Command Help using Manual Pages (man) (OS X, Linux, BSD)

As you start using the command line, you’ll come across thousands of different commands, all with their own options and ways of taking options.  Every command is different, but help is on hand in the form of man pages. Manual Pages (or man page for short) are the documentation distributed with every command (or, at …

Vim Text Editor: Guides on how to use it

New users to Linux or BSD, will have no doubt come across Vim (or at least Vi). Vim is “Vi IMproved” – it’s simply an extended Vi. You’ll have probably had times when you need to do something very simple, such as Cut and Paste, and not been able to, just because you don’t know …

Basic Steps to Securing OpenSSH from Random Attacks

If you run an SSH server, and have left it on the default port, you’ll probably notice in time lots of login attempts. These login attempts will be from random IP addresses, and usually try lots of different username/password combinations, and hopefully failing. This article will focus on OpenSSH – I’m not sure if all …

mtr: A Better traceroute and ping, combined! (Linux, BSD)

mtr is an small utility which combines both the functionality of traceroute and ping, for Linux and BSD. There are always occasions where you’ve wanted to traceroute to a host, possibly due to connectivity issues, and you need to diagnose where the problem lies.  Most operating systems offer basic traceroute and ping utilities, but what …