xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/fortune/datfiles/freebsd-tips (revision 39ee7a7a6bdd1557b1c3532abf60d139798ac88b)
1This fortune brought to you by:
2$FreeBSD$
3%
4Any user that is a member of the wheel group can use "su -" to simulate
5a root login. You can add a user to the wheel group by editing /etc/group.
6		-- Konstantinos Konstantinidis <kkonstan@duth.gr>
7%
8By pressing "Scroll Lock" you can use the arrow keys to scroll backward
9through the console output.  Press "Scroll Lock" again to turn it off.
10%
11Can't remember if you've installed a certain port or not? Try "pkg info
12-x port_name".
13%
14Ever wonder what those numbers after command names were, as in cat(1)?  It's
15the section of the manual the man page is in.  "man man" will tell you more.
16		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
17%
18Forget how to spell a word or a variation of a word? Use
19
20	look portion_of_word_you_know
21		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
22%
23Forget what directory you are in? Type "pwd".
24		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
25%
26Forget when Easter is? Try "ncal -e". If you need the date for Orthodox
27Easter, use "ncal -o" instead.
28		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
29%
30FreeBSD is started up by the program 'init'.  The first thing init does when
31starting multiuser mode (ie, starting the computer up for normal use) is to
32run the shell script /etc/rc.  By reading /etc/rc and the /etc/rc.d/ scripts,
33you can learn a lot about how the system is put together, which again will
34make you more confident about what happens when you do something with it.
35%
36Handy bash(1) prompt:  PS1="\u@\h \w \!$ "
37		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
38%
39Having trouble using fetch through a firewall? Try setting the environment
40variable FTP_PASSIVE_MODE to yes, and see fetch(3) for more details.
41%
42If other operating systems have damaged your Master Boot Record, you can
43reinstall it with boot0cfg(8). See
44"man boot0cfg" for details.
45%
46If you accidentally end up inside vi, you can quit it by pressing Escape, colon
47(:), q (q), bang (!) and pressing return.
48%
49If you are in the C shell and have just installed a new program, you won't
50be able to run it unless you first type "rehash".
51		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
52%
53If you do not want to get beeps in X11 (X Windows), you can turn them off with
54
55	xset b off
56%
57If you have a CD-ROM drive in your machine, you can make the CD-ROM that is
58presently inserted available by typing 'mount /cdrom' as root.  The CD-ROM
59will be available under /cdrom/.  Remember to do 'umount /cdrom' before
60removing the CD-ROM (it will usually not be possible to remove the CD-ROM
61without doing this.)
62
63Note: This tip may not work in all configurations.
64%
65If you need a reminder to leave your terminal, type "leave +hhmm" where
66"hhmm" represents in how many hours and minutes you need to leave.
67		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
68%
69If you need to ask a question on the FreeBSD-questions mailing list then
70
71	http://www.FreeBSD.org/doc/en_US.ISO8859-1/articles/\
72		freebsd-questions/index.html
73
74contains lots of useful advice to help you get the best results.
75%
76If you write part of a filename in tcsh,
77pressing TAB will show you the available choices when there
78is more than one, or complete the filename if there's only one match.
79%
80If you `set watch = (0 any any)' in tcsh, you will be notified when
81someone logs in or out of your system.
82%
83If you use the C shell, add the following line to the .cshrc file in your
84home directory to prevent core files from being written to disk:
85
86	limit coredumpsize 0
87		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
88%
89If you want df(1) and other commands to display disk sizes in
90kilobytes instead of 512-byte blocks, set BLOCKSIZE in your
91environment to 'K'.  You can also use 'M' for Megabytes or 'G' for
92Gigabytes.  If you want df(1) to automatically select the best size
93then use 'df -h'.
94%
95If you want to play CDs with FreeBSD, a utility for this is already included.
96Type 'cdcontrol' then 'help' to learn more.  (You may need to set the CDROM
97environment variable in order to make cdcontrol want to start.)
