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Questions tagged [terminology]

For questions about words/terms that are specific to Unix and/or Linux.

0 votes
2 answers
113 views

Do dotfiles require the initial dot?

Is there a difference between a "dot file" and a "configuration file"? For example, I have torrc file in /opt/homebrew/etc/tor. Neither filename itself nor any of its parent ...
jsx97's user avatar
  • 1,357
0 votes
3 answers
172 views

what is recursion when applied to the bash shell?

I keep hearing people talk about "recursion" for example, when you copy and paste a file and a directory you need to also put in the -r flag to tell the cp command to copy the directory &...
how to bash's user avatar
2 votes
1 answer
71 views

PEOT EOM EOT Difference

I'm a little confusing about the tape options in Unix EOM (end of mark) EOT (end of tape) PEOT (physical end of tape) As I understand EOM is the the end of last file, but I have also some free tape ...
elbarna's user avatar
  • 14.2k
6 votes
2 answers
2k views

Is ext4 and xfs only for usage with internal file systems?

I am attempting to store some large files and I thought an encrypted ext4 partition would be excellent. However the GNOME Disk Utility appears to state ext4 as for internal disks and xfs only for ...
Kitty Cat's user avatar
  • 171
-3 votes
1 answer
244 views

what is a "string" in bash? [duplicate]

i keep hearing people talking about "strings"? what is a string? what are people talking about? i keep hearing "enter a string" or "if your string this" or your "...
how to bash's user avatar
1 vote
3 answers
2k views

Linux command vs bash command, is my understanding correct?

this question may be a bit terminological. As a new Linux learner, I find many tutorials mention Linux/bash commands. To my understanding, commands are just various programs and bash is a shell like ...
GingerKitten7951's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
154 views

Confusing in status of 'fixed" and "obsolete" in debsecan of Ubuntu

May I know what are the meaning of 'fixed" and "obsolete" in debsecan of Ubuntu? output of "debsecan --suite bookworm" a) CVE-2024-xxxxx {Package Name} (fixed, obsolete) b) ...
Eric Lo's user avatar
0 votes
2 answers
53 views

Nomenclature for Application dependency

Assume that this command invokes an application from the MacOS terminal command line: /Applications/Matlab_R2020a.app/bin/matlab The terminal then is no longer able to accept commands and MATLAB is ...
gatorback's user avatar
  • 1,532
-1 votes
1 answer
106 views

Why doesn't 'export' give the export attribute while 'set -a' does?

From man bash (GNU bash, version 5.2.21(1)-release (x86_64-pc-cygwin)): set [-abefhkmnptuvxBCEHPT] [-o option-name] [--] [-] [arg ...] -a Each variable or function that is created or modified is ...
pmor's user avatar
  • 665
-1 votes
1 answer
84 views

'input-file' and 'output-file' vs. 'source-file' and 'target-file' as generic names [closed]

When documenting command-line things, it is often necessary to use generic names. Sometimes I use input and output words, and they play nice: # example 1 pandoc input_file.md -o output_file.htm But ...
jsx97's user avatar
  • 1,357
0 votes
0 answers
55 views

Name of the arrow icons that tell you there is a subdirectory in a menu?

I don't know how exactly to describe it verbally, but I just mean the white triangular arrows in this example image: In an icon theme that I'm trying to use they either don't exist or are the exact ...
cereallain's user avatar
7 votes
0 answers
354 views

Why is a loop device called a "loop" device?

As far as I understand, a loop device is a regular file that acts as a block device. It's used for various things like isolation in snap packages and installing ISOs over an existing filesystem. But ...
raul's user avatar
  • 71
4 votes
1 answer
3k views

What is a device manager in the context of Linux?

What is a device manager in the context of Linux?  That is, what is it that a device manager actually does? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Udev says udev (userspace /dev) is a device manager for the ...
How To Linux's user avatar
1 vote
2 answers
130 views

Each file gets one inode block

A question was given to us by a lecturer: How many data blocks are needed to collect all the data in an EXT4 file system using inodes if the file size is 54 KB and there is a block size of 4KB. ...
Matej Vesel's user avatar
0 votes
1 answer
240 views

How to understand fontconfig output: "Pattern has 38 elts (size 48)"

When running with verbose output, and sometime even without, the first thing fontconfig writes about any font is a line like the following: Pattern has 38 elts (size 48) What do these numbers ...
Mads Skjern's user avatar
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