Bash Shell in Linux

In this article, I will describe the main functionalities of Bash Shell in Linux shortly.

What is Command Shell?

The command shell is a command interpreter. It allows the user to run a command by writing it or by running Shell Scripts automatically.

Shell is not an Operating System. It is an interface linked to the operating system to run the commands.

What is BASH?

BASH=Bourne Again Shell
Bash is an alternative shell to the Bourne Shell (/bin/sh), which Steve Bourne created for Unix systems.

Bash has the same functionality as Bourne Shell, with extra functionalities which make it easier. Bash is free software and is adopted as Standart Shell of most Linux Distributions.

You might be interested in 5 Reasons why Linux is a good example of free, open-source software, a blog post where I described why you should install and try Linux.

The difference between BASH and DOS editor

• Case Sensitive
  In Linux/Unix, the names of the files and folders are in Case Sensitive. The same Case Sensitive rules are applied for commands too. This is why the command EXIT is not correct.
• Slash or Backslash
  In DOS, the symbol that separates the commands is the slash symbol ‘/.’
  In DOS, the folders are separated by using the backslash symbol ‘\.’
  In Linux/Unix, the slash separates the folders. Meanwhile, the backslash is a special character.
• File names
  DOS is still in use of the 8.3 conventions in renaming the files. That means that all the file names should follow this rule, where the name has a maximum of eight chars, followed by a dot and the extension at a maximum of three chars.  In Linux/Unix does not exist the rule of the file extensions. The dot can be at any part of the filename.