98%
99If you'd like to keep track of applications in the FreeBSD ports tree, take a
100look at FreshPorts;
101
102	http://www.freshports.org/
103%
104In order to make fetch (the FreeBSD downloading tool) ask for
105username/password when it encounters a password-protected web page, you can set
106the environment variable HTTP_AUTH to 'basic:*'.
107%
108In order to search for a string in some files, use 'grep' like this:
109
110	 grep "string" filename1 [filename2 filename3 ...]
111
112This will print out the lines in the files that contain the string.  grep can
113also do a lot more advanced searches - type 'man grep' for details.
114%
115In order to support national characters for European languages in tools like
116less without creating other nationalisation aspects, set the environment
117variable LC_ALL to 'en_US.ISO8859-1'.
118%
119"man firewall" will give advice for building a FreeBSD firewall
120		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
121%
122"man hier" will explain the way FreeBSD filesystems are normally laid out.
123		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
124%
125Man pages are divided into section depending on topic.  There are 9 different
126sections numbered from 1 (General Commands) to 9 (Kernel Developer's Manual).
127You can get an introduction to each topic by typing
128
129	man <number> intro
130
131In other words, to get the intro to general commands, type
132
133	man 1 intro
134%
135"man ports" gives many useful hints about installing FreeBSD ports.
136%
137"man security" gives very good advice on how to tune the security of your
138FreeBSD system.
139%
140"man tuning" gives some tips how to tune performance of your FreeBSD system.
141		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
142%
143Need to do a search in a manpage or in a file you've sent to a pager? Use
144"/search_word". To repeat the same search, type "n" for next.
145		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
146%
147Need to find the location of a program? Use "locate program_name".
148		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
149%
150Need to leave your terminal for a few minutes and don't want to logout?
151Use "lock -p". When you return, use your password as the key to unlock the
152terminal.
153		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
154%
155Need to print a manpage? Use
156
157	man name_of_manpage | col -bx | lpr
158		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
159%
160Need to quickly empty a file? Use ": > filename".
161		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
162%
163Need to quickly return to your home directory? Type "cd".
164		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
165%
166Need to remove all those ^M characters from a DOS file? Try
167
168	tr -d \\r < dosfile > newfile
169		-- Originally by Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
170%
171Need to see the calendar for this month? Simply type "cal".  To see the
172whole year, type "cal -y".
173		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
174%
175Need to see which daemons are listening for connection requests? Use
176"sockstat -4l" for IPv4, and "sockstat -l" for IPv4 and IPv6.
177		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
178%
179Need to see your routing table? Type "netstat -rn". The entry with the G
180flag is your gateway.
181		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
182%
183Nice bash prompt: PS1='(\[$(tput md)\]\t <\w>\[$(tput me)\]) $(echo $?) \$ '
184		-- Mathieu <mathieu@hal.interactionvirtuelle.com>
185%
186Over quota?  "du -s * | sort -n " will give you a sorted list of your
187directory sizes.
188		-- David Scheidt <dscheidt@tumbolia.com>
189%
190nc(1) (or netcat) is useful not only for redirecting input/output to
191TCP or UDP connections, but also for proxying them with inetd(8).
192%
193sh (the default Bourne shell in FreeBSD) supports command-line editing.  Just
194``set -o emacs'' or ``set -o vi'' to enable it.
195%
196Simple tcsh prompt: set prompt = '%# '
197%
198The default editor in FreeBSD is vi, which is efficient to use when you have
199learned it, but somewhat user-unfriendly.  To use ee (an easier but less
200powerful editor) instead, set the environment variable EDITOR to /usr/bin/ee
201%
202Time to change your password? Type "passwd" and follow the prompts.
203		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
204%
205To change an environment variable in /bin/sh use:
206
207	$ VARIABLE="value"
208	$ export VARIABLE
209%
210To change an environment variable in tcsh you use: setenv NAME "value"
211where NAME is the name of the variable and "value" its new value.
