CSE 391

Syllabus

Introduction to Linux

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Slides created by Josh Ervin. Based off slides made by Marty Stepp, Jessica Miller, Ruth Anderson, Brett Wortzman, and Zorah Fung

COURSE STAFF

Lecturer: Ryan Maas

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TA: Wei (Ellen) Wu

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• Email: maas@cs.washington.edu
• OH: TBD

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• Email: wuwei33@cs.washington.edu
• OH: TBD

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COURSE TOPICS

• Linux command line interface (CLI)
• Shell commands, input/output redirection
• Version control using git
• Users, groups, and permissions
• Regular expressions, sed
• Basic data processing
• Shell scripting

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AGENDA

• Course introduction and syllabus
• Learning remotely using Zoom
• Unix and Linux operating systems
• Introduction to Bash shell

COURSE INTRODUCTION

• Course website: https://cs.washington.edu/391
• Learning Objectives: A collection of tools and topics not addressed in other classes that all CSE majors should know
• Credit/No Credit class, assessed on weekly homework assignments
• Textbook - Linux Pocket Guide
• Optional, but we can only recommend it

ASSESSMENT

• Homework Assignments
• There will be 9 assignments, each worth 2 points
• Released after lecture, due the following Tuesday at 10:00am (before class)
• 1 point for a reasonable attempt on most questions*
• 2 points for attempting all questions and most are correct*
• * For most assignments this is graded by the autograder, and you will receive your score immediately after submission
• No late assignments accepted
• Collaboration is encouraged, but all submitted work must be your own.
• Passing the Class
• Of the 18 possible points, you need 14 to pass the class

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DISCUSSION BOARD

• Outside of office hours, the best way for you to get help with the class is to post on the course discussion board - https://edstem.org/us/courses/23457/
• For personal questions, email the course staff. Otherwise, all questions should be posted to Ed. You may post anonymously to your classmates if you prefer!

REMOTE LEARNING

• All lectures will be held in our classroom DEM 102, with recordings available after
• Lectures:
• Ryan will be giving “live” lectures during the allocated lecture time on Tuesdays from 10:50-11:50
• Attendance is not required, but it will be beneficial for you to ask questions during this time.
• Access:
• We understand that not everyone will be able to attend all lectures, especially given the circumstances. All lectures are recorded and will be available via the Panopto section on Canvas.

ACCESSING LINUX/UNIX

• In a roughly suggested order
• ssh into attu (CSE Majors), linuxNN(EE majors), or ovid (all UW students)
• Use the Virtual Machine (VM) provided by the CS Department
• Access basement lab computers via vdi
• Install Linux on your own computer
• With a Mac, you can open the Terminal application and then ssh
• With Windows, you can install Git for Windows and use Git Bash, or Cygwin
• Opening these applications will give you the terminal interface to ssh into attu
• For detailed information, see the Working-At-Home tab on the course website.

COURSE TOPICS

• Linux command line interface (CLI)
• Shell commands, input/output redirection
• Version control using git
• Users, groups, and permissions
• Regular expressions, sed
• Basic data processing
• Shell scripting

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A BRIEF HISTORY OF LINUX AND UNIX

• Unix
• First developed in 1969 at Bell Labs by Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson
• Many key ideas still used today
• “Everything is a file”
• Multiple users, hierarchical file system
• “Glueing” together lots of smaller files
• Documentation included
• macOS is a unix operating system in disguise!
• Linux
• Developed in 1992 by Linus Torvalds, who also developed git!

THE SHELL

• Shell: an interactive program that allows the user to interact with the operating system and its applications
• Why use a shell vs. the GUI (Graphical User Interface)?
• Many complicated tasks are easier to do on the command line
• Useful for working on remote servers
• Programmable
• Customizable

BASIC SHELL COMMANDS

SYSTEM COMMANDS

RELATIVE DIRECTORIES

UNIX FILE SYSTEM

DIRECTORY COMMANDS

COMMAND LINE ARGUMENTS

• There aren’t any consistent definitions when it comes to command line arguments, but for this class we will use the following way to describe the anatomy of a command

$ ls -al dir1

Command

Flags

Arguments

(Parameters)

COMMAND LINE ARGUMENTS

• Much like methods in Java take arguments, so do commands on the command line
• Flags are modifiers which change a programs behavior slightly, and they are usually prepended with a -
• For example, to list all files in long-list format, run the following
• $ ls -l
• Flags can be combined, to list all files in long-list format and list hidden files
• $ ls -la
• Commands also take arguments, such as file names
• To view all files , in long-listing format, inside of dir1
• $ ls -l dir1

FILE COMMANDS

• Warning: The above commands do not ask for confirmation. Be careful moving or copying files, as you might overwrite existing files!
• Check the man pages for flags to prevent this behavior

TEXT EDITORS

• In many instances, you will be interacting with a Linux system without a graphical environment so a command-line text-editor is necessary
• vim/emacs are powerful text-editors preferred by many experienced Linux users. It’s up to you which one to focus on in this class.

VIM BASICS

EMACS BASICS

C = control key

M = alt/meta key