Terminal & Vim

Linux

1. Linux Journey

2. Over the wire

Commands

• Terminal is used to interact with our system with commands

• The other mode of interaction is called the GUI which is graphical

• Many dev tools are only command based and their GUIs don’t exist

ls # To list all the files & folders
ls *.js # View all the js files in the folder
pwd # tells Current Working Directory
mkdir # Create a folder (directory)

cd # Navigate to a folder
cd ~ # Takes to home
cd / # Takes to root

head # first few lines from a file
tail # last few lines from a file
wc filename # view linecount, wordcount, charactercount of a file

history # Tells history of commands
touch # Create new file
echo "Hi" > file.txt # Creates file.txt with "Hi" content

rm file # Deletes the file
rm -rf folder # Deletes the folder (rf: recursive force)

cat file.txt # Concatenate, shows the file content

man git # Used to show manual
cp # To copy
mv # To copy & move

nano # Cli based text-editor
vi # Cli based code-editor :wq! (To exit)

open/start # To open a file

# Tricks
curl parrot.live # Dancing Parrot
curl wttr.in # Weather info
curl rate.sx # Crypto info

Making HTTP Requests

curl url # GET Request
curl -X POST url -H "HEADERS" -d '{JSON}'
curl -O url # Download

wget url # Used for Downloading
ping url # Used to check server latency

Advanced Commands

• grep → Searches for text or patterns in files.

• chmod → Changes file or folder permissions.

• sed → Edits text in a file (like find and replace).

• awk → Extracts and processes data from text (like columns).

chmod ugo-rwx # to add permissions to a file
chmod -R ugo-rwx # to add permissions to a folder

grep "one" filename # where "one" has been used in the file.
sed -n '/ERROR/ p' filename # to print lines with ERROR text.
awk '/ERROR/{print $0}' filename # to print lines with ERROR text.

Vim

• It is a full blown editor in terminal built in 1991 which was an improved version of another editor named Vi

• Some of the qualities of Vim are customization, performance and no-mouse control! 🔥

• To enter vim type vi in terminal

• Plain vim is not used alone, an improved version of vim called neovim is used instead

• Neovim can be made into a full blown IDE that uses Lua as it’s programming language 🤺

• Another alternative is NvChad that comes with all the good stuff out of the box on top of Neovim

Modes

• It is called a modal editor as with Vim we are always using some modes.

• There are three common modes in Vim:
1. Normal: Navigate with the keyboard
2. Visual: Used to select and delete text
3. Insert: Used to insert and edit (much like what VS Code gives by default)

• Vim is notorious to exit, simply do ESC + :wq! to write and quit

Normal Mode

• Normal mode is the default that is used to move in our code

• All these commands to move our cursor is called motion command

• Navigating using the H Left J Down K Up L Right

• 0 to go at top and $ to go at bottom

• e to end of the current word, b to beginning of the previous word

• gg to go at the top and G to go at the bottom

• p to paste

• y to copy (yank)

Visual Mode

• It is used to copy paste and delete text, much like what we do with our mouse

• All the same motion commands (cursor movement)

• y to copy (yank)

• d to cut (it deletes and also copies it to clipboard for pasting)

Insert Mode

• Type anything buddy!

• Used to type and edit text directly.

• Enter it with i (insert before), a (after), o (open new line below), etc.

• Exit insert mode with ESC.

Specials (Commands)

• Press ESC to go in Normal Mode

• :w to write

• :q to quit

• / to find

• :line-number to go to a line number

• u to undo and ctrl + r to redo