Question about using Konsole

[jacatone]

My username is jacatone. In Konsole it shows the $ prompt as jacatone@jacatone. Shouldn't it be home@jacatone. I'm trying to install a tar file that resides on my Desktop, so I tried jacatone@jacatone$ cd /Desktop but get "No such file or directory" . What am I doing wrong here? Thanks.

[Snowhog]

Re: Question about using Konsole

Your home directory will be /home/jacatone. What you are actually (should be) seeing is ~$ (tilde $). The ~ is linux shorthand that means 'home directory of the logged in user.' If you type pwd (print working directory) you will see that you are actually in /home/jacatone

Welcome to the world of Linux! 8)

[Fenyx]

Re: Question about using Konsole

1. The command line prompt's display can be modified to suit your needs and desires. But the default that Kubuntu uses is:

username@hostname:location$

2. As Snowhog mentioned, the ~ you will be seeing there means your home directory. so jacatone@jacatone:~$ means you are at your home.

3. When you tried to cd /Desktop, you are actually trying to go to a directory named Desktop, in the / (root) or base folder. What you meant to do was go to the Desktop folder in your home folder (/home/jacatone/Desktop), and you do that by typing cd Desktop, presuming you are currently in your home folder (/home/jacatone). Notice the difference? the '/' in the command you were trying means "start from the / (root) folder", but since there's no /Desktop folder, it gives you that error message.

Sounds a bit confusing? Just remember this, if you start a folder or file name with a /, you are telling the command line to start locating from the / folder. If you leave out the /, you are telling the command line to start locating from the current folder (where you currently are).

Hope that helps.

[bodiless]

Re: Question about using Konsole

and just to add to the above...the ls command (which is used to list files and directories) would show you where you can navigate directly to with cd from where you are now. So if you do for example:

jacatone@jacatone:~$ ls

you will probably see something like:

a.tmp Desktop   google-earth renouveau PowerFolders test2

then you can simply:

jacatone@jacatone:~$ cd Desktop

further reading "man ls"

[Qqmike]

Re: Question about using Konsole

A neat place to start, for CLI, is Tuxfiles: http://www.tuxfiles.org/
You have to use this stuff a lot so you don't forget it.
Which reminds me, about time for a review . . .