I thought it would be useful to break away from all the GUI-goodness and offer up a few command line tips and tricks. Why? No matter how powerful, user-friendly, and modern the Linux desktop becomes, there may come a time when you want to step up your game and get down and dirty with the command line interface.

Mutt is a text-based mail client along the lines of Pine or Elm. It's known for being a fast and highly configurable mail client, and since it is text-based, it’s ideal for checking email quickly over SSH (Secure Shell). Click through to learn exactly how to use it…

Today’s “Newbie Tip” is learning some basics about the “Command Line Interface” or as it’s mostly referred to, “Command Line”. The command line gives the user the ability to interact with the operating system by typing via a text terminal.

I still use the command-line mail client mutt to handle my mail. One of mutt's advantages is the wide range of keyboard commands you can use to do various useful tasks. Here's a selection of the ones I use regularly.

I love the command line. However, most people can’t just live on the command line, GUI’s can be pretty useful :P. I find myself spawning GUI programs from the command line a lot, and here are two tips which make doing that a pleasant experience:

Mutt is a text based email client that is both powerful and has a lot of features,some of which you will not find in other mail clients. One problem that you will see with many mail clients is that they do not work easily with IMAPS, or secure IMAP. Mutt integrates easily with IMAPS and is easy to set up.

Though I use Pidgin (formerly called Gaim) as my primary Internet Relay Chat client, I also installed Irssi, a text-mode IRC client. Why? --Because I use it to easily record an IRC channel's chat activity. How? --Here's how to do it:

In 1976 one man changed the face of text editors. That man is Bill Joy who developed vi for BSD UNIX. To those who are a bit unfamiliar with command line UNIX/Linux, vi (short for Visual) is a screen-oriented text editor that operates in two modes: insert mode and normal mode. Please reference here for a deeper explanation of its design and implementation.

Some times you just have to pull some tricks out of the vault. These tips can be timeless, classic, or just retro. But generally speaking they still apply to users today. Naturally, since these are mostly old school tips, they are going to be command line tips.