Linux
How to Ping Google in Linux
The ping command sends an ECHO_REQUEST to a remote server in order to judge just how solid a connection is. You could ping any remote host that you’d like via a host name or an IP address, but many administrators ping Google since it’s a stable site that many people…
How to Use CTRL R in Linux
If you’re using the modern bash shell, then you can use Ctrl+R as a keyboard shortcut to search through your command history. You can bring up commands that you used previously and issue them over again. This might work in other shells as well, such as if you’re using ksh…
How to Free Linux Buffers and Caches
Users may want to free Linux buffer and cache space if they think that it’s taking up too much room in RAM. This is usually because they’re used to Windows or Macintosh environments that don’t cache as aggressively. Doing this can actually reduce performance. However, it’s a good idea to…
How to Restart Firefox from the Command Line
Users of Linux are more than likely used to seeing Firefox installed on their systems by default, and they might very well type the name of the program in a terminal to start it. The name of the browser in all lower case is enough to start it up, but…
Fix: sudo command not found
If you’re an experienced Linux user, then you’ll probably find a sudo command not found error extremely disconcerting. You’ve more than likely gotten used to putting sudo in front of any command you need privileged administrator access for. This is doubly true if you’re a user of Ubuntu or any…
How to Use bc as a Hex Calculator
Various Unix-like operating system implementations like Linux and pretty much anything that has the GNU suite includes the bc basic calculator language. Its syntax is very similar to the C programming language. You can use it as a hex calculator right from the command line, so you won’t ever need…
Difference: Unix vs Linux vs BSD
Learning the differences of how to use the terminology Unix vs Linux is a great way to start a flame war. Some people consider these issues to be extremely important from a political standpoint. New users will certainly want some primer to go by, so it’s safe to say that…
How to Use the Recursive Linux Make Directory Command
Generally, when you use the mkdir Linux make directory command you create a single subdirectory that lives in whatever directory your prompt is currently sitting in. If you were in ~/Documents and you typed mkdir Memoranda, then you’d create a single directory called Memoranda that lived in ~/Documents. You don’t…
How to Set the Date and Time with Unix Epoch Format
The Unix epoch started at 00:00:00 UTC on Thursday, January 1, 1970. Ever since then Unix systems have kept track of time by counting the number of seconds since that date occurred. Unix, and the various implementations like Linux and FreeBSD, keep track of time as a literal number of…
How to Find MAC Address on Linux
If you need to find MAC address numbers for any network interface attached to your computer, then Linux makes this quite easy. Each computer network interface receives a unique Media Access Control (MAC) address, which explains what device it belongs to. No two MAC addresses are alike. Users with multiple…
Fix: GNU make is required
If you use FreeBSD, then you might see the following error when you’re trying to compile C code – configure: error: GNU make is required! Assuming that you’re already working on a command line interface as this error would generally only appear in such, you’d probably try to change into…
How to Create a File in Linux
There are many reasons you might want to create a file on a quick and easy basis in Linux with as little playing around as possible. You might want to make a placeholder for something you plan to put in later on. Many programs require a single blank file present…
How to Take Screenshots on Lubuntu 16.04 or Higher
If you’re used to using Microsoft Windows or some other different Linux distribution, then you might be confused when you attempt to take a screenshot on Lubuntu 16.04 or any of the versions that come out after it. Since 16.04 and 16.04.2 are long-term releases, you shouldn’t see any drastic…
How to Untar a File in Linux
When you work with Linux, FreeBSD or other Unix implementations, you’ll often see files that end in .tar and may even have other extensions after it. Even some experienced users don’t know the simple way to extract these from a command line. Some users who are used to working purely…
How to Use the Linux Version Command
You’ll often need to find the exact version of Linux you’re running if you need to update or reinstall anything. There’s a single Linux version command that will tell you most of what you need to know, and it will take an absolute minimum of time to run it. Finding…
How to Remove Directory and It’s Contents in Linux
If you’re working at the Linux command line and you need to remove an empty directory that you don’t use any longer, then all you have to do is type rmdir followed by the name of the directory. For instance, typing rmdir Test will remove the Test directory if it’s…
How to Remove Symbolic Link Files
A symbolic link, also called a soft link or even sometimes a symlink, is essentially a file that contains a reference to some other file and allows you to access it without entering the full path of the original file. You can link to regular files or directories, and many…
How to Use BASH for Loop
One of the most basic tricks when authoring bash scripts involves making a loop so that you can have a certain task executed automatically several times over. Eventually, the loop will reach a predetermined test condition and suddenly cease to execute. Loops like these will work perfectly in bash on…
How to Edit XPS Files on Linux
The XML Paper Specification is a comparatively open page description language that resembles Postscript to some degree. It’s used somewhat often on various types of Microsoft devices, but you won’t see it very much on Unix systems. Some Linux users turn to Google Drive and Google Docs to edit XPS…
How to Activate Linux USB Dongles ‘D-link, Belkin etc’
Generally you can expect a USB device to work as soon as you plug it into a machine running any modern distribution of GNU/Linux. Everything from Debian to openSUSE can usually identify any USB device you plug into it and activate it as long as it can find a suitable…
How to Stop TeamViewer Loading Automatically on Linux
TeamViewer is a popular application for those who want to remotely connect to different workstations in order to exchange data, messages, and conversations with other users. It’s one of the leading programs in the Microsoft Windows segment for this purpose. Some users have found that they can use it successfully…
How to Use the DD Command to Copy VHD Files to Physical Hard Disk
Virtual Hard Disk (VHD) files are giant files that emulate the use of physical media on VirtualBox and some other virtual x86/x86_64 emulators. This lets you run Windows, OS X, MS-DOS, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, OS/2 or even other versions of Linux inside your Linux distribution. These files don’t let you directly…
How to Change Default Players in Linux
You might want to watch an MP4 or AVI video in the GNOME Media Player. Perhaps you prefer listening to music in Audacious, VLC Media Player, Parole or something more exotic. Fortunately, you can change which media player Linux defaults to for each file type individually or as a whole.…
How to Fix snap Package Dependency Errors in Ubuntu
Ubuntu now allows you to use the snap command to install apps from a store. While it’s not designed to replace the Debian-derived apt-get system currently in use on most Ubuntu Linux installations, it does have the benefit of being fairly platform-agnostic. This is why it’s become popular on Ubuntu…
How to Display the $PATH Variable on Newlines in Linux
The PATH environment variable specifies a set of directories where your commands go, and if you type a command with nothing else in front of it the Linux shell looks for it in one of these directories. You can always type echo $PATH at the command line to see a…