Getting comfortable with terminal control

There’s no escaping the Linux terminal. This is your gateway to accessing Linux’s command-line interface (CLI) or shell. While all operating T

systems have an underlying CLI, none are more visible than the terminal. If you’re new to Linux, it’s tempting to studiously avoid it, but there are very good reasons for at least acclimatising yourself to the basics of Bash, the language used to power the Linux shell.

The terminal is the app used to access the shell. The good news is that it works in exactly the same way, so whatever you learn here will be helpful should you find yourself confronted by the command-line shell instead of your desktop due to some problem or other. What might be a daunting prospect is a little less frightening when you have some previous experience to draw on. But it’s not simply about equipping yourself with some potentially vital Linux-saving skills, because another reason to love the terminal is that it’s actually quicker to do certain things via a few quick-fire commands than wading through a series of point-and-click dialogs.

With this in mind, let’s introduce you to how the terminal works, how to access it and how to get started with the fundamentals of using it.

First steps

All Linux distros ship with a default terminal app – some even come with more than one. They all