PuTTY Commands for Beginners

Putty is an open source SSH client used to connect to a remote server. Putty is basically a terminal for windows based operating systems. It supports several network protocols, including SCP, SSH, Telnet and raw socket connection. PuTTY was originally written for Microsoft Windows, but it has been ported to various other operating systems. To work with Putty you need to know few basic Putty Commands.

Useful Putty Commands for Beginners

1) How to find out where you are, the pwd command shows you present working directory

pwd

2) Change directory

cd

The cd command is used to navigate into a specified directory on your server.
Example: cd /home (moves you into the home folder)

3) The same directory

cd .

Using this command you will remain in the same directory you were.

4) Move me up one directory

cd ..

Above command will navigate two steps back from current directory

5) Go to the previous directory

cd –

Above command will navigate to the previous directory.

6) Go to Home folder

cd ~

Above command will navigate to the home directory on your server.

7) Go to root

cd /

Above command will navigate to root.

8) List files

ls

usage: ls [option] [file]
Using the ls command in a folder will display all it’s content.
Example: ls /home.
Will return all content of the folder /home.

9) Show me all files in a directory

ls -a

10) Show contents with file size

ls -h

If you wish to see a directory’s contents with file sizes just type ls -h

11) How to see sub-directories recursively

ls -r

The ls -r command is used to see sub-directories recursively.

12) How to see files by file size

ls -is

13) List all folders in directory with details

ls -alh

How to Copy files/folders with Putty Commands

14) Copying a file

cp

To copy a file just use the cp ssh command.
Example:
cp filename.php /home/filename.php

15) Copy a folder with all files

cp -r

This one is used to copy the entire folder with all it’s contents.

16) Copy and rename

cp filename.php /home/filename2.php

How to Move files to different locations

17) Moving a file

mv

Example: mv page.php /home/page.php

18) Move and rename

mv page.php /home/newpage.php

19) Move file up one directory

mv filename ..

example: mv index.html/ ..
How to Create files/folders using Putty Commands

20) Create a folder

mkdir

example: mkdir new-folder

21) Create a file

touch

Use the touch command to create different files and file extensions
Example: touch index.php

22) How to Compress/Uncompress files ( Compressing folders )?

zip -r foldername.zip foldername

Example: zip -r newfolder.zip newfolder

23) uncompressing folders

unzip

Example: unzip newfolder.zip

24) Compressing folders using tar -czvf

tar -czvf foldername.tar.gz foldername

Example: tar -czvf wp-content.tar.gz wp-content

25) uncompressing folders using tar -czvf

tar -xvf foldername.tar.gz

Example: tar -xvf wp-content.tar.gz

26) How to Delete/Remove files?

rm

To delete a file on your server just use the rm command.
Example: rm index.php

27) Delete all files from a directory

rm *

This command is used to delete all contents from a directory.
Example: rm * foldername

28) Delete a folder/directory

rmdir

Use this command to remove directories.
How to change File permissions?

29) Change file permissions

chmod

Example: chmod 775 newfolder

30) Change permissions of folder and all files inside

chmod 755 folder name -R

Thanks for reading our article and we will keep updating the same articles with more useful commands in coming days. Keep checking this space for more Putty commands.
You can download PuTTY from the below URL
http://www.putty.org/

 

Social Share

Leave a Reply