searchable. If you still have the basic shell history (when pressing
ctrl+r), I cannot recommend this enough.ranger - a terminal file-browser (does everything I need and way more)
+1 for Atuin. I constantly use it on my machine and SSH-ing on remote machines who don’t have it is an absolute pain.
I’m gonna have to save this thread and check some of those!
For me the Home/End keys also go to the start/end of a line like ctrl-a/ctrl-e, and ctrl-tab/ctrl-Tab move the cursor fwd/back a word at a time.
What’s the shortcut for scrolling the terminal?
Saving this! Absolutely gold, thanks for writing it up. You’re what makes the Linux community cool. ❤️
I’ve found tab to be such a nice “please give me a hint” button.
…That was a terribly convoluted explanation I’m sorry. Just try hitting tab multiple times for fun if you’re stuck it’s kinda handy. Lol
If you’re looking for a full list of these kind of navigation shortcuts, they all come from
readlineso read themanpage for that. Or just look up the basic navigation ofemacswhich is whatreadlineis mimicking.A neat thing is that a lot of command line programs use readline. So learning and configuring it will also be useful in for example the Python REPL and calc.
Here are some neat configuration options you can put in
~/.inputrcset completion-ignore-case on set show-all-if-ambiguous on set completion-prefix-display-length 9 set blink-matching-paren on set mark-symlinked-directories onAnd if you are a sensible person who is used to vim
set editing-mode vi set show-mode-in-prompt onMakes me realize just how illogical and bad these shortcuts are
I believe, these are Emacs shortcuts. There’s also
set -o viin bash, but I’ve never used it, so can’t vouch for it.That’s good to know. It’s interesting that the other commenter thinks emacs shortcuts are illogical. I’ll make my best guesses at the logic
a is the beginning of the alphabet; e for end (of line)
No idea here. Seems similar to nano with k-“cut” and u-”uncut”.
w for word obviously.
r reverse, b back, f forward. Not sure why alt vs control though; presumably ctrl+b and ctrl+f do different things although I know emacs likes to use Alt (“Meta”) a lot.
In the 1980s, Digital Equipment Corporation had a word processor, WPS. Ctrl-u cleared the line you were typing and put it into the paste buffer. Maybe legacy usage?
Explains why they are so illogical! Unfortunately i think its better to just learn the defaults since i remote into lots of servers where i dont carry my config
I’ve been using the commandline for so long but was always too lazy to look up the rest of these commands after ctrl+a/e and ctrl+r THANK YOU!!!
post this commend again and again! There’s always lazy idiots like me who will be helped that way!
Nice list, TIL about
Ctrl+UandCtrl+Y.If I may add,
Ctrl+XintoCtrl+Eopens$EDITORto edit the current line.