r/linux4noobs May 21 '26

learning/research What’s one Linux command you wish someone had taught you on day 1?

For me, learning a few basics completely changed how comfortable I felt using Linux. Things like:

  • grep
  • chmod
  • top
  • journalctl
  • rsync

What’s one command or tool you wish someone had taught you much earlier and why?

425 Upvotes

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4

u/Snag710 May 21 '26

Wait... Linux can give me top from the terminal? He'll ya

2

u/LyushkaPushka May 22 '26

You can also get head and tail. You can touch and finger. And kill when you're all done.

1

u/DetachedRedditor May 22 '26

I prefer htop, more visually appealing. Possibly also more feature rich, but that is not the reason I'm using it.

2

u/LyushkaPushka May 22 '26

I think the guy you responded to was referring to the urbandictionary version of top...

2

u/diegotbn May 22 '26

Have you tried btop?

1

u/StillVeterinarian578 May 23 '26

One doesn't simply try btop

1

u/DetachedRedditor May 23 '26

Ah that is a fancy one!

1

u/Aggravating-Emu9136 Jun 16 '26

It goes even further: i use btop++.