this post was submitted on 03 Jan 2025

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Which Linux tool or command is surprisingly simple, powerful, and yet underrated?" (lemmy.ml)

submitted 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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Which Linux command or utility is simple, powerful, and surprisingly unknown to many people or used less often?

This could be a command or a piece of software or an application.

For example I'm surprised to find that many people are unaware of Caddy, a very simple web server that can make setting up a reverse proxy incredibly easy.

Another example is fzf. Many people overlook this, a fast command-line fuzzy finder. It’s versatile for searching files, directories, or even shell history with minimal effort.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago

Find

[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

GNU datamash (https://www.gnu.org/software/datamash/alternatives/) - handy tool for data munching. There's also https://github.com/BurntSushi/xsv

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[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 days ago (1 children)

awk

..for parsing the output of other commands quickly and simply. Then that parsed output can be used to create simple log messages or be passed as args to other scripts. Powerful.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 days ago (1 children)

awk and sed have always been intimidating for me with that cryptic syntax.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

I agree with your sentiment regarding confusing syntax, however I think that confusion simply requires a calculated approach to dispell it.

It's a prime example of why I use scripts as reminders as much as I use them functionally. I work out the syntax once.. save it to an example script, then save myself 20 minutes of remembering by just $ cat ./path/to/script.sh and copying said syntax.

So if you can change your workflow such that learned things stay around as examples, I feel that you will pick it up much more quickly :)

[–] [email protected] 8 points 6 days ago

I like btop Maybe not really "unknown", but hey for those that don't know about it, check it out!

[–] [email protected] 6 points 6 days ago (6 children)

Lightweight sudo alternatives, hard to google too. I know ssu and rdo, please mention others.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Underrated or not widely known?

I love lazygit and I'm still surprised at how many people are shocked when they see it for the first time. Not exactly a command, but a very handy text UI tool.

For more elementary tools, I can't believe how many people know about ! and ctrl+r who don't also know about fc and edit-and-execute-command.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 6 days ago (5 children)

degit is a tool that will check out a git repo (or a specific branch or commit), but not set it up as a git repo. Basically just downloading a specific commit to a directory.

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