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.

Sun's recently released VirtualBox 2 is one of the best virtualization applications for desktop users. It's available in two wallet-friendly flavors, with a few extra features in the closed-source variant.

I am personally a strong advocate of using the Command Line. However, I am coming from a more tech type of situation than some others do. For the 'average" user however, is the Command Line relevant to everyday use?

I started learning computers back when DOS was all that was available to me, so I was comfortable with the command line. When Windows 95 was released my command line usage dropped considerably because there simply wasn't the "need" for it that there once was. I've gone from using the command line all the time to using it very seldom because GUI's were getting better and becoming more wide spread.

When you familiarise yourself with the interface with a little help from our article, you'll see that daily tasks like copying or deleting files are executed much faster in CLI than when done graphically and when you dig even deeper into the command line, it'll show you it's true power with scripts and the like.

The trash project allows you to interact with your desktop trashcan from the command line. It lets users "undo" deletions made with the trash command in a similar manner to restoring files from the trashcan in a desktop environment. For experienced Linux users, the trash command comes in handy when you want to put a file into the trashcan from the command line.

VBoxManage, a command-line utility that allows you to control all of VirtualBox's powerful features.In essence, VBoxManage supports everything that our graphical user interface allows you to do with the click of a button. VBoxManage supports a lot more than that,however. It exposes really all the features of the virtualization engine, even those that cannot (yet) be accessed from the GUI.

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.

One of the strangest mind-benders these days is hearing Linux users going all Barbie and vowing "I will never touch the command line! What is so terrifying about the command line?