Bonus: A massive missive of omission

I try to claim ownership over my bad ideas as well as my good ones. My decision to dump everything in binutils, bsd-games, coreutils and util-linux back into my list of software was … not the best one. 😕

It added quite a few useful titles that were not in my original list, but it also dropped me into a flood of esoteric utilities and one-shot wonders that are really only polluting my attempts to showcase newer and stronger stuff.

My next brilliant decision 🙄 is to take the opposite tack: Add the less-intriguing titles in the mix to this page, just for archive-and-or-search purposes, and retain the half-dozen that have really caught my eye.

What that means is … here’s what I have installed (in Arch) with each package, its one-line description from the man page, and any note that I can think to make about it. If you don’t see something here, that means I have either already discussed it, or it’s going to make a special appearance in the days to come. Please stay tuned. 😉

Let’s go alphabetically — here’s binutils.

• addr2line: convert addresses into file names and line numbers.
• ar: create, modify, and extract from archives
• as: the portable GNU assembler.
• c++filt: Demangle C++ and Java symbols.
• elfedit: Update the ELF header of ELF files.
• gprof: display call graph profile data
• ld: The GNU linker
• nm: list symbols from object files
• objcopy: copy and translate object files
• objdump: display information from object files.
• pwd: print name of current/working directory
• ranlib: generate index to archive.
• readelf: Displays information about ELF files.
• size: list section sizes and total size.
• strings: print the strings of printable characters in files. (The best use I can think of for this is to point it at a mystery binary file, to find out what it is. Try it with any executable you have, and you’ll see what I mean.)
• strip: Discard symbols from object files.

I don’t have much to say about binutils. With the exception of strings, I doubt I have ever used more than two or three of these.

Here’s coreutils.

• base64: base64 encode/decode data and print to standard output (This could be another type of “encryption,” since it’s essentially a base-64 alphabet converter, and requires some understanding of the output to recognize how to “decrypt” it. Security through obfuscation, I guess.)
• chcon: change file security context
• chgrp: change group ownership
• chmod: change file mode bits
• chown: change file owner and group
• chroot: run command or interactive shell with special root directory (Outside of installing new systems, I rarely get a chance to use this.)
• cksum: checksum and count the bytes in a file (This works as a primitive checksum utility, but doesn’t really vary much from md5sum or sha*sum.)
• cp: copy files and directories
• dircolors: color setup for ls (Sounds better than it is; just dumps your screen color codes to an editable string.)
• dir: list directory contents
• env: run a program in a modified environment
• expr: evaluate expressions (Allows for some basic mathematical functions at the terminal too.)
• false: do nothing, unsuccessfully (The most successful unsuccessful program in history.)
• hostid: print the numeric identifier for the current host
• install: copy files and set attributes
• link: call the link function to create a link to a file
• logname: print user’s login name
• ls: list directory contents
• mkdir: make directories
• mknod: make block or character special files
• mktemp: create a temporary file or directory
• mv: move (rename) files
• nohup: run a command immune to hangups, with output to a non-tty
• nproc: print the number of processing units available
• pathchk: check whether file names are valid or portable
• pinky: lightweight finger
• printenv: print all or part of environment
• printf: format and print data
• pr: convert text files for printing
• ptx: produce a permuted index of file contents
• pwd: print name of current/working directory
• readlink: print resolved symbolic links or canonical file names
• realpath: print the resolved path
• rmdir: remove empty directories
• runcon: run command with specified security context
• sleep: delay for a specified amount of time (I don’t have much to say about a program that just sleeps.)
• stdbuf: Run COMMAND, with modified buffering operations for its standard streams.
• sum: checksum and count the blocks in a file
• test: check file types and compare values
• timeout: run a command with a time limit
• touch: change file timestamps (I generally use this to show myself when I last referenced a file.)
• true: do nothing, successfully
• tsort: perform topological sort (I’ve never worked with this type of sorting before, so the program seems terribly obtuse. Start here if you want more information.)
• tty: print the file name of the terminal connected to standard input
• unexpand: convert spaces to tabs (I haven’t been able to get this one working like it seems it should.)
• unlink: call the unlink function to remove the specified file
• users: print the user names of users currently logged in to the current host
• yes: output a string repeatedly until killed

Here’s the last of it: util-linux.

