How to run a program in a Linux command line?

Photo by Kevin Horvat on Unsplash

To run a program in a Linux command line, you can follow these steps:

1. Open a terminal window.
2. Type the name of the program you want to run and press Enter.

For example, to run the “nano” text editor, you would type:

nano

If the program is installed in your user’s $PATH variable, Linux will search for it and launch it automatically.

If the program is not installed in your $PATH variable, you will need to navigate to the directory where the program file is located and then run the program.

To do this, type the following command:

cd /path/to/program/file

where /path/to/program/file is the full path to the program file.

Once you are in the directory where the program file is located, you can run the program by typing the following command:

./program_file

where program_file is the name of the program file.

For example, to run the “nano” text editor from a directory other than your home directory, you would type:

cd /usr/bin
./nano

If you are not sure where the program file is located, you can use the which command.

The which command will search your $PATH variable for the program and return the full path to the program file if it is found.

To use the which command, type the following command:

which program_name

where program_name is the name of the program you are looking for.

For example, to find the path to the “nano” text editor, you would type:

which nano

If the “nano” text editor is installed in your $PATH variable, the which the command will return the following output:

/usr/bin/nano

You can then use this path to run the program from any directory on your system.

I hope this helps!