this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2025
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Howdy y'all!

I'm curious about everyone's favorite/most used CLI tool! Please include your favorite as well as your use case if you don't mind. Mine is rsync, which I use to keep my home music storage synced with my music player's SD card.

Runner up is ranger to navigate files. I mainly use this to quickly visually navigate mounted drives that I did not organize myself.

Hope to hear from you all soon, thanks!

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[–] MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip 1 points 8 hours ago

Edir. Renaming files in the text editor.

[–] liliumstar@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 16 hours ago

Outside of the coreutils and builtins, I use git a lot for work, school, and otherwise. I prefer the simplicity and speed over a graphical client.

btop is probably one of my favourites, really easy and nice way to visualize the system status.

[–] TootSweet@lemmy.world 9 points 21 hours ago

jq is a really good one.

[–] ZeroGravitas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 22 hours ago (2 children)
[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

So a quick look at the man page says its a fuzzy search. How do YOU use it? So I can get a point of reference to figure things out myself.

[–] ZeroGravitas@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 3 hours ago

The killer features for me are fuzzy command history match for bash (or zsh, or even powershell) and respectively interactive grep. Lots of other examples here: https://github.com/junegunn/fzf/wiki/Examples#searching-file-contents

[–] a14o@feddit.org 1 points 21 hours ago

Good one, although I only use it as ctrl+t or ctrl+r or within scripts

[–] xxce2AAb@feddit.dk 3 points 18 hours ago

rg is lovely.

[–] hellfire103@lemmy.ca 4 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago)

Most used (estimated, excluding base utilities and package managers):

  • micro
  • git
  • ssh
  • tree
  • (un)zip
  • curl
  • mpv
  • fzf
  • tar
  • fastfetch

Favourite:

  • fastfetch
  • micro
  • curl
  • btop
  • w3m
  • scp
  • wormhole
  • mc (Midnight Commander)
  • aerc
  • 7z
[–] GammaGames@beehaw.org 5 points 22 hours ago (1 children)
[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 22 hours ago

Not quite the answer I was expecting, but I still appreciate the participation.

[–] hakunawazo@lemmy.world 5 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago) (1 children)

ssh, screen, vim, git, grep, find, less
In that order.

[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 3 points 22 hours ago (2 children)

I do love me some ssh, it initially blew my mind how simple it was to set up.

I have no idea what screen does, even after glancing at the man page, can you enlighten me on your use case for it?

I'm still learning (quite slowly) vim keybinds, but I've gotten to the point where I can "use" it and not get trapped.

I've never used git personally, what's your use case if you don't mind?

Thanks!

[–] hakunawazo@lemmy.world 4 points 20 hours ago* (last edited 20 hours ago) (1 children)

screen keeps the current state of your console if your connection is lost or if you switch devices. You could also use tabs for multiple console windows. Customize it by a ~/.screenrc file (scrollback amount, no welcome screen, nicer colors, a status bar ...)

About vim: I enjoy it most with an eye-friendly theme and some plugins like nerdtree (file explorer) and ctrlp (fuzzy file search). More plugins here: https://vimawesome.com/ You can (and should) use your own ~/.vimrc config file, where you could setup your own keybindings, plugins and themes.

About git: It's a version control tool to keep track of your file changes. Properly configured, you could also use your vim for git file differences (git difftool). Professionally used for code changes and collaboration with other developers. Privately it could be used to track changes in your local markdown documentation, your diary or your tex thesis for example.

[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 20 hours ago

I really appreciate the write up. I'll play around with those tools! Thanks!

[–] a14o@feddit.org 3 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

I ditched screen for tmux ~10 years ago and never looked back

[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Why the switch? What features drew you in and kept you in? I haven't dove into multiplexing yet so no need to get too in the weeds, I wanna do some research then make a separate post about that later.

[–] a14o@feddit.org 2 points 21 hours ago

Better configurability and scripting iirc

[–] owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca 4 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

Most used? Probably...

  • ls
  • cd
  • nano
  • cat
  • ssh
  • ping
  • grep

Favourite? Probably one of...

  • yt-dlp_linux (for getting... stuff...)
  • ffmpeg (for modifying a/v files)
  • rsync (for pushing files to my media server)
[–] Albbi@lemmy.ca 2 points 18 hours ago

You're still using cd? Zoxide is great!

[–] a14o@feddit.org 4 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

I prefer vifm to ranger.

Other than that it's a tough question to answer because use the command line for everyday productivity, but

  • neovim
  • neomutt
  • khal
  • khard
  • castget

rsync seems really low-level though, so let me also mention

  • btm
  • git
  • ag
  • find
[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 3 points 22 hours ago (1 children)

Oh wow, there's a command line email and calendar client. Thanks for bringing these to my attention. I'm still, slowly, learning vim keybinds so vifm is out for me.

What's the difference between btm and top/btop? What does ag do for you differently than grep?

[–] a14o@feddit.org 3 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

btm is one of many alternatives to top. It works very well for me because it is fast and has nice usability.

I found ag more intuitive to use, and it's lightning fast. Here's a detailed comparison of features: https://beyondgrep.com/feature-comparison/

[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 3 points 21 hours ago

Awesome, I'll check the link out. Thanks for your time.

[–] stinky@anarchist.nexus 4 points 22 hours ago (1 children)
[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

What's your use case for ripgrep, or rather, what sets it apart from other tools for your uses?

[–] calliope@retrolemmy.com 1 points 8 hours ago

It’s a replacement for grep, which searches the content of text files for a regular expression.

Ripgrep is very fast. If you use grep, it’s an easy drop-in.

[–] teft@piefed.social 1 points 16 hours ago

man

My use case is i’m a forgetful dipshit.

[–] CameronDev@programming.dev 2 points 21 hours ago

sl

nyancat

Not useful, but fun.

[–] watson387@sopuli.xyz 2 points 22 hours ago (1 children)
[–] ScientifficDoggo@lemmy.zip 2 points 22 hours ago* (last edited 22 hours ago) (1 children)

I'm familiar with the flac format, but not so much with the program. What do you use it for?

I've never heard of ffmpeg, but a quick glance at the man page says it can rip from data streams with sounds awesome! What's your main use case if you don't mind sharing?

Thanks, btw

[–] watson387@sopuli.xyz 1 points 9 hours ago

I use flac to encode wav/aiff files to flac and to read flac fingerprints (md5) from flac files. I mainly use ffmpeg for ripping subtitles from mp4 files, but it's a pretty versatile tool.

[–] hellequin67@lemmy.zip 1 points 20 hours ago

ncdu and nano

[–] Endymion_Mallorn@kbin.melroy.org 1 points 21 hours ago