A small byte of bash aliases and functions.

#linux #bash #productivity #discuss

I'd like to share a few of my favorite bash aliases and functions. All I ask for in return is for you to share your own in the comments!

# Set up ls to use my preferences
alias ls='ls -l --color=auto --group-directories-first'

# Quickly add things to a todo-list. Usage: remember milk
alias remember="xargs -I TODO  echo \"[ ] TODO\" >> ~/remember <<<"

# I often find files that I don't know what to do with, but I don't want to delete. So I just move them to dev-hell. usage: devhell mysuperniftyfunctionthatiwillneveruse.js
alias devhell='mv -t ~/dev-hell/'

# I don't know how many times I typed this in before I made it an alias. Usage: pid vim
alias pid="ps -aux | grep "

# I use the following function and alias to jump back and forth between home and the current directory.
function home() {
        PREVIOUS=$(pwd)
        cd ~
}
alias back="cd $PREVIOUS"

# I use Arch Linux, and often download from AUR. Usage: aur chromium
alias aur="xargs -I FILENAME git clone https://aur.archlinux.org/FILENAME <<<"

Top comments (3)

Ben Sinclair • Jan 12 '21

For your process finding one, you might want to exclude the grep command itself, depending on what system you're on. On a Mac, for example, you'll get the process used to grep listed, which is generally not what you want. Also on a Mac, ps -aux will fail if there isn't a user called "x" because ps interprets commands differently depending whether you use a dash or not (I know!).

alias pid='ps aux | grep -v grep | grep'

Or if you're only interested in the PID (as implied by the alias name, you can use pgrep which fits nicely with pkill because without any other options it just returns the PID.

I know you tagged this with #linux but I think it's good to make things as general as possible so if you have to work on a BSD system or a Mac you can re-use the same commands.