212%
213To clear the screen, use "clear". To re-display your screen buffer, press
214the scroll lock key and use your page up button. When you're finished,
215press the scroll lock key again to get your prompt back.
216		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
217%
218To determine whether a file is a text file, executable, or some other type
219of file, use
220
221	file filename
222		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
223%
224To do a fast search for a file, try
225
226	 locate filename
227
228locate uses a database that is updated every Saturday (assuming your computer
229is running FreeBSD at the time) to quickly find files based on name only.
230%
231To erase a line you've written at the command prompt, use "Ctrl-U".
232		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
233%
234To find the hostname associated with an IP address, use
235
236	drill -x IP_address
237		-- Allan Jude <allanjude@FreeBSD.org>
238%
239To obtain a neat PostScript rendering of a manual page, use ``-t'' switch
240of the man(1) utility: ``man -t <topic>''.  For example:
241
242	man -t grep > grep.ps	# Save the PostScript version to a file
243or
244	man -t printf | lp	# Send the PostScript directly to printer
245%
246To quickly create an empty file, use "touch filename".
247		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
248%
249To read a compressed file without having to first uncompress it, use
250"zcat" or "zless" to view it.
251		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
252%
253To repeat the last command in the C shell, type "!!".
254		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
255%
256To save disk space in your home directory, compress files you rarely
257use with "gzip filename".
258		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
259%
260To search for files that match a particular name, use find(1); for example
261
262	find / -name "*GENERIC*" -ls
263
264will search '/', and all subdirectories, for files with 'GENERIC' in the name.
265      	--  Stephen Hilton <nospam@hiltonbsd.com>
266%
267To see all of the directories on your FreeBSD system, type
268
269	find / -type d | less
270
271All the files?
272
273	find / -type f | less
274%
275To see how long it takes a command to run, type the word "time" before the
276command name.
277		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
278%
279To see how much disk space is left on your partitions, use
280
281	df -h
282		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
283%
284To see the 10 largest files on a directory or partition, use
285
286	du /partition_or_directory_name | sort -rn | head
287		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
288%
289To see the IP addresses currently set on your active interfaces, type
290"ifconfig -u".
291		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
292%
293To see the last 10 lines of a long file, use "tail filename". To see the
294first 10 lines, use "head filename".
295		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
296%
297To see the last time that you logged in, use lastlogin(8).
298		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
299%
300To see the MAC addresses of the NICs on your system, type
301
302	ifconfig -a
303		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
304%
305To see the output from when your computer started, run dmesg(8).  If it has
306been replaced with other messages, look at /var/run/dmesg.boot.
307		-- Francisco Reyes <lists@natserv.com>
308%
309Want colour in your directory listings?  Use "ls -G".  "ls -F" is also useful,
310and they can be combined as "ls -FG".
311%
312Want to find a specific port, just type the following under /usr/ports
313or one its subdirectories:
314
315	make search name=<port-name>
316    or
317	make search key=<keyword>
318%
319Want to know how many words, lines, or bytes are contained in a file? Type
320"wc filename".
321		-- Dru <genesis@istar.ca>
322%
323Want to see how much virtual memory you're using? Just type "swapinfo" to
324be shown information about the usage of your swap partitions.
325%
326Want to strip UTF-8 BOM(Byte Order Mark) from given files?
327
328	sed -e '1s/^\xef\xbb\xbf//' < bomfile > newfile
329%
330Want to use sed(1) to edit a file in place?  Well, to replace every 'e' with
331an 'o', in a file named 'foo', you can do:
332
333	sed -i.bak s/e/o/g foo
334
335And you'll get a backup of the original in a file named 'foo.bak', but if you
336want no backup:
337
338	sed -i '' s/e/o/g foo
339%
340When you've made modifications to a file in vi(1) and then find that
341you can't write it, type ``<ESC>!rm -f %'' then ``:w!'' to force the
342write
343
344This won't work if you don't have write permissions to the directory
345and probably won't be suitable if you're editing through a symbolic link.
