Skip to content
Beginner LinuxLesson 4 of 27 1 min read

Creating and Manipulating Files

touch, mkdir, cp, mv, rm - the core file operations.

Skip to the challenge
On this page4 sections

In this lesson you'll learn the everyday verbs for working with files and directories.

Make

bash
mkdir projects          # create a directory
mkdir -p a/b/c          # create nested directories (-p = parents)
touch notes.txt         # create an empty file (or update timestamp)

Inspect

bash
cat notes.txt           # print file contents
less notes.txt          # page through a file (q to quit)
head -n 5 notes.txt     # first 5 lines
wc -l notes.txt         # count lines

Move / copy / delete

bash
cp notes.txt copy.txt        # copy
mv notes.txt renamed.txt     # rename / move
rm renamed.txt               # delete a file
rm -r projects               # delete a directory recursively

Warning: rm is permanent. There is no recycle bin. Triple-check before running rm -rf /.

Edit

You'll often edit files straight from the terminal:

  • nano notes.txt - beginner-friendly editor
  • vim notes.txt - powerful but steep learning curve

Challenge

Create a new directory called lab and then create an empty file lab/notes.txt inside it. Do it in two commands.

Want to experiment first? Try things in the practice terminal (opens in a new tab), then enter the command that solves the task here.

Quiz

Lock in the concepts. Score at least 80% to mark the lesson complete.

0 of 2 answered

Done with this one?

Skipped the challenge? You can mark the lesson complete by hand.

Your notes

Kept on this browser only.