My Terminal Workflow
I’ve collected and used thousands of terminal commands through actual devops, AI/ML, data science, full-stack web development, and cloud engineering workflows.
This post captures the most frequently used, most impactful, and uniquely powerful commands from that experience. Each one has been battle-tested and integrated into real engineering environments.
Setup & Shell Enhancements
Switch to the fish shell (Friendly Interactive Shell)
brew install fish
which fish
sudo sh -c 'echo /opt/homebrew/bin/fish >> /etc/shells'
chsh -s /opt/homebrew/bin/fish
fish
Enables better auto-suggestions, syntax highlighting, and user-friendliness.
Install Core Tools
brew install git htop jq wget tree curl tmux
These are essentials for terminal power users.
Add PATHs in fish shell
fish_add_path /opt/homebrew/bin/
Make it persistent via config.fish:
nano ~/.config/fish/config.fish
Use alias for shortcuts
alias gs="git status"
alias ll="ls -lah"
alias gc="git commit -m"
alias gco="git checkout"
Save to:
nano ~/.config/fish/config.fish
Git: Daily Driver for Projects
These are the most-used git commands that show up repeatedly across dev workflows:
git clone [email protected]:user/project.git
git checkout -b feature/my-branch
git switch branch-name
git commit -m "meaningful message"
git push --set-upstream origin branch-name
git stash / git stash pop
git reset HEAD~1
git log --oneline --graph --all
Create and jump to a new feature branch:
git checkout -b fix/critical-issue
View status or staged diff:
git status
git diff
Python Development Workflows
Create isolated environments with conda:
conda create -n myenv python=3.10
conda activate myenv
conda install numpy pandas jupyter
Run scripts:
python my_script.py
python -m http.server
Profile performance:
python -m cProfile -s cumulative script.py
Use tuna to visualize import times:
pip install tuna
python -X importtime script.py 2> import.log
tuna import.log
Networking, SSH & System Tools
SSH with custom keys
ssh -i ~/.ssh/id_rsa user@host
Copy your key:
ssh-copy-id user@host
Diagnose DNS, IP, Connectivity
ping google.com
dig example.com
nslookup example.com
ifconfig | grep broadcast
Find your local IP:
ipconfig getifaddr en0
Scan network devices
sudo nmap -sn 192.168.1.0/24
Package Managers
Brew (macOS)
brew install wget git jq
brew update
brew upgrade
Pip & Python packages
pip install package-name
pip uninstall package-name
pip freeze > requirements.txt
pip install -r requirements.txt
File and Text Utilities
Search history
history | grep "ssh"
Grep for content in files
grep -r "keyword" .
grep "error" logs.txt
Recursive file ops
find . -name "*.py"
find . -type f -exec cat {} +
Disk space
df -h
du -sh *
Clean terminal
clear
Ctrl + L
System Monitoring
htop
sudo apt install htop
htop
Better than
top— shows processes, memory, swap, threads, and more.
Check ports
lsof -i :8000
sudo lsof -i -P | grep ':8080'
Kill process by PID:
kill -9 <PID>
Automation Scripts
Make a Python file executable:
chmod +x script.py
./script.py
Zip files:
zip -r archive.zip folder/
Unzip:
unzip file.zip
APIs & Web Tools
Curl with headers
curl -X POST https://api.example.com/endpoint \
-H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"key":"value"}'
Secure file uploads (example)
curl -X PUT "$SIGNED_S3_URL" \
-H "Content-Type: application/pdf" \
--upload-file ./file.pdf
Audio Tools (AI & Speech)
TTS using LLaMA-TTS:
This needs llama.cpp setup, binary works.
llama-tts --tts-out-default -p "Hello world" && ffplay output.wav -nodisp -autoexit
Stream via Flask API:
curl -X POST http://localhost:5000/tts \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"text": "Welcome to the demo"}' \
--output output.wav
Data Engineering Tools
Terraform
terraform init
terraform plan -out=tfplan
terraform apply tfplan
terraform destroy
Target specific modules:
terraform apply -target=module.my_module
AWS CLI
aws s3 ls
aws configure
aws lambda invoke --function-name my-func out.txt
Use localstack:
LOCALSTACK_AUTH_TOKEN=dummy localstack start
High-impact One-liners
Re-run last command with sudo
!! does not work on fish, not sure why?
sudo !!
Repeat previous command
!!
View last 100 commands
history | tail -n 100
Git reset & clean
git reset --hard HEAD
git clean -fd
Miscellaneous Yet Powerful
View markdown docs in browser
python3 -m http.server 8000
Set environment variables
export AWS_PROFILE=default
export OPENAI_API_KEY=your-key
Decode JWT
echo "<JWT_PART_2>" | base64 --decode
Final Words
These commands reflect months of actual engineering activity — not just tutorials. If you found this useful:
- Follow @tellsiddh
- Star my GitHub
- Check out blog.tellsiddh.com
Stay curious and keep building!
— Siddharth