UNIX Tutorial for Beginners

A beginners guide to the Unix and Linux operating system. Eight simple tutorials which cover the basics of UNIX / Linux commands. This guide is based on a tutorial developed by Michael Stonebank from the University of Surrey, it has been modified to reflect the Duke OIT Linux environment. Parts seven and eight are advanced and may not reflect the Duke OIT systems. Thanks Michael!

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You should complete through Tutorial Six, the others (seven and eight) are more advanced and may not reflect the Duke OIT systems

Typographical Conventions

Introduction to the UNIX Operating System

• What is UNIX?
• Files and processes
• The Directory Structure
• Starting an UNIX terminal

Tutorial One

• Listing files and directories
• Making Directories
• Changing to a different Directory
• The directories . and ..
• Pathnames
• More about home directories and pathnames

Tutorial Two

• Copying Files
• Moving Files
• Removing Files and directories
• Displaying the contents of a file on the screen
• Searching the contents of a file

Tutorial Three

• Redirection
• Redirecting the Output
• Redirecting the Input
• Pipes

Tutorial Four

• Wildcards
• Filename Conventions
• Getting Help

Tutorial Five

• Processes and Jobs
• Listing suspended and background processes
• Killing a process

Tutorial Six

• Other Useful UNIX commands

Tutorial Seven

• Compiling UNIX software packages
• Download source code
• Extracting source code
• Configuring and creating the Makefile
• Building the package
• Running the software
• Stripping unnecessary code

Tutorial Eight

• UNIX variables
• Environment variables
• Shell variables
• Using and setting variables

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M.Stonebank@surrey.ac.uk, 19 October 2001