Introduction to Unix and the X Window System

Scott D. Anderson
Wellesley College
Scott.Anderson@acm.org

c Fall 2002

1 Overview Linux is also part of the Open Source movement, which

means different vendors and volunteer developers share
UnixTM is an old and venerable operating system that has source code and build on each other’s work. Thus, you can
also managed to grow with the times. It currently runs on al- buy Linux from many different companies, or even down-
most any kind of computer, from PC hardware to big main- load it for free. In the Linux lab, Wellesley has about 13 PCs
frames and supercomputers. Well worth learning, for any running Linux. What I describe here runs on those comput-
computer scientist. ers, although almost everything runs on any version of Unix.
The X Window System is a graphical user interface (GUI)
that runs on most Unix machines. It has some nice advan-
tages over a Microsoft Windows or Apple Macintosh GUI, 3 Logging In
primarily in being able to run over networks. Again, this is
well worth learning. Indeed, a computer scientist with any When you come to a Linux machine, say “Teddy,” there will
breadth of knowledge would be expected to understand Unix be a login prompt, like this:
and the X Window System. (The latter is often abbreviated
Red Hat Linux release 7.3 (Valhalla)
to “X Windows” or even just “X.”)
Teddy login:
There is too much about both of these topics for me to
do more than scratch the surface. My goal is just to give You type your login name (typically the same as your
you enough to get started and be able to run a few simple First Class username) and your password. People may call
commands, write simple programs, and learn more. this your “Puma” password, but in fact the same password
works for all the machines. Your password doesn’t have
to be the same as your First Class password, and probably
2 Unix and Linux shouldn’t be.
Once you give your password, you’ll get a simple text
Linux is an operating system that was intended to (1) work interface (like DOS, if you know what that looks like). This
just like Unix, and (2) run on inexpensive IBM PC hardware is quick and effective if you just want to do a few operations,
(the Intel 80x86 family of chips and the PC clones). It tech- such as printing a file or sending a short email, but if you are
nically isn’t Unix because “Unix” is a trademarked name, 1 doing much work, you’ll want to start up the X Window
but you won’t find any practical differences. In practice, the System. Issue the following command:
word “Unix” is an umbrella term that covers many variations
on the Unix idea, including Linux. startx
Because Linux runs on PC hardware, it becomes a vi-
able alternative to Windows NT, 95, 98 and 2000. There The X Window System will start up, and you’ll have a
are also version of Linux that run on Macintosh hardware, desktop that looks a little like an MS Windows desktop.
so it becomes an alternative to the Macintosh operating sys- Unlike Windows, however, different window managers have
tem, MacOS. However, the impact of Linux has been much been developed for Linux. We use one called KDE (the K
greater in the server market than the desktop market, pri- Desktop Environment). It is recognizable because there will
marily because of its speed and reliability: Linux servers be a big K in the lower left corner. This is an icon similar
run 24/7 for months without needing to be rebooted. to the “Start” button in MS Windows. You’ll also see some
icons along the bottom (which is called the “panel”). Using

the K menu, select “Utilities” and “terminal.” Equivalently,
Thanks to LeeAnn Tzeng for helpful comments and to Agnes Ampadu you can click on the panel icon that looks like a monitor
for resurrecting this document that I feared was lost forever.
partly covered by a seashell. Both of these are ways of start-
1 Unix is a trademark of AT&T Bell Laboratories. ing up a “shell.”

