ESP Biography

We typically interact with our computers through graphics, like buttons and menus, that make up what are called graphical user interfaces, or GUIs. Another, often more powerful way that we can interact with our computers is through the command-line interface (CLI), which requires you to type instructions to your computer. The Unix shell is a command-line interface that allows you to run programs and instruct your computer to perform tasks. It is a particularly powerful and efficient tool for automating many small tasks. In this brief introduction to the shell, we will learn how to navigate a computer filesystem and give basic commands to our computers using the command-line. The primary goal of this beginner-level lesson is to help students think of ways that the shell can be useful to them, and to show them that the command-line is pretty fun!