Apple: how to work with terminal in mac

Quick How To Guide

The iOS operating system is basically modified UNIX with beautiful graphics. This means that if you need something to set up or automate, you can use the command line the UNIX shell.

The shell is available on Apple iMac and MacBooks. On the iPhones and iPads, the command line is hidden.

How to start MAC terminal?

Click the launchpad on the bottom bar, find the terminal icon and launch it.

First commands

This command displays the current work directory you are in.

pwd

Since the iOS is de facto unix, the entire file system complies with the File Hierarchy Standard (FHS) that specifies the tree directory directory. At the top of the tree there is a "/" symbol. Under "/" are individual directories and files in tree structure.

Use this command to list the contents of the directory in which you are currently:

ls -l

The first column shows the type (d = directory) and system rights (r = read, w = write, x = execute) in the triad in the following order: owner, group, all. The third column shows who the owner is. The column shows the group that owns the given file. The sixth column shows the time of the last modification and the seventh file name.

Use this command to change the current work directory (to /home):

cd /home

If you specify this command without parameters, the cd command is set to the current home directory that you specify in the $HOME variable.

Do you want to view the contents of any Mac shell variable? For example, $HOME? It is simple:

echo $HOME

How to use terminal: basic advice

Hint1: Arrow up to view the last commands.

Hint2: Using Ctrl A, you will get to the top of the line by pressing Ctrl E at the end of the line.

Hint3: Hold down the left mouse button to select the text and then right-click on the menu to select "copy" or "paste" as needed.

Hint4: Magic button "home": command Ctrl C to interrupt the execution of the current command and get back to the command prompt. For example, you can try this by entering a yes command on the terminal, which causes the ypsilon to endlessly. You interrupt this infinite program with Ctrl C.

Most useful commands in terminal

Overview of hard disk usage

This command displays the current use of disks that are "assembled" to your computer:

df -aH

Option H means human readable output. By selecting and specifying that we want to display all mounted drives.

Which folder does the disk space take?

Use the cd command to set up the folder you want to see how much it takes. You can check the entire file system using the cd /. Using this command, you will be able to print out in a comprehensible manner how much you deal with:

du -sh /* 2>/dev/null

The beaked twin determines that we do not want to see any error messages.

What does MAC do now? Which processes are most active?

This command displays the most active processes.

top

Each process also has a PID (Process ID), according to which the process can be uniquely identified and, for example, shut down. Use the q button to finish the top.

How to find and destroy a particular process by name?

This command looks for the command bash - the command line you are running:

ps aux | grep bash | grep -v grep

The second column indicates the PID. In my case it is 2335. Use this command to exit the program. beware, the terminal will disappear! Muhaha :D

kill 2335

What is currently happening in the system? What bothers MAC?

With this command, you are constantly monitoring what the system says:

tail -f /var/log/system.log

To quit tail command, use Ctrl C

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