Terminal Cheatsheet for Mac (Basics)
Letters are shown capitalized for readability only. Capslock should be off.
SHORTCUTS
Key/Command |
Description |
Ctrl + A |
Go to the beginning of the line you are currently typing on. This also works for most text input fields system wide. Netbeans being one exception |
Ctrl + E |
Go to the end of the line you are currently typing on. This also works for most text input fields system wide. Netbeans being one exception |
Ctrl + Q |
Clears everything on current line |
Ctrl + L |
Clears the Screen |
Cmd + K |
Clears the Screen |
Ctrl + U |
Cut everything backwards to beginning of line |
Ctrl + K |
Cut everything forward to end of line |
Ctrl + W |
Cut one word backwards using white space as delimiter |
Ctrl + Y |
Paste whatever was cut by the last cut command |
Ctrl + H |
Same as backspace |
Ctrl + C |
Kill whatever you are running |
Ctrl + D |
Exit the current shell when no process is running, or send EOF to a the running process |
Ctrl + Z |
Puts whatever you are running into a suspended background process. fg restores it. |
Ctrl + _ |
Undo the last command. (Underscore. So it's actually Ctrl + Shift + minus) |
Ctrl + T |
Swap the last two characters before the cursor |
Ctrl + F |
Move cursor one character forward |
Ctrl + B |
Move cursor one character backward |
Esc + F |
Move cursor one word forward |
Esc + B |
Move cursor one word backward |
Esc + T |
Swap the last two words before the cursor |
Tab |
Auto-complete files and folder names |
CORE COMMANDS
Key/Command |
Description |
cd [folder] |
Change directory e.g. cd Documents |
cd |
Home directory |
cd ~ |
Home directory |
cd / |
Root of drive |
cd - |
Previous directory |
ls |
Short listing |
ls -l |
Long listing |
ls -a |
Listing incl. hidden files |
ls -lh |
Long listing with Human readable file sizes |
ls -R |
Entire content of folder recursively |
sudo [command] |
Run command with the security privileges of the superuser (Super User DO) |
open [file] |
Opens a file ( as if you double clicked it ) |
top |
Displays active processes. Press q to quit |
nano [file] |
Opens the file using the nano editor |
vim [file] |
Opens the file using the vim editor |
clear |
Clears the screen |
reset |
Resets the terminal display |
CHAINING COMMANDS
Key/Command |
Description |
[command-a]; [command-b] |
Run command A and then B, regardless of success of A |
[command-a] && [command-b] |
Run command B if A succeeded |
[command-a] |
|
[command-a] & |
Run command A in background |
PIPING COMMANDS
Key/Command |
Description |
[command-a] | [command-b] |
Run command A and then pass the result to command B e.g ps auxwww | grep google |
|
COMMAND HISTORY
Key/Command |
Description |
history n |
Shows the stuff typed – add a number to limit the last n items |
Ctrl + r |
Interactively search through previously typed commands |
![value] |
Execute the last command typed that starts with ‘value’ |
!! |
Execute the last command typed |
FILE MANAGEMENT
Key/Command |
Description |
touch [file] |
Create a new file |
pwd |
Full path to working directory |
. |
Current folder, e.g. ls . |
.. |
Parent/enclosing directory, e.g. ls .. |
ls -l .. |
Long listing of parent directory |
cd ../../ |
Move 2 levels up |
cat |
Concatenate to screen |
rm [file] |
Remove a file, e.g. rm data.tmp |
rm -i [file] |
Remove with confirmation |
rm -r [dir] |
Remove a directory and contents |
rm -f [file] |
Force removal without confirmation |
cp [file] [newfile] |
Copy file to file |
cp [file] [dir] |
Copy file to directory |
mv [file] [new filename] |
Move/Rename, e.g. mv file1.ad /tmp |
pbcopy < [file] |
Copies file contents to clipboard |
pbpaste |
Paste clipboard contents |
pbpaste > [file] |
Paste clipboard contents into file, pbpaste > paste-test.txt |
DIRECTORY MANAGEMENT
Key/Command |
Description |
mkdir [dir] |
Create new directory |
mkdir -p [dir]/[dir] |
Create nested directories |
rmdir [dir] |
Remove directory ( only operates on empty directories ) |
rm -R [dir] |
Remove directory and contents |
[command] | [command] |
Allows to combine multiple commands that generate output, e.g. `cat data.txt |
less |
Output content delivered in screensize chunks |
[command] > [file] |
Push output to file, keep in mind it will get overwritten |
[command] >> [file] |
Append output to existing file |
[command] < [file] |
Tell command to read content from a file |
SEARCH
Key/Command |
Description |
find [dir] -name [search_pattern] |
Search for files, e.g. find /Users -name "file.txt" |
grep [search_pattern] [file] |
Search for all lines that contain the pattern, e.g. grep "Tom" file.txt |
grep -r [search_pattern] [file] |
Recursively search for all lines that contain the pattern |
grep -v [search_pattern] [file] |
Search for all lines that do NOT contain the pattern |
grep -i [search_pattern] [file] |
Search for all lines that contain the case-insensitive pattern |
mdfind [search_pattern] |
Spotlight search for files (names, content, other metadata), e.g. mdfind skateboard |
mdfind -onlyin [dir] -name [pattern] |
Spotlight search for files named like pattern in the given directory |
HELP
Key/Command |
Description |
[command] -h |
Offers help |
[command] --help |
Offers help |
info [command] |
Offers help |
man [command] |
Show the help manual for [command] |
whatis [command] |
Gives a one-line description of [command] |
apropos [search-pattern] |
Searches for command with keywords in description |