Homework 1 - Getting Started with Unix

Due - Wednesday, February 4, 2004

The goal of this assignment is to give you some experience using the Unix environment. This assignment is to be done individually.

This assignment should be done on napa. All of you should have accounts on napa and should be able to log in using your mhc username and password. To log in, ssh (telnet won't work) to napa.mtholyoke.edu. If you have any trouble logging in, you should contact me immediately.

If you want to do the assignment elsewhere, you should contact me first.

Your assignment is to read the "Introduction to the Unix Operating System" and do tutorials 1 through 5 available at: http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/Teaching/Unix/. You should try all of the commands outlined in the tutorials. You are welcome to use additional resources as long as you cite them. Some additional resources you might find helpful are:
http://www.washington.edu/computing/unix/startdoc/
http://wks.uts.ohio-state.edu/unix_course/intro-137.html
http://www.math.utah.edu/lab/unix/unix-commands.html

Note: The tutorial asks you to copy the file /vol/examples/tutorial/science.txt. Instead, copy the file /home/srollins/pub/science.txt.

Turnin - Assignments are due by the start of class on the due date. Turn in answers to the following questions.
  1. What does 'ls ~' (without the '') list?
  2. What set of commands would you use to create a directory public_html inside your home directory and make that directory world readable?
  3. What command would you use to copy the file /home/srollins/pub/dump.bin into a file called mydump.bin in your home directory?
  4. What command would you use to change the name of the file mydump.bin to mydump.bak?
  5. tail by default allows you to see the last 10 lines of a particular file. How can you view the last 15 lines of a file?

Sami Rollins