Helpful Terminal Commands

[Dan Worley]

I'm hoping we can share some helpful Terminal commands.

This first command makes it possible to copy text from Quick Look windows.

I've tested this in Mavericks 10.9.1 and it works for me.

Copy and paste the colored text into Terminal and hit return.

Ability to Copy text from Quick Look windows

• 1. defaults write com.apple.finder QLEnableTextSelection -bool true (hit return)
  
  2. killall Finder (hit return)

--

This next one is nice to use when working in DP because it gets rid of all distractions. I admit it, sometiems my Desktop gets pretty messy.

I've tested this in Mavericks 10.9.1 and it works for me.

Hide All icons on Desktop

• 1. defaults write com.apple.finder CreateDesktop false (hit return)
  
  2. killall Finder (hit return)

To show them again you change false to true.

• 1. defaults write com.apple.finder CreateDesktop true (hit return)
  
  2. killall Finder (hit return)

I have an Apple Script that can do the same thing which I run from Services, except it doesn't hide the hard drive icons. If anyone is interested, let me know and I'll post how to do that. It saves from having to go into Terminal.

Edit: I've created two executable shell commands and put them in the Dock so I can just run them from there. One hides the Desktop and one shows it.
--

Please share some of your helpful Terminal commands.

[billf]

1. purge

Cleans up Inactive Memory. May not work in Mavericks though.

[cuttime]

dig

Snow Leo. Shows DNS IP address and response time.

If your ISP service sucks like mine does, you might find this handy in determining where the bottle neck is. Changing the DNS server can make all the difference in the world sometimes.

[Dan Worley]

I was glad to find this one. This one stops the Help Viewer from floating on top, which I find most annoying.

Stop Floating Help Viewer
defaults write com.apple.helpviewer DevMode -bool true

To change it back to float, change true to false

I've tested this in Mavericks and it works for me.

[wylie1]

I use TOP sometimes to find frozen PIDs and then KILL the PID number to get rid of the frozen program.
Lower case of course.
I spent a couple of hair pulling days in Terminal trying to get a USBasp AVR programing device to work that was enough to realize I don't want to be a programmer.