Learning Unix for OS X: Going Deep With the Terminal and Shell

by Dave Taylor

Overview

Think your Mac is powerful now? This practical guide shows you how to get much more from your system by tapping into Unix, the robust operating system concealed beneath OS X's beautiful user interface. OS X puts more than a thousand Unix commands at your fingertips--for finding and managing files, remotely accessing your Mac from other computers, and using freely downloadable open source applications.

If you're an experienced Mac user, this updated edition teaches you all the basic commands you need to get started with Unix. You'll soon learn how to gain real control over your system.

• Get your Mac to do exactly what you want, when you want
• Make changes to your Mac's filesystem and directories
• Use Unix's find, locate, and grep commands to locate files containing specific information
• Create unique "super commands" to perform tasks that you specify
• Run multiple Unix programs and processes at the same time
• Access remote servers and interact with remote filesystems
• Install the X Window system and learn the best X11 applications
• Take advantage of command-line features that let you shorten repetitive tasks

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781491939987
Publisher:	O'Reilly Media, Incorporated
Publication date:	02/14/2016
Pages:	236
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

Dave Taylor is a popular writer focused on both business and technology. A thirty year veteran of the Unix world, he's a columnist for "Linux Journal" and writes extensively about gadgets and technology at AskDaveTaylor.com. Founder of four Internet startups, author of twenty books, he's also an award-winning public speaker and film critic, when he's not busy being single dad to his three children.

Table of Contents

Preface; Who This Book Is For; Who This Book Isn’t For; A Brief History of Unix; How This Book Is Organized; Conventions Used in This Book; Using Code Examples; Safari® Books Online; How to Contact Us; The Evolution of This Book; Acknowledgments; Chapter 1: Why Use Unix?; 1.1 The Power of Unix; 1.2 Folders or Directories?; 1.3 Thousands of Free Applications; 1.4 Commands Included with Unix; 1.5 A Simple Guided (Unix) Tour; Chapter 2: Using the Terminal; 2.1 Launching the Terminal; 2.2 Customizing Your Terminal Session; 2.3 Working with the Terminal; 2.4 Customizing the Shell Environment; 2.5 Advanced Shell Customization; 2.6 The Unresponsive Terminal; Chapter 3: Exploring the Filesystem; 3.1 The OS X Filesystem; 3.2 Listing Files and Directories; 3.3 Calculating File Size and Disk Space; 3.4 Protecting and Sharing Files; 3.5 Changing Your Password; 3.6 Superuser Privileges with sudo; 3.7 Exploring External Volumes; Chapter 4: File Management; 4.1 File and Directory Names; 4.2 File and Directory Wildcards; 4.3 Looking Inside Files; 4.4 Creating and Editing Files; 4.5 Managing Files; Chapter 5: Finding Files and Information; 5.1 The Oddly Named grep Command; 5.2 Finding Files with locate; 5.3 Using find to Explore Your Filesystem; 5.4 Shining a Light on Spotlight; Chapter 6: Redirecting I/O; 6.1 Standard Input and Standard Output; 6.2 Pipes and Filters; 6.3 Printing; Chapter 7: Multitasking; 7.1 Running a Command in the Background; 7.2 Checking on a Process; 7.3 Canceling a Process; 7.4 Launching GUI Applications; Chapter 8: Taking Unix Online; 8.1 Remote Logins; 8.2 Transferring Files; Chapter 9: Of Windows and X11; 9.1 X11; 9.2 GIMP, the X11 Graphics Editor; Chapter 10: Where to Go from Here; 10.1 Documentation; 10.2 Customizing Your Unix Experience; Colophon;