Files

printing to system output

print file line by line

cat [file]

print file line by line (reverse order)

tac [file]

Copy

copy file

cp original destination

copy directory

cp -r directory destination

copy don't overwrite (useful for backups)

cp -n original destination

Move

move file

mv original destination

move file (verbose)

mv -v [source] [destination]

Soft link

create soft link (general form)

ln -s [existing target] [link to create]

concrete example

ln -s ~/.bashrc /tmp/bashrc

create links to files with their original name in a destination directory

ln -s ~/.b* .

get the destination of a link on the filesystem

readlink [existing_link]

rsync

copy directory source/data to destination/data

rsync -v -a source/data destination

copy files from source/data to destination/data without overwriting

rsync -v -a --ignore-existing source/data destination

move files (not links) from source/data to destination/data without overwriting

rsync -v -a --ignore-existing --remove-source-files source/data destination

same as above, but create hardcopies of links

rsync -v -a --ignore-existing --remove-source-files --copy-links source/data destination

split a file into chunks

split a file into chunks of specified size

split --bytes 500M --numeric-suffixes --suffix-length=3 [input] [output file prefix]