Working faster.
WHAT HISTORY PROVIDES
A record of commands you have run.
HOW TO SEARCH IT
Control and r, then type part of the command.
WHY THAT IS THE SINGLE MOST USEFUL SHORTCUT
Most commands are repeats or near-repeats.
WHAT AN EXCLAMATION MARK AND A NUMBER DOES
Repeats a command from history.
WHAT TWO EXCLAMATION MARKS DO
Repeat the previous command.
WHERE THAT HELPS
Prefixing with sudo after a permission error.
WHAT TAB COMPLETION DOES
Completes commands, paths and sometimes options.
WHY IT PREVENTS ERRORS
It confirms a path exists as you type it.
WHAT ALIASES PROVIDE
Short names for long commands.
WHAT TO ALIAS CAUTIOUSLY
Destructive commands.
WHY
An alias making deletion interactive is helpful until you work on a machine without it.
WHAT THE USEFUL MOVEMENT KEYS ARE
Start and end of line Delete to start or end Move by word
WHAT TO KEEP OUT OF HISTORY
Commands containing passwords.
HOW
A leading space, where the shell is configured to ignore such lines.
WHAT TO CHECK ON A SHARED SERVER
That history is not exposing credentials.
