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Alkesh Baghel
Alkesh Baghel

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🐧 Linux Basics Part 2: File Operations, Viewing Content & Permissions

#beginners #productivity #aws #learning

Welcome back to our Linux beginner series! In this part, we’ll explore how to work with files, read their contents, and understand Linux file permissions. Let’s dive right in!

📁 1. File Operations

➕ Create a File: touch 

touch file.txt
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  • Creates an empty file named file.txt.

📝 Edit a File (Using nano) 

nano file.txt
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  • Opens a simple text editor in the terminal.
  • Save with CTRL + O, then press Enter.
  • Exit with CTRL + X.

🗑️ Delete a File: rm 

rm file.txt
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  • Deletes the specified file.
  • ⚠️ Be careful! There's no recycle bin.

📝 Copy a File: cp 

cp file1.txt file2.txt
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  • Copies file1.txt to file2.txt.

🔁 Move or Rename a File: mv 

mv oldname.txt newname.txt
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  • Renames oldname.txt to newname.txt.
  • You can also move it to another folder.

📖 2. Viewing File Content

📄 cat – Show file content 

cat file.txt
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  • Displays the whole file in the terminal.

🔍 less – View large files 

less bigfile.txt
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  • Allows scrolling through the file.
  • Use q to quit.

🧠 head and tail – View start/end of a file 

head file.txt
tail file.txt
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  • head shows the first 10 lines, tail shows the last 10.
  • Add -n to specify number of lines: 
  tail -n 20 file.txt
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🔐 3. File Permissions

Every file and folder has permissions that control who can read, write, or execute them.

➤ See Permissions: ls -l 

ls -l
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You’ll see something like:

-rw-r--r-- 1 user group  123 Apr 24 08:00 file.txt
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Let’s break it down:

  • -rw-r--r-- = permissions
    • r = read
    • w = write
    • x = execute
  • First set is for owner, second for group, third for others.

🛠️ Change Permissions: chmod 

chmod +x script.sh
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  • Makes script.sh executable.

👤 Change Ownership: chown 

sudo chown tejaswini file.txt
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  • Changes the file’s owner to tejaswini.

🔁 Comparison with Windows

Task Linux Command Windows Equivalent
View file cat, less Notepad, type
Create file touch Right-click → New → Text file
Change perm chmod File properties → Security

🎯 Practice Tips:

  • Try making a text file, adding some text with nano, and viewing it with cat and less.
  • Experiment with changing permissions and making a script executable.

Next up in Part 3, we’ll explore process management, network commands, and a bit of package management! Stay tuned.

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