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DVD-Rip
Make backups of your home DVDs easily. Other: mencoder dvd://1 -o "$targetDir/$dvdTitle.avi" -aid "$audioID" -ovc x264 -x264encopts qp=26:frameref=3:bframes=15:direct_pred=auto:cabac:weight_b:partitions=all:8x8dct:me=esa:me_range=24:subq=7:mixed_refs:trellis=2:bitrate=1000:nofast_pskip:threads=0 -oac mp3lame

Quickly (soft-)reboot skipping hardware checks
If you are doing some tests which require reboots (e. g. startup skripts, kernel module parameters, ...), this is very time intensive, if you have got a hardware with a long pre-boot phase due to hardware checks. At this time, kexec can help, which only restarts the kernel with all related stuff. First the kernel to be started is loaded, then kexec -e jumps up to start it. Is as hard as a reboot -f, but several times faster (e. g. 1 Minute instead of 12 on some servers here).

Convert seconds to [DD:][HH:]MM:SS
Converts any number of seconds into days, hours, minutes and seconds. sec2dhms() { declare -i SS="$1" D=$(( SS / 86400 )) H=$(( SS % 86400 / 3600 )) M=$(( SS % 3600 / 60 )) S=$(( SS % 60 )) [ "$D" -gt 0 ] && echo -n "${D}:" [ "$H" -gt 0 ] && printf "%02g:" "$H" printf "%02g:%02g\n" "$M" "$S" }

get a mysqldump with a timestamp in the filename and gzip it all in one go
Performs a mysqldump and gzip-compresses the output file with a timestamp in the resulting dump file. Inspect the file for integrity or fun with this command afterward, if you desire: $ zcat mysqldump-2009-06-12-07.41.01.tgz | less

Poor's man Matrix script
This creates a matrix of letters that run forever until you hit Ctrl-C simulating "The Matrix" effect... just for fun :) You may want to try the -n and -y switch to change the "FX" LOL! e.g.: pwgen -ny 3

Save a file you edited in vim without the needed permissions
I often forget to sudo before editing a file I don't have write permissions on. When you come to save that file and get the infamous "E212: Can't open file for writing", just issue that vim command in order to save the file without the need to save it to a temp file and then copy it back again.

show ALL iptable rules
show your current iptable rules from every available iptable table

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"

Cleanup firefox's database.
For Mac OS X users only

Remove a range of lines from a file
Delete a range of line


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