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commandlinefu.com is the place to record those command-line gems that you return to again and again. That way others can gain from your CLI wisdom and you from theirs too. All commands can be commented on, discussed and voted up or down.

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Find the package that installed a command

Delete all git branches except master
Delete all your branches except master (useful after archiving branches)

mkdir & cd into it as single command
The biggest advantage of this over the functions is that it is portable.

invoke MATLAB functions from command line
`-r script.m` also possible

pop-up messages on a remote computer
Run this command when you are physically at the computer you wish to send pop-up messages to. Then when you ssh in to it, you can do this: echo "guess who?" > commander guess who? will then pop up on the screen for a few moments, then disappear. You will need to create the commander file first. I mess with my wife all the time with this. i.e. echo "You have given the computer a virus. Computer will be rendered useless in 10 seconds." > commander lol

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 !!).

Reconstruct standard permissions for directories and files in current directory

Which processes are listening on a specific port (e.g. port 80)
swap out "80" for your port of interest. Can use port number or named ports e.g. "http"

easy C shell math calculators
allows simple C shell access to the power of bc - never could figure out how to do the same thing with Bash - that's why I use tcsh most of the time.

Set laptop display brightness
Run as root. Path may vary depending on laptop model and video card (this was tested on an Acer laptop with ATI HD3200 video). $ cat /proc/acpi/video/VGA/LCD/brightness to discover the possible values for your display.


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