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no # comments, blank lines, white space. # can start in any column
The shortest and most complete comment/blank line remover... Any line where the first non-whitespace character is # (ie, indented # comments), and all null and blank lines are removed. Use the alias as a filter: $ noc /etc/hosts or $ grep server /etc/hosts | noc Change to nawk depending awk versions.

ascii digital clock
# ### ### # # ### ### # # # ## # # ### # # # # ### ## # # # # # # ### # # # # ### # # # # # ### ##### # # ##### # # # ### # # ### # # # # # ### # # ### # # ##### ### ### # ##### ### ##### #

Archive all files that have not been modified in the last days
Finally, we can make the file "unchangeable" sudo chattr +i

Find usb device
I often use it to find recently added ou removed device, or using find in /dev, or anything similar. Just run the command, plug the device, and wait to see him and only him

.inputrc keybinding to wrap current line in inotifytools for instant compile/test-as-you-save-loop
Assuming you've written all of make -j hfst-tokenize && echo doavtter gr?dakursa|./hfst-tokenize --gtd tokeniser-gramcheck-gt-desc.pmhfst and want that to execute every time you :w in vim (or C-xC-s in Emacs), just hit and it'll turn into $ while true; do ( make -j hfst-tokenize && e doavtter gr?dakursa|./hfst-tokenize --gtd tokeniser-gramcheck-gt-desc.pmhfst ); inotifywait -q -e modify -e close_write *; done with the cursor right before the ')'. Hit enter, and it'll run on each save. Requires the package inotify-tools installed.

aptbackup restore
Use when aptbackup will not start or you just want to see what's going on.

kill all processes using a directory/file/etc
This command will kill all processes using a directory. It's quick and dirty. One may also use a -9 with kill in case regular kill doesn't work. This is useful if one needs to umount a directory.

[vim] Clear trailing whitespace in file
% acts on every line in the file. \s matches spaces. \+ matches one or more occurrences of what's right behind it. Character '$' matches end-of-line.

Mirror a directory structure from websites with an Apache-generated file indexes
wget/curl/friends are not good with mirroring files off websites, especially those with Apache-generated directory listings. These tools endlessly waste time downloading useless index HTML pages. lftp's mirror command does a better job without the mess.

Get full from half remembered commands
Show all commands having the part known by you. Eg: $apropos pdf | less


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