1
4 Shell Commands % ls
HelloWorld.class public_html
Back in the olden days, when you logged into a computer, HelloWorld.java read-only
there were no windows, and you typed commands to a % pwd
“command line” and results were typed back to you (or put /students/wwellesl
into files). You still get that when you log in before you % cd public_html
start X Windows and when you login remotely using Tel- % pwd
net. Unix still bears that legacy, and the place where you /students/wwellesl/public_html
type commands is called “the shell.” (It’s called the shell in % ls
contrast to “the kernel,” which is the core of the operating % mkdir newdir
system; the shell is a command-line interface to the kernel.) % ls
Nowadays, each shell runs in a window and you can have as newdir
many shell windows as you like. % cd newdir
The shell prompts you for input and responds to your % pwd
commands. You can customize your prompt. Here at /students/wwellesl/public_html/newdir
Wellesley, we’ve defined it to be your username and host % cd ..
(machine name) and the name of the directory you are in. % rmdir newdir
If I’m logged into Teddy and I’m in my public_html % cd
directory, my prompt would look like: % pwd
/students/wwellesl
[anderson@teddy public_html] % ls -1a
.
In this document, however, I will pretend that the prompt ..
is a percent sign. .bash_profile
Here are a few of the shell commands that people use ev- .bashrc
ery day: .emacs
HelloWorld.class
ls This prints a listing of all the files in a directory (called HelloWorld.java
“folders” in other operating systems). By default, .kde
it lists the files in the current directory, but with a .login
command-line argument, it lists the files in the direc- .profile
tories named on the command line.. public_html
read-only
pwd Prints the complete name of the current working di- % cp .profile dot-profile
rectory; in other words, what the current directory is. % ls
dot-profile public_html
mkdir This creates a new directory, contained in the current
HelloWorld.class read-only
one. That is, the new directory is a sub-directory.
HelloWorld.java
cd This changes your current directory. In other words, it % mv dot-profile renamed-file
moves you from one place to another, like changing % ls
your location. HelloWorld.class read-only
HelloWorld.java renamed-file
cp This copies a file from one place to another. public_html
% rm renamed-file
mv This moves a file from one place to another (or one
name to another). You can rename a file by using mv. The first ls shows that we have two things in our cur-
rent directory. The pwd shows us that the current directory
rm This removes (deletes) a file. Warning: you can’t get it is /students/wwellesl. It happens that public_
back again! html is a directory within our current directory, so we can
cd into it. The pwd shows that the cd command worked.
rmdir This removes (deletes) a directory, but only if it’s The second ls shows that the private directory is empty.
empty. We make a sub-directory and use ls to check that it exists.
We can cd to it, as the pwd confirms. The Unix file struc-
Now, let’s see these in action. See if you understand what ture is a tree, just like all computers, with the directories in
is happening at each step here. Afterward, I’ll go over them a path separated by slashes (Windows uses backslashes and
and interpret. Here’s a session by Wendy Wellesley: MacOS uses colons).

2
 The cd.. changes to the directory above the current one. “control” key while typing “x” then “w”). This is what other
(The “..” is a special name for the parent directory.) This programs call “Save As.” To just save a file you’re working
brings us back to our public_html first directory. The on, without specifying a name, type “C-x C-s.” You can also
lsnewdir shows that ls can be followed by a directory access these commands via the “Files” menu.
name, to list the contents of that other directory. Since I highly recommend running the Emacs tutorial. To start
newdir is empty (we just created it, after all), we can use the tutorial, type “C-h t,” which means to hold down the
rmdir to remove it. control key while typing “h,” then release the control key
The bare cd command changes to the original directory, and type a “t.”
also called the “home” directory. We confirm this with pwd. Note: a single Emacs can edit any number of files, so un-
We then do an ls-al and discover that there are additional, less you have a good reason to, it’s not necessary to start
invisible files in our home directory. The -a option to ls up multiple Emacs applications, and it will just slow down
means to show all files. Usually, ls hides any files whose your machine unnecessarily. Instead, switch among differ-
name begins with a dot. The -1 option means to give a ent Emacs buffers.
listing in one column, which I did just for convenience in
this document; in real life, -1 is rarely used. However, -l
(the letter “l,” for a “long” listing) is often used and gives a 6 Compiling C Programs
lot more information about each file.
We can use cp to copy one of these files, use mv to re- There are two ways to compile a C program. There’s the
name (or move) the copy to a new name, and finally use rm old-fashioned way, and the spiffy new way (actually, both
to delete the copy. are older than you are). I’ll explain both. For concreteness,
let’s assume you’re editing a file called foo.c.
The old-fashioned way is to switch to the shell window,
5 Creating/Editing Files make sure you’re in the directory that contains foo.c (use
cd if you’re not, and ls to check), and run the C compiler,
Having seen how to rename and remove files, how do we which is called cc. Either of the following will do it:
create them in the first place? This is done with an “editor,”
% cc foo.c -o foo
which is any program that allows you to change the contents
% make foo
of a file. One of the two standard editors in Unix is Emacs.
(The other is vi.) I’ve written a separate document intro- The first command compiles foo.c and puts the binary (ex-
ducing Emacs, so I will describe it even more briefly here. ecutable) file in foo. Note that foo is not the same thing
There are quite a few ways to start Emacs, depending on as foo.c! One is your source code and the other is your
what effects you want. I’ll just tell you two. executable code. If you make a mistake and accidentally do:


If you’re physically at the machine, called using the % cc -o foo.c foo

console, go to the K menu, go to the Applications menu
(the top item) and select Emacs. That starts up a new the compiler will destroy your source code. So, be care-
window running Emacs. You can use the mouse to ful!
switch back and forth between any shell windows and The second example, makefoo, is just like the first, but
your Emacs window. easier to remember and type, and won’t accidentally over-
write your source code. The program called make attempts


