Hacker News Reader

Comment by telemachos | Hacker News Reader

Should you is nearly a philosophical question, so for the moment I'll just assume you kind of want to. I strongly recommend The Linux Phrasebook if you regularly use Linux. If you use OSX, you might take a look at Peepcode's screencasts on the command line[2]. (Much of The Linux Phrasebook actually applies to OSX as well, but there will be occasional issues because Linux uses GNU versions of things that Mac uses BSD versions of. This can cause lots of small differences, though the underlying basics are pretty similar.)

[1] http://opensource.weblogsinc.com/2006/06/20/my-new-book-linu...

[2] http://peepcode.com/products/meet-the-command-line

View on HN

If using Windows, then Powershell.

Nah, install cygwin and use bash so your skills are transferable. Linux skills last for years; Windows skills tend to last till the next version. And I say this coming from a Windows background.

Powershell gives you direct access to all .NET components and the ability to run C# [or any other CLR language] directly from the command line and in your scripts.

YMMV.

That's untrue. I haven't used Windows as my primary workstation in over two years (and it was an XP system then) and I can hop onto a Win7 box and interact using most of the same commands I internalized administrating Windows 3.11 boxes on LanMan networks in the mid-90s.

The real problem is that Windows skills generally are only transferrable to other versions of Windows whereas Unix command line tools - be they GNU or BSD - are. And even that's not entirely true. If there's a Windows command-line tool that you learn about and like I guarantee you it's based on a Unix command-line tool that has a man entry.

I'm not talking about just the operating system, I'm talking about the platform and the necessary services you'd need on a server. Configuring a windows server, setting up IIS, mail server, etc, are different from version to version. Linux is much more consistent, editing a few text files in /etc. Sure, you can jump into cmd and execute many of the commands that always worked on windows, but that's a very small set of commands compared to Linux.

I made the switch to Linux a few years ago for servers, only months ago for my primary workstation, and I'd never go back to Windows; though Windows with cygwin is close enough to Linux to make a very nice workstation.

>"I'd never go back to Windows"

That's not much of a reason to use Cygwin in lieu of Powershell.

Sure it is, it's how you make the transition to Linux easier.

With that I certainly do agree.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com