Useful Linux Commands

I have compiled a list of useful linux commands for day to day operation. make a pdf of a manual page

[email protected]$ man -t man | ps2pdf - > man.pdf

Run a low priority command

[email protected]$ nice

Go to previous directory

[email protected]$ cd -

Go to dir, execute command and return to current dir

[email protected]$ (cd dir && command)

Make compressed archive of dir/

[email protected]$ tar -c dir/ | bzip2 > dir.tar.bz2

Extract archive (use gzip instead of bzip2 for tar.gz files)

[email protected]$ bzip2 -dc dir.tar.bz2 | tar -x

Display a calendar for a particular month year

[email protected]$ cal 9 2008

What date is it this friday.

[email protected]$ date -d fri

What day does xmas fall on, this year

[email protected]$ date --date='25 Dec' +%A

Convert seconds since the epoch (1970-01-01 UTC) to date

[email protected]$ date --date='@2147483647'

Email reminder

[email protected]$ echo "mail -s 'reminder' user@address.com < /dev/null" | at 20:00

Show name and version of distribution

[email protected]$ head -n1 /etc/issue

Show all partitions registered on the system

[email protected]$ cat /proc/partitions

Download url at 1AM to current dir

[email protected]$ echo 'wget url' | at 01:00

You can find more commands from Linux Commands – A Practical Reference. Or more on Top 10 Best Cheat Sheets for Linux Commands