Terminal
Here is a very nice tutorial on Linux terminals. Our student graduate machines have Debian/GNU Linux installed, currently running version 4.0, named “Etch”. Our machines have an icon on the taskbar to start a terminal. It looks like this:
There are many other ways to start a terminal. From the K Menu:
- Utilities/Terminal
- Debian/Shells/ (select one of several)
- Debian/XShells/ (select one of several)
Note that, if you start a terminal from the GUI, then (obviously) you are already logged in, so the terminal session will start with you as the user already logged in. One of the nice things about a terminal is that it give you a clue who you are logged in as.
| Standard User | Super User (root) |
|---|---|
| the login prompt will show a dollar sign, like this | the login prompt shows as a pound sign, like this: |
 |  |
This is a little visual check, a quick way to make sure you don't make a big mistake!
Linux is also configured by default with six “virtual” terminals. Press Ctl + Alt + F1 (or F2, or F3, etc) to open one of these terminals. Ctl + Alt + F7 is for the graphical user interface. This is nice for things like writing this wiki page, so I can toggle back and forth between a terminal, and the GUI where I am logged into our wiki page.
If you use one of the six “virtual” terminals, then no one is logged in at the login prompt. So, to login, enter your user name and press Enter. Then it will ask for the password; enter the password, and press Enter.
You can log in as the standard user, and then become root by typing in 'su'. However, when you are at one of the “virtual” terminals, you can also just log in directly as root. To do so, enter 'root' at the login prompt, and then enter the root password. Note that this option is not available from a terminal started from within the GUI. The reason for that is that Debian, for security reasons, does not allow root to login to the GUI.