If you’re logged in remotely via ssh, and you’re on a to figure out how to run cc in order to make foo, which is
Unix machine running X Windows, you can start up a what you wanted. Highly recommended.
new window running Emacs by typing its name as a The new-fangled way to compile a C program is to ask
command, followed by an ampersand. Emacs to run it for you. Type the following in Emacs: “M-
x compile RET.” If you’ve run the tutorial, you know that
% emacs & “M-x” means to hold down the “meta” key (usually “alt”)
and type an “x,” then to type “compile” in the mini-buffer,


If you’re logged in remotely via telnet (ssh is better

and finally hit the “return” or “enter” key. If the “alt” key
than telnet because it’s secure, but telnet is more widely
doesn’t work, use the “ESC” key.
available), so you only have a single shell and no desk-
That command will then prompt you for the compilation
top, you can run Emacs by typing its name as a com-
command, which defaults to some kind of “make.” You can
mand:
fill in the rest of the “make” command, or replace it with the
% emacs “cc” command.
The reason this is cool is that if there are any compilation
You can move around using the arrow keys, and you can errors, Emacs will bring you to the next erroneous line when
type stuff into your file. You can save the file with a par- you type C-x‘: That’s “C-x” followed by an open quote
ticular name using the “C-x C-w” command (hold down the (not an apostrophe).

3
7 Running Your Programs can do anything to the disks that you can do with your own
files and directories, using the same commands.
Once you’ve compiled your program and you have a binary When you’re done, you can unmount the disks and pop
file called foo, you can run it by switching to your shell them out:
window and typing:
% umount /mnt/zip
% ./foo % umount /mnt/floppy

The “./” is necessary for security reasons that are hard to

explain. 9 Logging Out
When you’re done with a Linux machine, don’t just walk
8 Using Removable Disks away. You must log out so that others can use the machine.
If you’re at the K desktop, there is a menu item in the “K”
Using a diskette (floppy disk) or a Zip disk on a Macintosh menu for logging out, or you can use the icon on the panel.
or Windows machine is very easy. It’s a bit more compli- The icon isn’t easy to describe, but if you put your mouse
cated under Unix, but not enough to keep you from doing so. over any icon, a balloon will pop up to give a text descrip-
You should keep a second copy of your programs and such tion, and you can find it easily enough. If you’re logged in
on a removable disk, just in case you accidentally delete a via telnet, you should use the logout command:
file. Every computer scientist will tell you about the time he
% logout
or she inadvertently deleted a valuable file or lost hours of
editing due to an untimely power outage. Don’t let it happen If you’re at the console, logging out only brings you
to you! Learn from our sad experience! In short, making du- to where you typed startx, so remember to give the
plicate copies of your work will probably, at some unknown logout command there.
point in the future, save you inordinate grief.
You don’t have to use removeable disks in order to work
on your program using different computers. Thanks to the 10 Learning More
wonders of NFS (the Network File System), all of your files
live on Puma, our file server, and you can login to any of the To learn more about a particular Unix command, the best
Linux machines and your files will appear there. Of course, source is the online manual. For example, to learn more
if you want to take your work to your home Linux computer about the ls command, type:
(remember, you can install Linux on your home machine), a
% man ls
removeable disk is helpful.
Oh, I’m sorry to say that I don’t know how to mount a Warning: The “man” pages are reference material, not
Mac-formatted Zip disk onto a Linux machine. So, this sec- tutorials or easy reading, which means they can get a lit-
tion assumes PC-formatted disks. tle dense sometimes, so skim them at first reading, and go
The first issue is “mounting” the disk. You see, with Win- back for more when you’ve swallowed that. Reading man
dows, the diskette is forced to be the A drive and the Zip pages is another skill that is well worth acquiring, because
disk is forced to be, say, the D drive. On a Macintosh, the software changes, and even experienced computer scientists
disks appear on the desktop. In Unix, they can be added any- check the man pages regularly.
where in the file system (they could even be a sub-directory To learn more about Emacs, use the built-in help system.
of your home account), but they usually go in a directory Try “C-h i” to start up the “info” pages, and then learn about
called /mnt, which is short for “mount.” 2 So, you stick that. Emacs is enormous, so don’t try to learn too much at
your disk into the slot and issue one of the following com- once. Start with the basics, then gradually add new things.
mands: A web search will turn up tutorials for Unix and Emacs.
Also, there are copies of The Linux User’s Guide, by Larry
% mount /mnt/zip Greenfield, scattered about the lab. It’s well worth dipping
% mount /mnt/floppy into as needed, though it’s a bit thick to sit and read all at
once. I recommend chapters 1, 4, 6, and 8 to start.
When your disk is mounted, the contents of those two
If you think of any important information or advice to add
directories are equated with your disk. So, you can ls those
to this primer, please let me know.
directories, cd to them, cp and mv files to and from them.
You can even mkdir and rmdir directories. In short, you

2 Some Linux machines are configured so that they go in /, so they

are mounted as /zip or /floppy. My directions are for the Wellesley

machines.