346%
347You can adjust the volume of various parts of the sound system in your
348computer by typing 'mixer <type> <volume>'.  To get a list of what you can
349adjust, just type 'mixer'.
350%
351You can automatically download and install binary packages by doing
352
353	pkg install <package>
354
355This will also automatically install the packages that are dependencies
356for the package you install (ie, the packages it needs in order to work.)
357%
358You can change the video mode on all consoles by adding something like
359the following to /etc/rc.conf:
360
361	allscreens="80x30"
362
363You can use "vidcontrol -i mode | grep T" for a list of supported text
364modes.
365		-- Konstantinos Konstantinidis <kkonstan@duth.gr>
366%
367You can disable tcsh's terminal beep if you `set nobeep'.
368%
369You can install extra packages for FreeBSD by using the ports system.
370If you have installed it, you can download, compile, and install software by
371just typing
372
373	# cd /usr/ports/<category>/<portname>
374	# make install && make clean
375
376as root.  The ports infrastructure will download the software, change it so
377it works on FreeBSD, compile it, install it, register the installation so it
378will be possible to automatically uninstall it, and clean out the temporary
379working space it used.  You can remove an installed port you decide you do not
380want after all by typing
381
382	# cd /usr/ports/<category>/<portname>
383	# make deinstall
384
385as root.
386%
387You can look through a file in a nice text-based interface by typing
388
389	less filename
390%
391You can make a log of your terminal session with script(1).
392%
393You can often get answers to your questions about FreeBSD by searching in the
394FreeBSD mailing list archives at
395
396	http://www.FreeBSD.org/search/search.html
397%
398You can open up a new split-screen window in (n)vi with :N or :E and then
399use ^w to switch between the two.
400%
401You can permanently set environment variables for your shell by putting them
402in a startup file for the shell.  The name of the startup file varies
403depending on the shell - csh and tcsh uses .login, bash, sh, ksh and zsh use
404.profile.  When using bash, sh, ksh or zsh, don't forget to export the
405variable.
406%
407You can press Ctrl-D to quickly exit from a shell, or logout from a
408login shell.
409		-- Konstantinos Konstantinidis <kkonstan@duth.gr>
410%
411You can press Ctrl-L while in the shell to clear the screen.
412%
413You can press up-arrow or down-arrow to walk through a list of
414previous commands in tcsh.
415%
416You can search for documentation on a keyword by typing
417
418	apropos keyword
419%
420You can `set autologout = 30' to have tcsh log you off automatically
421if you leave the shell idle for more than 30 minutes.
422%
423You can use aliases to decrease the amount of typing you need to do to get
424commands you commonly use.  Examples of fairly popular aliases include (in
425Bourne shell style, as in /bin/sh, bash, ksh, and zsh):
426
427	alias lf="ls -FA"
428	alias ll="ls -lA"
429	alias su="su -m"
430
431In csh or tcsh, these would be
432
433	alias lf ls -FA
434	alias ll ls -lA
435	alias su su -m
436
437To remove an alias, you can usually use 'unalias aliasname'.  To list all
438aliases, you can usually type just 'alias'.
439%
440You can use /etc/make.conf to control the options used to compile software
441on this system.  Example entries are in
442/usr/share/examples/etc/make.conf.
443%
444You can use "pkg info" to see a list of packages you have installed.
445%
446You can use the 'fetch' command to retrieve files over ftp, http or https.
447
448	 fetch http://www.FreeBSD.org/index.html
449
450will download the front page of the FreeBSD web site.
451%
452You can use "whereis" to search standard binary, manual page and source
453directories for the specified programs. This can be particularly handy
454when you are trying to find where in the ports tree an application is.
455
456Try "whereis firefox" and "whereis whereis".
457		-- Konstantinos Konstantinidis <kkonstan@duth.gr>
458%
459Want to run the same command again?
460In tcsh you can type "!!"
461%
462Want to go the directory you were just in?
463Type "cd -"
464%
465