How Linux Works

Using the Shell

When you installed Linux, you set up a root (superuser) password, and hopefully you also made at least one more regular user for yourself. For this chapter, you should log in as the regular user.

The first thing you need to do after logging in is to bring up a shell window. After starting a shell, its window contains a prompt at the top that usually ends with a dollar sign ($). On Red Hat Linux, the prompt looks like [name@host path]$. If you know Windows, you will find that the shell window looks vaguely similar to the command prompt.

Note

You may hear the shell window referred to as the terminal window. The terminal window is the part of the user interface that accepts keystrokes from the windowing system and draws the characters ...