Mac OS Command Line Commands

File Management:

cd

Change the current directory. For example, cd ~/Documents changes the current directory to "Documents" in the home directory.

ls

Lists the contents of the current directory. For example, ls -l shows a list of files and directories in the current directory.

pwd

Shows the current directory. For example, pwd shows the current directory.

mkdir

Creates a new directory. For example, mkdir ~/Documents/MyProject creates a new directory named "MyProject" in the "Documents" directory in the home directory.

rm

Removes a file or directory. For example, rm ~/Documents/MyProject removes the "MyProject" directory in the "Documents" directory in the home directory.

cp

Copies a file or directory. For example, cp ~/Documents/MyProject ~/Desktop/MyProject copies the "MyProject" directory in the "Documents" directory in the home directory to the "MyProject" directory on the desktop.

mv

Moves a file or directory. For example, mv ~/Documents/MyProject ~/Desktop/MyProject moves the "MyProject" directory in the "Documents" directory in the home directory to the "MyProject" directory on the desktop.

open

Opens a file or directory. For example, open ~/Documents/MyProject opens the "MyProject" directory in the "Documents" directory in the home directory.

find

Finds files and directories. For example, find ~/Documents -name MyProject finds files and directories named "MyProject" in the "Documents" directory in the home directory.

grep

Searches a file or text for a pattern or expression. For example, grep "error" log.txt shows all lines in the "log.txt" file that contain the word "error".

less

Shows the contents of a file. For example, less log.txt shows the contents of the "log.txt" file.

head

Shows the first lines of a file. For example, head log.txt shows the first 10 lines of the "log.txt" file.

tail

Shows the last lines of a file. For example, tail log.txt shows the last 10 lines of the "log.txt" file.

touch

Creates an empty file. For example, touch log.txt creates an empty file named "log.txt".

System Monitoring:

top

Shows a list of running processes. For example, top shows a list of running processes.

ps

Shows a list of running processes. For example, ps aux shows all processes on the system.

ifconfig

Shows the network configuration. For example, ifconfig en0 shows the configuration of the "en0" network adapter.

Network Tools:

ping

Sends a ping to a host. For example, ping google.com sends a ping to "google.com".

ssh

Connects to a remote server via Secure Shell (SSH). For example, `ssh

File System Tools

df

Shows the free space on the file systems. For example, df -h shows the free space in a human-readable form.

du

Shows the size of files and directories. For example, du -sh shows the size of the current directory in a human-readable form.

tar

Creates or extracts a tar archive. For example, tar -xvf archive.tar extracts the archive "archive.tar".

unzip

Unzips a ZIP file. For example, unzip archive.zip unzips the ZIP file "archive.zip".

diskutil

Shows information about the disks. For example, diskutil list shows a list of disks.

ln

Creates a symbolic link. For example, ln -s ~/Documents/MyProject ~/Desktop/MyProject creates a symbolic link to the "MyProject" directory in the "Documents" directory in the home directory on the desktop.

mount

Mounts a file system. For example, mount -t iso9660 image.iso /mnt/iso mounts the ISO file "image.iso" to the directory "/mnt/iso".

Access Rights Tools

chmod

Changes the access rights for a file or directory. For example, chmod 755 script.sh gives the script "script.sh" the permission to be executed.

chown

Changes the owner of a file or directory. For example, chown user file.txt changes the owner of the file "file.txt" to the user "user".

Root Tools

sudo

Executes a command as superuser. For example, sudo reboot reboots the computer.