Unix Utility Descriptions

The following page is provided as a brief introduction to some of the Unix commands that will be used frequently. For more information about these commands, please read the on-line manual pages.

Note: The %" character shown in the examples below is the shell prompt, and should not be typed when you use these commands. Only type what appears after the %.

AIMK
aimk is a wrapper program for the make utility. It is used to select options needed to build PVM applications over various types of architectures.

%aimk master1 slave1

This command line will build the executable files given by the rules in the makefile for master1 and slave1. For more information about aimk, click here.

CD
cd is the change directory command. It allows you to move into different directories, making that the current working directory.

%cd example

Executing the above command will move try to make the directory example the current directory. If this directory does not exist however, you can not move into it. Refer to mkdir below for help with creating a directory.

CSH
csh is a shell, or command interpreter, with C-like syntax. csh is used both as a script command processor and an interactive login shell. The shell loads the .cshrc each time a user logs into a machine, setting up the desired paths and commands. See also the description of source below.

MAKE
make is a Unix utility used to simplify program compilation. The user defines all the dependencies needed to compile the program in a file called makefile, and then must only call make to get the executable. The user does not have to manually list the include and library paths each time the program is compiled. For more information about aimk, click here.

MAN
man formats and displays the on-line manual pages. These help pages give a complete explanation of the desired command, and the arguments it takes.

%man who

This command line will list the pages for the Unix command who.

MKDIR
mkdir is the command used to create new directories.

%mkdir example

Execution of the above line will cause a directory called example to be created under the current directory.

SETENV
The environment list is a set of variables that are assigned values. These environment variables, and their values, can then be read and used by other programs, namely X applications. setenv sets a variable in the environment list to the specified value so that it can be used later.

%setenv DISPLAY ws255:0

This line sets the variable DISPLAY to ws255:0. The value of this variable, when read by the X server, tells the server where to display any output that is generated.

SOURCE
source will execute C shell commands in a file as if they were typed in from the keyboard. Any csh file that is written or modified must then be executed by using source as follows.

%source .cshrc

This command line executes all the instructions included in the .cshrc file.

TELNET
telnet allows a user to login on a remote machine via the TELNET protocol.

%telnet ken2171-pc

This command line will attempt to establish a TELNET connection with ken2171-pc.

WHICH
which locates the executable file within the user's path. It searches the path for the executable that would be run if the command were invoked.

%which sum

The example line above will return the path of the executable file that would be executed.

XHOST
xhost allows host names to be added, or deleted, from the list allowed to make connections with the X server.

%xhost ken2171-pc

The command line above adds ken2171-pc to this list. This command should preceed a telnet connection to ken2171-pc.

%xhost+

Executing this command will add all possible hosts to the list allowed to make connections to the X server.

For more help with Unix, you made find it helpful to refer to the following links.