Command Central

Sometimes if you know the command, it is just as easy to type that command and tell the program to run without having to work your way through all those menus . On your old system, you would have clicked that Start button, selected Run, and typed something in, usually setup, because that is when you tended to use the Run option. On your Linux system, you can do the same thing by clicking the big K and selecting the Run command . You can also simply hold down the <Alt> key and hit <F2> (Alt+F2). A nice dialog box will appear asking you to type the name of the program you want to run.

Are you wondering what those programs are called? Let me give you a hint: Click on the big K, select the Multimedia menu, and start the CD player. Now look at the title bar at the top of the player. See that KsCD ? That's the name of the program—almost. It's the name in mixed case. To run it, forget all those capital letters and just type the command in lowercase— kscd is the name of the program that runs the KDE CD player.

To recap, pressing <Alt+F2>, typing kscd in the dialog box, and hitting <Enter> is the same as going through the menus. Have a look at Figure 4-12 for an example.

A Polite Introduction to the Command Line

In your line of Kicker icons is something that looks like a screen with a shell in the lower right-hand corner. If you move your mouse over it and pause for a second, the bubble help will tell you that this is called Konsole . This is your command prompt. In Windows-land, you might have thought of it as the DOS prompt.

The reason there is a shell in front of the icon is because Konsole is your access to the Linux command line, known as the shell. There are many types of shells , each of which works similarly (e.g., all allow you to run commands), but each may have different capabilities. The default on Linux is called bash , the GNU Bourne-Again Shell .

The shell is powerful, and learning about its capabilities will make you a wizard of the Linux world. Become one with the shell, and nothing can stop you. The shell is the land of the Linux systems guru and the administrator. For the most part, you can do just about anything you need to do by staying and working with the X window system and your KDE desktop. Still, from time to time, I will ask you to do something from the shell prompt. As time goes on, you too will feel the power of the Linux shell.

Give Me More!

For those of you who get to the end of the chapters in this book and find yourselves wanting to know more about the shell, check out Appendix C.

Here's our polite introduction. Click the Konsole icon. The Konsole will appear, with a Tip of the Day window in front of it (Figure 4-13). Early on in your Linux experience, you might want to leave these tips on. You can even walk through them by clicking on the Next button. When you've had enough of these tips, you can banish them by unchecking the box to Show tips on startup and clicking Close. If you find yourself missing the tips later on, click Help on the menu bar and select Tip of the Day.

When you do click Close, you'll be left with an open Konsole and your cursor sitting beside a dollar sign prompt. This is the shell prompt. Whenever you find yourself at a shell prompt, the system is waiting for you to type in a command. Remember the CD player from earlier? You could type kscd here and have it start up just as easily. For now, type date at the shell prompt and then hit the <Enter> key.

[marcel@mypc marcel]$ date

Sat Apr 9 20:56:59 EDT 2005

Aside from learning the date and time that I wrote this paragraph, you'll also get your current date and time when you try it. That's what date is, a command that displays the date and time. You'll also find yourself back at the shell prompt as your system patiently awaits your next command. Type exit and press the <Enter> key. The Konsole disappears. That's it.

We use the shell again as we go through this book, but for now your polite introduction to the shell ends here.