Bash

From TheLinuxVault

[edit] The "Bourne Again SHell"

bash[1] is a common shell interface used by many distributions. This is commonly known as the command line interface. Although many shells are available (ash, zsh, and who knows what others) they all allow you to run programs directly.

Common programs to use on the command line are ls, cd, rm, mkdir, rmdir, and hosts more.

You can find more information about bash here. [2]

[edit] Uses of Bash

There are several ways to use bash. You can use it just for installing programs with the magic three, you can use it for low level bash file management, you can use it for running programs, or you can use it to write scripts for automating complex tasks using bash programming.

The magic three allows you to compile and install programs from a .tar.gz archive. See the link for more information

For bash file management, there are many options. For the average user, it is generally easier to use a graphical interface. But if you truly want to learn bash, this is a good place to start.

You can also use bash for running programs. This is similar to file management in that it is powerful, but most people would rather use a menu interface to start a program.

Bash programming is an art unto itself. Most scripts are only a few lines long - But with a little know-how, short scripts can be generalized and turned into useful tools for everyday use.