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a function to find the fastest free DNS server
Evoke from the command like as: $ timeDNS commandlinefu.com . This isn't too terribly practical, but it is a good code example of using subshells to run the queries in parallel and the use of an "anonymous function" (a/k/a "inline group") to group i/o. . I'm assuming you have already defined your local DNS cache as ${local_DNS}, (here, it's 192.168.0.1). . You do need to install `moreutils` to get `sponge`. . If you're willing to wait, a slower version w/o sponge, (and w/o sorting), is this: . DNS () { for x in "192.168.0.1" "208.67.222.222" "208.67.220.220" "198.153.192.1" "198.153.194.1" "156.154.70.1" "156.154.71.1" "8.8.8.8" "8.8.4.4"; do (echo -n "$x "; dig @"$x" "$*"|grep Query) ; done ; }

[re]verify a disc with very friendly output
[re]verify those burned CD's early and often - better safe than sorry - at a bare minimum you need the good old `dd` and `md5sum` commands, but why not throw in a super "user-friendly" progress gauge with the `pv` command - adjust the ``-s'' "size" argument to your needs - 700 MB in this case, and capture that checksum in a "test.md5" file with `tee` - just in-case for near-future reference. *uber-bonus* ability - positively identify those unlabeled mystery discs - for extra credit, what disc was used for this sample output?

Using a single sudo to run multiple && arguments
Bash's here string

Show the UUID of a filesystem or partition
Shows the UUID of the given partition (here /dev/sda7). Doesn't need to be root.

Place the argument of the most recent command on the shell
When typing out long arguments, such as: $ cp file.txt /var/www/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/ You can put that argument on your command line by holding down the ALT key and pressing the period '.' or by pressing <ESC> then the period '.'. For example: $ cd 'ALT+.' would put '/var/www/wp-content/uploads/2009/03/ as my argument. Keeping pressing 'ALT+.' to cycle through arguments of your commands starting from most recent to oldest. This can save a ton of typing.

Remove the first character of each line in a file

Undo commit in Mercurial

How to trim a video using ffmpeg
Will trim the video to 4 seconds starting from the beginning. The -vcodec , -acodec options are required so that ffmpeg knows in what video/audio format you want for the new video.

Fast command-line directory browsing
Not really alternative, just giving a different behavior listing current directory if no directory given.

Copy the contents of one partition to another


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