Commands using uniq (255)

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Preserve user variables when running commands with sudo.
In this case the current user has proxy variable set which allows access to the rpm on the internet but needs root privs to install it. Running sudo -E preserves the current user proxy var and allows the rpm install to be executed with sudo.

Start another X session in a window
You might have Xnest (older) rather than Xephyr. You can experiment with other desktops eg: startx /usr/bin/start-kde -- /usr/bin/Xephyr :2 You can start X on a remote machine (although I'd recommend vnc for anything slower than a LAN): startx /usr/bin/ssh -X gnome-session -- /usr/bin/Xephyr :2 Or just start another X session locally talking to the remote backend:

stop windows update
Windows only: stops windows update and the nagging restart window. You need your admin password for this one.

Get AWS temporary credentials ready to export based on a MFA virtual appliance
You might want to secure your AWS operations requiring to use a MFA token. But then to use API or tools, you need to pass credentials generated with a MFA token. This commands asks you for the MFA code and retrieves these credentials using AWS Cli. To print the exports, you can use: `awk '{ print "export AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=\"" $1 "\"\n" "export AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=\"" $2 "\"\n" "export AWS_SESSION_TOKEN=\"" $3 "\"" }'` You must adapt the command line to include: * $MFA_IDis ARN of the virtual MFA or serial number of the physical one * TTL for the credentials

Create and replay macros in vim
You can record, then replay a series of keystrokes in vim. In command mode 'q', then a letter [a-zA-Z] starts macro recording mode. Enter a series of vim commands. When done, enter command mode again, and press 'q' to stop recording. To replay, enter command mode, then press @{letter}

Shows what processes need to be restarted after system upgrade
This command can be installed in debian by the package debian-goodies. It also outputs the /etc/init.d/ commands that you need to do.

Show Directories in the PATH Which does NOT Exist
I often need to know of my directory in the PATH, which one DOES NOT exist. This command answers that question * This command uses only bash's built-in commands * The parentheses spawn a new sub shell to prevent the modification of the IFS (input field separator) variable in the current shell

Takes and displays screenshot of Android phone over adb.
Dependencies on phone: adb access, screencap command, base64 command. Dependencies on computer: adb, sed, base64, display (from imagemagick, but can substitute other image viewer which reads from stdin). This should work around adb stupidies (i.e. that it replaces \n with \r\n) with base64.

Perl one liner for epoch time conversion
Converts Unix epoch time to localtime. Useful for any logs that only display epoch time.

from within vi, pipe a chunk of lines to a command line and replace the chunk with the result
The vi key sequence !}command will send the file contents from the cursor to the next blank line as STDOUT to the command specified and replace that sequence of file lines with the output of the command. For example: sorting a block of data - !}sort The sequence !{command will do the same but "upwards" (from the current position towards the start of the file.


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