Home Account Access Linux Basics Web Site Basics Web Site Security Policies Contact Me		Linux Basics When you log into your Linux account you will be entering an environment that are most likely unfamiliar with. We're used to the convience of the Windows operating system with nice and easy point and clicks. Well you won't get any of that here. Instead you'll be at a command prompt. It is up to you to issue the commands manually. Although there are alot of commands you can easily get the job done with only a couple. One thing about commands is that most of them have switches. Switches are the commands paramters or options. By using switches you can greatly change the way a command operates or displays its output. man The man command is your help option, it's short for manual. When ever your having problems with a particular command just type the command man and then the name of the command your want help on. One page will be listed at a time and hit the SPACE BAR to move on to the next page. Hitting "q" will quit the man program at any time.   passwd This command simply changes your password. Just type it as is and you'll be prompted for a new password. REMEMBER: case sensitivity   cp & mv The cp command is the copy command. cp Test.txt MyCopy.txtwill copy the file Text.txt and name the file MyCopy.txt. The mv command moves files from one location to another.mv Test.txt ..This command will move Test.txt up on directory. The mv command is also used to rename files.mv Test.txt ../NewName.txt   ls ls is the file list option. It has many switches but you don't need to use any. Type "man ls" to see the switches and what they do. For instance:                  ls -ta -OR- ls -a -t (switches can be seperated or together) Will list all the files including files that start with ".", sorted by the file time. A very usefull switch is the -l switch. Try it out and see what you get.   chmod Chmod is a very important command. It changes the permissions of files or directories. Permissions are extremely important expecially when dealing with web pages and CGI's. Permissions control the ability for other group members or any other user on the system to read, write or execute your files and directories. The command:chmod 755 *.txt Will change all text files to 755. In Website Basics there is alittle permissions calculator to get you going.