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Discover the hidden power of the command line

Learn Enough Command Line Developer Fundamentals 01
Learn Enough Command Line to Be Dangerous by Michael Hartl is an introduction to the Unix command line for complete beginners. Because the command line is a foundational technology for everything else in tech, this first Learn Enough tutorial is the best place to start learning to code. Read full post
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ebooks
90 pages
screencasts
hours
course
4 chapters
 
21 videos
 
67 exercises

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An Essential Computer Skill

The Command Line Interface

Tutorial 01 in the
Developer Fundamentals Series

This is the place to start learning technical sophistication. Learn Enough Developer Fundamentals covers three essential tools for the aspiring computer magician: the Unix command line, text editors, and version control with Git. After this level, you will be in a position to collaborate with millions of developers around the world, even if you're not (yet) a developer yourself.

“In the Beginning..."

The essential tool for developers

Suppose you wanted to go search through a large amount of text and count the number of lines matching a particular word or phrase. Say, the number of times the word “rose” appears in the famous Sonnets by William Shakespeare. What might be the easiest way to do this? The answer is to use the command line.

Understanding the basics of the command line is absolutely essential to becoming a skilled software developer. It’s also useful for anyone who needs to work with developers, such as product managers, project managers, and designers. Making this critical component of modern computing accessible to as broad an audience as possible is the goal of Learn Enough Command Line to Be Dangerous.

To be productive with the command line, you don’t have to know everything about it—you just have to learn enough to be dangerous.

Manipulate files

You don't always need an interface

In Learn Enough Command Line to Be Dangerous, you’ll learn how to use the command line to manipulate files, include creating, listing, renaming, copying, and deleting them. Stringing together command-line commands can be ten times faster than using a graphical interface.

Download and search

Even the internet can be reached

You’ll also learn how to download files from the Internet, quickly look inside of them, and search through them. You can do a quick content check in a fraction of the time it would take to open a separate application. And you can easily find all the lines that match a particular pattern, even if the file is hundreds or thousands of lines long.

Work with directories

Precise automation at the command line

Finally, you’ll learn how to work with directories (folders): making, changing, renaming, copying, and deleting them. As with file commands, these can be strung together to accomplish common tasks an order of magnitude faster than with graphical tools.

The result learning enough command line to be dangerous is a solid foundation for every other aspect of modern computing technology.

Is all of this…

Sounding good?

Happy people

saying nice things!

Jimmy Wales Founder, Wikipedia

Q: What is Jimmy Wales' favorite book?

A: It changes often. At the moment, it’s Ruby on Rails Tutorial by Michael Hartl. :)


Quora link
About the Command Line Tutorial
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">This <a href="https://twitter.com/LearnEnough?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@learnenough</a> commandline book is the best I&#39;ve read on the subject so far. And so is this cartoon from it. <a href="https://t.co/pCuPNbcX4L">pic.twitter.com/pCuPNbcX4L</a></p>&mdash; Keith Warter (@KeithWarter) <a href="https://twitter.com/KeithWarter/status/883433404900950017?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">July 7, 2017</a></blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Day 63: Went through a command line tutorial by <a href="https://twitter.com/mhartl?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@mhartl</a>. I like this course because I get to practice while learning. I find myself getting really burned out by really long tutorial videos, so this was a nice change of pace. <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/100DaysOfCode?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#100DaysOfCode</a> <a href="https://t.co/rlSV78xZAu">https://t.co/rlSV78xZAu</a></p>&mdash; Dayren Tolliver (@dayren_tolliver) <a href="https://twitter.com/dayren_tolliver/status/1134951822299414528?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 1, 2019</a></blockquote>

Michael Hartl’s guide to the command line is an awesome tutorial for beginners and a great refresher for experienced programmers as well.

— Paul Yi

I bought the Learn Enough command line program and videos last fall, and it’s paid off sooooo many times in my new job. During my first week, I had a manager sitting right beside me giving me the “go here, go there, do this, etc.” Having watched, read, and done the exercises, I was confident in getting around the CLI—and even had him asking, ”What was that shortcut?” For this, I thank you. Now I need a “Learn even more CLI to be dangerouser.”

I’m just writing to say I enjoyed Learn Enough Command Line to Be Dangerous. I’m a senior CS student and was actually already familiar with the UNIX console, however, I didn’t find your book boring or tedious at any point, quite the contrary! It was a nice refresher of the basics, and I actually learned some new tricks (being able to search inside the manpages for instance). The chapter + exercise format was effective in solidifying concepts for me.

I stumbled upon your website by luck a couple weeks back and since then I have gone through the Developer Fundamentals series, which I have to say exceeded my expectations and filled in many gaps in my knowledge which multiple other online tutorials failed to do.

