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Go (cd) directly into a new temp folder
This command create a new temp directory using mktemp (to avoid collisions) and change the current working directory to the created directory.

Recursive grep of all c++ source under the current directory

list all file extensions in a directory
Works on current directory, with built-in sorting.

Shows space used by each directory of the root filesystem excluding mountpoints/external filesystems (and sort the output)
Excludes other mountpoints with acavagni's "mountpoint" idea, but with -exec instead of piping to an xargs subshell. Then, calling "du" only once with -exec's "+" option. The first "\! -exec" acts as a test so only those who match are passed to the second "-exec" for du.

renice by name

Dump a configuration file without comments or whitespace...
A short, *easy-er* to remember command for stripping whitespace and comments from a config file, (or any file for that matter). Remember regex as: slash, space, star. pound, slash, bar. pointy-hat, dollar. (or "caret, dollar" if you must) :-P

Force logout after 24 hours idle
Shell timeout variables (TMOUT) can be very liberal about what is classified as 'activity', like having an editor open. This command string will terminate the login shell for an user with more than a day's idle time.

See the top 10 IP addresses in a web access log

Expand shortened URLs
curl(1) is more portable than wget(1) across Unices, so here is an alternative doing the same thing with greater portability. This shell function uses curl(1) to show what site a shortened URL is pointing to, even if there are many nested shortened URLs. This is a great way to test whether or not the shortened URL is sending you to a malicious site, or somewhere nasty that you don't want to visit. The sample output is from: $ expandurl http://t.co/LDWqmtDM

Add "prefix" on a buch of files


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