• addpart: a simple wrapper around the “add partition” ioctl
• agetty: alternative Linux getty
• blkdiscard: discard sectors on a device
• blkid: locate/print block device attributes
• blockdev: call block device ioctls from the command line
• chcpu: configure CPUs
• chfn: change your finger information
• chrt: manipulate the real-time attributes of a process
• chsh: change your login shell
• colcrt: filter nroff output for CRT previewing
• colrm: remove columns from a file (Don’t think of this as a “reverse column“; it’s actually slicing away specific vertical rows of characters. Big difference.)
• col: filter reverse line feeds from input (I’m not sure why this is called “col;” the only time I have ever used it is to convert man pages into plain text, i.e., man man | col -b )
• ctrlaltdel: set the function of the Ctrl-Alt-Del combination
• delpart: simple wrapper around the “del partition” ioctl
• eject: eject removable media
• fallocate: preallocate or deallocate space to a file
• fdformat: low-level format a floppy disk (I guess I found it.)
• findfs: find a filesystem by label or UUID
• findmnt: find a filesystem
• flock: manage locks from shell scripts
• fsck.cramfs: fsck compressed ROM file system
• fsck.minix: check consistency of Minix filesystem
• fsck: check and repair a Linux filesystem
• fsfreeze: suspend access to a filesystem (Ext3/4, ReiserFS, JFS, XFS)
• fstrim: discard unused blocks on a mounted filesystem
• getopt: parse command options (enhanced)
• hexdump: display file contents in hexadecimal, decimal, octal, or ascii (I have actually used this, long ago.)
• hwclock: query or set the hardware clock (RTC) (This is useful to know about when working with very old computers, if you’re having problems where heavy processor strain causes the internal clock to lag. See this as an example, or this for more information.)
• i386: change reported architecture in new program environment and set personality flags
• ipcmk: make various IPC resources
• ipcrm: remove certain IPC resources
• ipcs: show information on IPC facilities
• isosize: output the length of an iso9660 filesystem
• lastb: show a listing of last logged in users
• last: show a listing of last logged in users
• ldattach: attach a line discipline to a serial line
• linux32: change reported architecture in new program environment and set personality flags
• linux64: change reported architecture in new program environment and set personality flags
• logger: a shell command interface to the syslog(3) system log module
• login: begin session on the system
• losetup: set up and control loop devices
• lsblk: list block devices
• lscpu: display information about the CPU architecture
• lslocks: list local system locks
• lslogins: display information about known users in the system
• mesg: display (or do not display) messages from other users (I have worked through this, and write and wall, more than once and never seen it work. 😦 )
• mkfs.bfs: make an SCO bfs filesystem
• mkfs.cramfs: make compressed ROM file system
• mkfs.minix: make a Minix filesystem
• mkfs: build a Linux filesystem
• mkswap: set up a Linux swap area
• mountpoint: see if a directory is a mountpoint
• mount: mount a filesystem
• namei: follow a pathname until a terminal point is found
• newgrp: log in to a new group
• nologin: politely refuse a login
• nsenter: run program with namespaces of other processes
• partx: tell the Linux kernel about the presence and numbering of on-disk partitions
• pivot_root: change the root filesystem
• prlimit: get and set process resource limits
• raw: bind a Linux raw character device
• readprofile: read kernel profiling information
• resizepart: simple wrapper around the “resize partition” ioctl
• runuser: run a command with substitute user and group ID
• setarch: change reported architecture in new program environment and set personality flags
• setsid: run a program in a new session
• sfdisk: partition table manipulator for Linux (With both fdisk and cfdisk to consider, I rarely even hear about sfdisk.)
• sulogin: single-user login
• su: run a command with substitute user and group ID
• swaplabel: print or change the label or UUID of a swap area
• swapoff: enable/disable devices and files for paging and swapping
• swapon: enable/disable devices and files for paging and swapping
• switch_root: switch to another filesystem as the root of the mount tree
• tailf: follow the growth of a log file (Not to be confused with tail‘s --follow flag. 😉 )
• taskset: retrieve or set a process’s CPU affinity
• umount: unmount file systems
• uname26: change reported architecture in new program environment and set personality flags
• unshare: run program with some namespaces unshared from parent
• utmpdump: dump UTMP and WTMP files in raw format
• uuidd: UUID generation daemon
• uuidgen: create a new UUID value
• vigr: edit the password or group file
• vipw: edit the password or group file
• wall: write a message to all users
• wdctl: show hardware watchdog status
• wipefs: wipe a signature from a device
• write: send a message to another user

A few of those look like they have similar descriptions, but that’s probably because they are preset commands linking back to setarch. If you use something like that frequently, you might want to double-check what options are already configured.

And of course, there’s nothing there from bsd-games, because I do believe everything from bsd-games is somewhere here. 🙂

Please feel free to chime in if you have a particular use for any of these tools and you want to share. I don’t plan on revisiting any of these titles because my own frame of reference for them is terribly narrow. That doesn’t mean they’re not useful though.

And I apologize if this seems like a massive cop-out; in some ways it is. I wanted to cruise through those four packages one more time, but a lot of what is here is just too … unique to warrant inclusion. Perhaps it is possible to be too special.

P.S.: No, I did not retype every line from those man pages. And no, I don’t have an intern. Let’s just say I have enough skill at the prompt to slice and dice a few HTML-ized lists of programs. …