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This article is awful. You're not going to "break your dependence on the GUI" by replacing 5 things you do a few times a day with obscure, less good CLI alterna

This article is awful. You're not going to "break your dependence on the GUI" by replacing 5 things you do a few times a day with obscure, less good CLI alternatives. What about things like manipulating files and running programs? Aren't they the things people do with computers? Also, bc is especially terrible. Nobody who is already "dependent on the GUI" is going to want to know about scale= and all that. Better to use Python or even bash (echo $((123+456)) etc)

yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
> What about things like manipulating files and running programs? Aren't they the things people do with computers? I'm confused. Manipulating files and running programs is a given, isn't it? You mean ls/cp/mv/rm-style? And running programs is... type in the name of the program (if in $PATH) or its path (if not) and press enter. Why would anyone bother blogging about that?
- cranekam 7y ago
  It depends on what people use the GUI for. It's not inconceivable that people start up gvim to make a new file (instead of cat > file) or use some bulk-renaming tool instead of learning about shell expansions. "Awful" was a mean description of this article. I'll fix it (edit: comment, not fix).
  - wruza 7y ago
    touch file if you need an empty file (also prevents accidental truncation).
  - yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
    `vim newfile` (or gvim/nano/emacs/whatever) will create a new file. I won't say I've never created a file with cat (handy for pasting), but it's a little unusual.
    - cranekam 7y ago
      I usually do it when autoindent is going to make a mess of whatever I'm pasting into the file.
- JeanMarcS 7y ago
  Or using Midnight Commander ! (Ok, it’s a bit cheating, sort of text/GUI, but makes file manipulation so easy on console)
- xg15 7y ago
  How about finding out what files are there in the first place, what data the files represent and which programs would be useful to operate on the files? In other words, things a typical GUI file manager can do easily.
  - yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
    > finding out what files are there in the first place ls? > what data the files represent ls, file > which programs would be useful to operate on the files? I guess I assume that people know this kind of thing, but xdg-open is fine.
kerng 7y ago
I wouldnt say it's awful, couple of neat things that one can use - noone forces anything on anyone.
cranekam 7y ago
"Awful" was mean. Sorry. I just meant that IMO it's more productive to get familiar with the shell and demonstrate powerful shell alternatives than learning a handful of situation-specific CLI alternatives. Getting to know things like shell expansions, using ipython (or whatever) for adhoc data crunching, the "jq" command, sup/mutt/whatever and so on will make someone a much better CLI wrangler (and less dependent on GUI tools) than knowing you can Google from the command line.
lukeschlather 7y ago
`bc -l` gets you everything you need. Sometimes I prefer Python, but `bc -l` is seriously a little more user friendly.

yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago

> What about things like manipulating files and running programs? Aren't they the things people do with computers? I'm confused. Manipulating files and running programs is a given, isn't it? You mean ls/cp/mv/rm-style? And running programs is... type in the name of the program (if in $PATH) or its path (if not) and press enter. Why would anyone bother blogging about that?

cranekam 7y ago
It depends on what people use the GUI for. It's not inconceivable that people start up gvim to make a new file (instead of cat > file) or use some bulk-renaming tool instead of learning about shell expansions. "Awful" was a mean description of this article. I'll fix it (edit: comment, not fix).
- wruza 7y ago
  touch file if you need an empty file (also prevents accidental truncation).
- yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
  `vim newfile` (or gvim/nano/emacs/whatever) will create a new file. I won't say I've never created a file with cat (handy for pasting), but it's a little unusual.
  - cranekam 7y ago
    I usually do it when autoindent is going to make a mess of whatever I'm pasting into the file.
JeanMarcS 7y ago
Or using Midnight Commander ! (Ok, it’s a bit cheating, sort of text/GUI, but makes file manipulation so easy on console)
xg15 7y ago
How about finding out what files are there in the first place, what data the files represent and which programs would be useful to operate on the files? In other words, things a typical GUI file manager can do easily.
- yjftsjthsd-h 7y ago
  > finding out what files are there in the first place ls? > what data the files represent ls, file > which programs would be useful to operate on the files? I guess I assume that people know this kind of thing, but xdg-open is fine.

kerng 7y ago

I wouldnt say it's awful, couple of neat things that one can use - noone forces anything on anyone.

cranekam 7y ago

"Awful" was mean. Sorry. I just meant that IMO it's more productive to get familiar with the shell and demonstrate powerful shell alternatives than learning a handful of situation-specific CLI alternatives. Getting to know things like shell expansions, using ipython (or whatever) for adhoc data crunching, the "jq" command, sup/mutt/whatever and so on will make someone a much better CLI wrangler (and less dependent on GUI tools) than knowing you can Google from the command line.

lukeschlather 7y ago

`bc -l` gets you everything you need. Sometimes I prefer Python, but `bc -l` is seriously a little more user friendly.