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set prompt and terminal title to display hostname, user ID and pwd
used in an if-then-else in case the default shell is ksh, not bash. The $(basename ${0#-}) is handy to echo which shell and strip the dash some flavors put in front of "bash" if [ $(basename ${0#-}) == "bash" ] ; then export PS1='\[\e]0;\h \u \w\a\]\n\[\e[0;34m\]\u@\h \[\e[33m\]\w\[\e[0;32m\]\n\$ ' else HOST=`hostname` ESC=`echo "\033"` BEL=`echo "\007"` RAW=`echo "\r"` export PS1='-${RAW}${ESC}]0;${HOST} ${USER}${BEL}-${ESC}[0;34m${USER}${ESC}[0m@${ESC}[0;34m${HOST%%.*}${ESC}[0;33m${ESC}[0m $ ' fi

Show the key code for keyboard events include the Fn keys
The keycodes are a result of pressing: Mute (Fn+F1) a

SVN script for automatically adding and deleting files

Batch edition of all OpenOffice.org Writer files in the current directory (body text)
This function does a batch edition of all OOO3 Writer files in current directory. It uses sed to search a FOO pattern into body text of each file, then replace it to foo pattern (only the first match) . I did it because I've some hundreds of OOO3 Writer files where I did need to edit one word in each ones and open up each file in OOO3 gui wasn't an option. Usage: bsro3 FOO foo

Replace Caps-lock with Control-key
You can return to defaults with "setxkbmap". More here: http://dailycli.blogspot.com/2009/12/xmodmap-replace-caps-lock-with-left.html

uniq for unsorted data

shell equivalent of a boss button
Nobody wants the boss to notice when you're slacking off. This will fill your shell with random data, parts of it highlighted. Note that 'highlight' is the Perl module App::highlight, not "a universal sourcecode to formatted text converter." You'll also need Term::ANSIColor.

Alias HEAD for automatic smart output
Run the alias command, then issue $ps aux | head and resize your terminal window (putty/console/hyperterm/xterm/etc) then issue the same command and you'll understand. $ ${LINES:-`tput lines 2>/dev/null||echo -n 12`} Insructs the shell that if LINES is not set or null to use the output from `tput lines` ( ncurses based terminal access ) to get the number of lines in your terminal. But furthermore, in case that doesn't work either, it will default to using the deafault of 12 (-2 = 10). The default for HEAD is to output the first 10 lines, this alias changes the default to output the first x lines instead, where x is the number of lines currently displayed on your terminal - 2. The -2 is there so that the top line displayed is the command you ran that used HEAD, ie the prompt. Depending on whether your PS1 and/or PROMPT_COMMAND output more than 1 line (mine is 3) you will want to increase from -2. So with my prompt being the following, I need -7, or - 5 if I only want to display the commandline at the top. ( https://www.askapache.com/linux/bash-power-prompt/ ) 275MB/748MB [7995:7993 - 0:186] 06:26:49 Thu Apr 08 [askapache@n1-backbone5:/dev/pts/0 +1] ~ $ In most shells the LINES variable is created automatically at login and updated when the terminal is resized (28 linux, 23/20 others for SIGWINCH) to contain the number of vertical lines that can fit in your terminal window. Because the alias doesn't hard-code the current LINES but relys on the $LINES variable, this is a dynamic alias that will always work on a tty device.

list files recursively by size

Create incremental backups of individual folders using find and tar-gzip
Problem: I wanted to backup user data individually, using and incremental method. In this example, all user data is located in "/mnt/storage/profiles", and about 25 folders inside, each with a username ( /mnt/storage/profiles/mike; /mnt/storage/profiles/lucy ...) I need each individual folder backed up, not the whole "/mnt/storage/profiles". So, using find while excluding directories depth and creating two variables (tarfile=username & desdir=destination), tar will create a .tgz file for each folder, resulting in a "mike_2013-12-05.tgz" and "lucy_2013-12-05.tgz".


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