Linux Shell
Last Updated March 2014

Copy without overwrite (ignore existing)

yes n | cp -i src dest

Mount remote folder over SSH

sudo apt-get install sshfs
mkdir ~/folder
sshfs user@server:/remote/path/to/folder ~/folder

TAR+GZIP directory recursively

tar -zcvf archive.tar.gz folder
Afterwards, untar and gunzip with the following:
tar -zxvf archive.tar.gz
References:

Watch file size grow

Here's a nifty little command you can run to watch the size of a file grow (such as if it's being transferred over SFTP by another process like CRON):
watch -n 5 "du -h filename"

Start program over SSH w/o ending by disconnect

Some things take a while and when the SSH connection times out it will quit all running programs in that session. I found this simple method to run those long commands and disconnect without killing them:
  1. SSH to server
  2. Run "screen" command
  3. Start whatever things you want
  4. Press CTRL+A, CTRL+D to detach from screen session

Later ...
  1. SSH to server
  2. Run "screen -r" to reattach to screen session

Reference: http://superuser.com/questions/134554/how-to-keep-program-running-after-ssh-disconnection

SCP: Copy file via SSH

scp -P port hostname:/remote/path/file.txt /local/path

SFTP shell script

  • http://stackoverflow.com/questions/5386482/how-to-run-the-sftp-command-with-a-password-from-bash-script
  • http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19531699/sftp-file-manipulation-using-shell-script

Cancel stuck SSH session

Press ~. (TILDE + PERIOD). You may have to press ENTER before that. CTRL+C, as you may have noticed, does not end a session that needs to timeout due to a broken pipe. This often happens to me when I put my laptop in suspend and then return to it later.