— Tayyab I.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-cards="hidden" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I&#39;ve done a lot of programming tutorials and I just want to commend <a href="https://twitter.com/LearnEnough?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@LearnEnough</a>&#39;s intro tutorial (text editor, git, terminal, HTML) for showing how to make a website and publish it to the world. None of the other tutorials have made it &quot;click&quot; like this one. Thanks guys. <a href="https://t.co/1hQvaTWQdt">pic.twitter.com/1hQvaTWQdt</a></p>&mdash; Calvin Fung (@theCalvinEffect) <a href="https://twitter.com/theCalvinEffect/status/1084602512861057024?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 14, 2019</a></blockquote>
About the Learn Enough Courses

I must say, this Learn Enough series is a masterpiece of education. Thank you for this incredible work!

— Michael K.

I must say, this Learn Enough series is a masterpiece of education. Thank you for this incredible work!

— Michael K.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I have nothing but fantastic things to say about <a href="https://twitter.com/LearnEnough?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@LearnEnough</a> courses. I am just about finished with the <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/javascript?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#javascript</a> course. I must say, the videos are mandatory because <a href="https://twitter.com/mhartl?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@mhartl</a> will play the novice, and share in the joy of having something you wrote actually work! 🤓</p>&mdash; claudia marie (@StarvingHearts) <a href="https://twitter.com/StarvingHearts/status/1134234858157355008?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">May 30, 2019</a></blockquote>

I want to thank you for the amazing job you have done with the tutorials. They are likely the best tutorials I have ever read.

— Pedro I.

I have been trying to learn web development and programming on and off for the past 3 years and your website is the first one that I feel does the job right.

— Janelle S.

Just bought the new ebook and want to say keep up the great work!! The Learn Enough to Be Dangerous series re-ignited my desire to code after 10+ years of “meh”.

— Diane Y.

The Learn Enough Society and the courses are incredible. It’s the best value in the market of online courses in my opinion. Like you say, it’s learning to tech, which is very useful in our world.

— Sébastien D.

I just meant to tell you: your tutorial books from the Learn Enough series are awesome! The books are well-written, clear, concise, super-useful, and even fun to read. Thank you so, so much for this! I have bought the first three and will buy whatever you publish next. Keep up doing this very good work and thanks again.

— Pierre W.

Have been following the whole “Learn Enough to Be Dangerous” series and am VERY impressed with it. I am a project manager who works with software developers daily. These sessions have provided me with a huge amount very useful information, to the extent that I now not only understand what the dev guys are talking about, but am starting to use the tools (command line, Git, etc.) that they use.

— Brian

Michael Hartl is one of the best educators around when it comes to web development. I have been following him for a long time, and everything he produces is top quality. If you are looking for a quick way to become a thorough and productive professional web developer, Hartl’s books are a great place to start.

— Abram Bailey
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-conversation="none" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Also - if you are working through <a href="https://twitter.com/RailsTutorial?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@RailsTutorial</a> you will probably check out <a href="https://twitter.com/LearnEnough?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@LearnEnough</a> quite soon, which is an incredible resource for people starting out. Same high quality as the rails tutorial, while still digestible for people starting out.</p>&mdash; Michael Wallbaum (@mwallba) <a href="https://twitter.com/mwallba/status/988590924203679744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 24, 2018</a></blockquote>

Hi, my name is Philip, and I’m a beginning learner of web development. I’ve dabbled in small ways in Ruby/Rails for about a year and a half. Occasionally, I write ruby scripts to solve problems at my job. I also dabble in learning: JavaScript, Ember, more Ruby/Rails, brief intro readings into Scala.

I’ve tried Codeschool, Codecademy, and I’ll stop there, so you don’t spend the next 3 hours reading all the different learning resources I’ve tried.

Ruby on Rails Tutorial (Rails 5) is undoubtedly, the most effective and educational resource I’ve ever come across when it comes to learning anything about web development or writing any code on any level.

Here’s what you seem to understand that everyone else just gets wrong: There’s a big spectrum between the very beginner basics: declaring variables, to voodoo, magical, incantational trickery of witchcraft, like building your own web server.

Almost all tutorials make this mistake. The first couple “lessons” are good for people who don’t even have a clue what computer programming is and then suddenly, there’s a big jump to what seem to be concepts that only seasoned developers have mastered.

Thanks for such a great, educational guide in Ruby on Rails.

— Philip

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About the Author
Michael-hartl

Michael Hartl

Michael Hartl is the creator of the Ruby on Rails Tutorial, one of the leading introductions to web development, and is cofounder and principal author at Learn Enough. Previously, he was a physics instructor at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech), where he received a Lifetime Achievement Award for Excellence in Teaching. He is a graduate of Harvard College, has a Ph.D. in Physics from Caltech, and is an alumnus of the Y Combinator entrepreneur program.

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