[herbsman]

I'd like to start a thread about useful Mac OS X terminal commands:

Installing available software updates:
sudo softwareupdate -ia

Repairing disk permissions:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /

Toggling airport off and on:
sudo ifconfig en1 down (off)
sudo ifconfig en1 up (on)

[Simon]

Checking battery status:
ioreg -l | grep -i LegacyBatteryInfo

[besson3c]

- lsof
- top, ps, kill
- cat, grep, find, awk, more, sort, etc.
- tail -f /path/to/logfile
- ssh, rsync, scp
- screen
- memtest (this is not included with OS X)
- ping, host, dig, traceroute, etc.
- ifconfig
- du
- port (Macports command)
- curl, wget (the latter is not included with OS X)
- ttf2eot, fondu, fontforge (likewise)
- wine (also likewise)

[reader50]

Place a Trash folder on your desktop. Works for files on same hard drive, but doesn't do the Eject function. No delay on use, no CPU load.
ln -s /Users/yourAccountName/.Trash Desktop/Trash

[Hal Itosis]

Originally Posted by herbsman 

sudo diskutil repairPermissions /

Less popular than most.

No (jest joshing), i only wanted to mention that sudo is not needed for that one.

--

I feel all users should get real comfortable with list ( ls ), and use it for troubleshooting questions. E.g.,

ls -alOe /path/to/the/problem/file/or/folder

A good listing is often better than words (and pictures).

Besson already mentioned find. (Probably 90% of my most shell scripts have a "find" in there somewhere).

Please learn sed and eschew cut (i really dislike cut).

Thanks. (now back i go to the endless task of learning perl. )

EDIT: forgot to add something useful. Maybe,
list all 3rd-party prefPanes... and extensions:

system_profiler SPPrefPaneDataType |
grep -A2 -B3 3rd |sed '/3rd/d;/./!d'

kextstat |grep -v com.apple

[herbsman]

How does one toggle 'remote access /ssh' via the terminal?

If it's possible, I presume the command would usable and quite useful when in single-user mode during times of need

[besson3c]

Networking access is not supported in single-user mode, as single user mode boots you into a lower level run level.

I don't know of a way to toggle SSH access via the Terminal, although you might want to look for a launchd file.

[Simon]

This might come in handy for some. Turning VNC screen sharing on and off via the CLI.

to turn on:

sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -activate
sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -configure -clientopts -setvnclegacy -vnclegacy yes
sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -configure -clientopts -setvncpw -vncpw PASSWD

where PASSWD is a password you chose for VNC screen sharing.


to turn off:

sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -configure -clientopts -setvnclegacy -vnclegacy no
sudo /System/Library/CoreServices/RemoteManagement/ARDAgent.app/Contents/Resources/kickstart -deactivate