In an editorial a few months ago, Editor-in-Chief Martin Streicher pointed out that, whether we like Microsoft or not, it’s a fact that many of us use Windows systems. Some of us use Macintosh computers with OS X. Each of those systems has a different graphical interface. Yes, you can install the X Window System on Macs and PCs, but wouldn’t it be great to have the same standard interface to all of those systems, right out of the box?
In an editorial a few months ago, Editor-in-Chief Martin Streicher pointed out that, whether we like Microsoft or not, it’s a fact that many of us use Windows systems. Some of us use Macintosh computers with OS X. Each of those systems has a different graphical interface. Yes, you can install the X Window System on Macs and PCs, but wouldn’t it be great to have the same standard interface to all of those systems, right out of the box?
One universal interface is already there! It’s the command line, the time-tested (and time-improved) keyboard interface. If you’re a long-time Windows user, you may not be familiar with all of the latest Windows command line features — or how similar it is to the familiar Linux (and Unix) shells.
If you’ve been reading this column for some time, you’ve seen a lot about command lines. (We’ll cover another graphical tool soon!) But this month, let’s look at even more tips that experienced users can appreciate: time-savers (and cross-platform-confusion-savers) that you can probably use on all of your systems, running Linux and otherwise.
When You Aren’t Using Linux
Before we start crossing platforms, let’s see how to get a command line prompt on Mac OS X and Windows.
In OS X, it’s simple to get a command line: just open the Terminal application. By default, you’ll get a prompt from tcsh or zsh (or you can choose other Unix-like shells). OS X has a lot of…
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