Talk: Command Line Crash Course

These are the slides and notes from my Command Line Crash Course talk presented at DevMemphis on March 3, 2020

This was the first DevMemphis meetup that was streamed live and recorded but, unfortunately, because of some issues with the recording, the audio was unusable.

Outline

This month we’ll be talking about leveling up your command line skills, something every software developer should strive for.

Speaker:
George Spake
Software Engineer @ Green Mountain Technology
@georgespake
georgespake.com

The command line is perhaps the most ubiquitous and efficient interface between humans and computers. The terminals and shells through which we interact with the command line are among the most important tools used by software developers and technical professionals. Understanding how to configure your terminal to work more effectively is an invaluable skill.

This talk is for everyone from complete beginners to pros.

Here’s what we’ll cover:
What is a terminal?
What’s the difference between a terminal and a shell?
Some command line fundamentals and basic commands
Installing a different terminal
Configuring your terminal and shell
Creating aliases for common commands
Searching command history
Saving configuration in dotfiles
Hosting your dotfiles so you can share them and take them wherever you go

Slides

Notes

This is the document I referenced during the talk that includes most of the commands we covered.

Meetup