Free cheat sheet

Terminal survival cheat sheet

The two dozen commands that cover most of your first month in the Mac terminal, each in plain English, with what to ask AITerm instead.

Download the PDF · or print this page with ⌘P.

Find your way around

pwd: Shows the folder you are in right now (“print working directory”).In AITerm: “which folder am I in?”
ls · ls -la: Lists what is in this folder. -la adds sizes, dates and hidden files, the ones whose names start with a dot.In AITerm: “show everything in this folder, including hidden files”
cd Documents: Moves into a folder. cd .. goes up one level, cd on its own goes to your home folder (~), and cd - goes back to the last folder.
open .: Opens this folder in Finder. open report.pdf opens a file in its usual app.In AITerm: “open this folder in Finder”

mkdir notes: Makes a new folder. mkdir -p a/b/c makes the whole path at once.
touch todo.txt: Creates an empty file, or updates the date on one that exists.
cp a.txt b.txt: Copies a file; cp -R copies a folder. If b.txt exists it is replaced without asking. Add -i to be asked first.
mv old.txt new.txt: Moves or renames a file or folder. Like cp, it replaces an existing file without asking unless you add -i.
rm file.txt: Deletes at once. It does not go to the Trash, and there is no undo. rm -r folder deletes a folder and everything in it. Read the path twice, and stop before any rm -rf you don’t fully understand, especially with sudo or a *.AITerm marks a delete Destructive. The Work and Production safety profiles ask before it runs; Locked Down blocks it.

cat notes.txt: Prints a whole file to the screen. Best for short files.
less log.txt: Shows a long file one screen at a time. Space for the next page, /word to search, q to quit.
grep -i "error" log.txt: Shows the lines that contain a word; -i ignores capitals. grep -r "TODO" . searches every file in and below this folder.
find . -name "*.pdf": Finds files by name in this folder and every folder inside it. Keep the quotes around the pattern.In AITerm: “find the PDFs in my Downloads folder”

man ls: Opens the manual for a command. Space to page, q to quit. Many built-in Mac commands don’t understand --help, so try man.
history: Lists commands you ran before. The up arrow brings back the last one, and Ctrl-R searches them as you type.
Tab: Finishes a file or command name for you. When several names match, it shows the choices.
Ctrl-C: Stops the command that is running and gives you the prompt back.
clear: Clears the screen. Nothing is undone; your files are untouched.

sudo …: Runs one command as an administrator. It asks for your Mac password, and nothing appears as you type it. Use it only when you understand the command and why it needs admin rights, never on a line you copied without reading.
brew install wget: Homebrew installs command-line tools (get it at brew.sh). brew search finds one, brew update refreshes Homebrew’s list, brew upgrade updates what you installed. Don’t put sudo in front of brew.
git status: In a project folder, shows changed, staged and new files. git log --oneline lists recent commits, one per line.In AITerm: “show me what changed in this project”
chmod +x script.sh: Lets a script run, so ./script.sh works. Avoid chmod 777: it lets every user on the Mac change the file.
which python3: Shows the full path of the program that runs when you type a command’s name.
du -sh * · df -h: du -sh * shows how big each item in this folder is; df -h shows how much space is free.In AITerm: “what is taking up space in this folder?”

Plain English: Type what you want in the input bar. AITerm proposes a command you can edit; Return runs exactly what is shown, Escape drops it.
/explain · ⌘⇧E: Explains your last command or its output, or a command you give it, like /explain chmod +x script.sh. It never runs anything.
/fix · ⌘⇧F: After a command fails, proposes a corrected one for you to review. Add a follow-up, like “we use pnpm in this project”.
Risk badges: Safe, Caution, Destructive, Irreversible. Click a badge to see why, and for risky commands a dry-run preview.

From ai-term.com/cheatsheet.html · AITerm is free for Apple Silicon Macs on macOS 13 or later.