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du is the *nix command for disk usage. It tells you how much space everything in the given directory is taking up. GNU du introduced a handy option -h making it human readable, or showing sizes using K, M, G rather than bytes. Unfortunately this makes it not sortable numerically. Here’s how to sort du by size and keep it as human readable.
If you use *nix, no doubt you’ve spent some time on the command line. Here are a few of the most helpful tricks you can use in the bash shell to really optimize your time, impress your friends, and make everyone else feel inferior… not to mention become more productive. People familar with the command line can usually work considerably faster (for most tasks) than you can through a gui. So be brave, embrace the keyboard and master the bash shell.
Bash heavily uses two keys, Ctrl and Meta. You’ll easily find the Ctrl key on your keyboard, but the Meta, not so much (unless you’re on a Sun system).. It’s also different for Mac vs PC. Point is commonly called cursor.
All tips taken from the very large man file (man bash), with my additional commentary. Please reference that file for more information.
One thing that makes subversion such a powerful revision system is it's ability to permit multiple methods of access. Https (webdav), SSH and svnserve. In spite of svn's ability to support multiple access methods, doing so simultaniously can be quite challenging. Typically one will run into permission issues as the http(s) access will all be written to the filesystem as the user running the webserver. The ssh access will all write to the filesystem under each users given account.
Here is one approach to permit both.
SVK is a client for SVN built using perl. It makes a number of improvements over the standard svn client, while retaining much of the same feel. It works with the standard Subversion server and works perfectly in an environment with some users using svn and some using svk on the client side. It provides a number of sizable advantages over the standard svn client and is a must have for any development project.
One of the things that makes vim great is that it can be extended through plugins. There are plugins for more than you would expect. I have gathered together the 15 best plugins. I also include a tarball which when extracted in your home directory will setup my vim environment with all the plugins and configuration.
Despite living in the age of multicore processors, GUI everything and mountains of ram, I continually find myself more productive with a terminal open. Especially when that terminal is running GNU Screen.
Steve Francia is a technology and business executive, developer and innovator, currently serving as VP of Engineering at the OpenSky Project.
He has held positions at all levels including Developer, Sys Admin, DBA, Lead Developer, Architect, VP, CTO, COO and CIO.
The author of spf13.com, a blog on development, leadership and social media which is syndicated on All Top and has been featured in prominent industry publications including CIO Magazine.
A key contributor to and founding developer of the Zoop Framework, a popular framework for PHP and is big on contributing to the open source community.
When not working, developing or blogging Steve can be found spending time with his family, working on his home or playing sports.
[The opinions expressed here are mine alone, and not those of my employer.]
