DEV Community

Cover image for OhSnap! Handy Terminal & Git Commands
Gedalya Krycer
Gedalya Krycer

Posted on

OhSnap! Handy Terminal & Git Commands

#productivity #beginners #git #webdev

The "OhSnap!" series explores bite-sized tips that you can apply today.

Here is a list of some helpful terminal and git commands for your viewing pleasure and my own future reference. 😉

Terminal Commands

Working With Spaces 

cd Class\ Work
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode 
cd 'Class Work'
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

  • Use a backslash (\) to make "Class\ Work" equal "Class Work”.

  • Encapsulate the phrase with quote marks to preserve spaces between words.

Open project folder in VS Code 

cd my-project-folder-name 

code .
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Only show directories 

ls -d */
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Clear the terminal 

cmd + k
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode 
clear
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Go back to the main directory 

cd ~
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Show permissions 

ls -l
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Create a file 

touch index.html
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Create a folder/directory 

mkdir my-project
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Removes a file 

rm index.html
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Remove a folder 

rm -r my-project
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

-r stands for “recursive”. It means to delete this thing and everything in it.

Copy a file/folder 

cp img images
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

The first value is the original file/folder and the second value is what it is copied as.

Rename a file/folder name 

mv old-name.html new-name.html
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

The first value is the original file/folder name and the second value is the new name.

Open folder in Finder 

open .
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Getting unstuck from hard-to-exit terminal screens 

shift + z
shift + z
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Git Commands

Show available local branches 

git branch
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Create new branch 

git checkout -b feature-1
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode
  • checkout moves to the new branch
  • -b creates a new branch
  • feature-1 name for branch

Push local branch to remote 

git push origin feature-1
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Switch to a new branch 

git checkout main
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Merge changes from one branch to another 

git merge master
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode
  1. Navigate to the branch you want to work in
  2. After the merge keyword, specify the branch that has the changes to be merged from

Grab all remote branches without merging 

git fetch --all
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Reset the local master with the remote version 

git reset --hard origin/master
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

Remove non-committed changes from all branches and master since 

git checkout -f
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

View differences between commits 

git diff
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

To leave this view hit Q on the keyboard

Thumbnail designed with Figma

Top comments (3)

Collapse
 
moopet profile image
Ben Sinclair •

Couple of tips:

cmd + k is going to be specific to MacOS. ctrl + l will work on pretty much any terminal emulator and is also often bound to things like "redraw" in apps as well.

cd ~ will take you to your home directory, but also so will cd on its own.

Opening the current directory in apps, like with code . and open . is the same as passing the complete current path. open is a Mac-specific (in this case) program which dispatches the path parameter to whatever application is associated with "folder" (again, in this case). On Linux you'd do something like xdg-open if you have a GUI, or even something else depending on your configuration. On Windows I suspect you're SOL.
This means if you have something associated with .js files in your GUI (e.g. Finder) then open foo.js will launch that application, regardless of what it is. In that case, open is a tiny bit easier because you can share code using it with others and it'll work even if they use something else like Sublime.

I have a whole rant about using touch to create files.

git diff
To leave this view hit Q on the keyboard

I'm guessing you have less as your pager for git diffs. It doesn't have to be that way though, and even if you do there's a good chance it's not called if there's nothing to diff!

Getting unstuck from hard-to-exit terminal screens

What do you mean by this? What terminal screens are getting stuck? The only time I know ZZ as a shortcut it's an alternative way to save and exit Vim.

Collapse
 
gedalyakrycer profile image
Gedalya Krycer •

Thanks for leaving feedback and additional explanations. Regarding your question at the end, I do believe the screen was a VIM editor. It sometimes comes up when I am working with git.

Collapse
 
moopet profile image
Ben Sinclair •

Gotcha.

If you're using Vim to edit git commit messages and don't want to, I think there's a git config setting. Failing that, I imagine setting something like;

export EDITOR=$(command -v code)
Enter fullscreen mode Exit fullscreen mode

in your shell config would let you use VS Code instead (or whatever you want)

Read next

pflashgary profile image

Build Your First React App: Mood Tracker

pflashgary -

markadel profile image

Fixing VS Code Go to Definition Issue on Linux Mint

Mark Adel -

alexroor4 profile image

Liquidation is every crypto trader's worst nightmare. But what can be done to avoid it?

Alex Roor -

willowjr profile image

What I’ve Learned from Building a Calculator with Vue.js

William Kwadwo Owusu -