Unix Commands Interview Questions


1) State and explain about features of UNIX?
UNIX operating system originally was developed in 1969. This is an open source operating system developed by AT&T. It is widely used in work stations and servers. It is designed to be multi tasking, multi user and portable. UNIX has many several components packed together.

2) Explain about sh?
Sh is the command line interpreter and it is the primary user interface. This forms the programmable command line interpreter. After windows appeared it still retained the programmable characteristics.

3) Explain about system and user utilities?
There are two utilities they are system and user utilities. System utilities contain administrative tools such as mkfs, fsck, etc. Where as user utilities contain features such as passwd, kill, etc. It basically contains environment values.

4) Explain about document formatting?
UNIX systems were primarily used for typesetting systems and document formatting. Modern UNIX systems used packages such as Tex and Ghostscript. It uses some of the programs such as nroff, tbl, troff, refer, eqn and pic. Document formatting is very used because it forms the base of UNIX.

5) Explain about communication features in UNIX?
Early UNIX systems used inter user communication programs mail and write commands. They never contained a fully embedded inter user communication features. Systems with BSD included TCP/IP protocols.

6) Explain about chmod options filename?
This command allows you to change, write, read and execute permissions on your file. Changes can be done to the file system but at times you need to change permissions for the file systems. At times files should be executable for viewing the files.

7) Explain about gzip filename?
Gzip filename is used to compress the files so that those files take up less space. The size of the file actually gets reduced to half their size but they might also depend upon about the file size and nature of the file systems. Files using gzip file name end with .gz.

8) Explain about refer?
Refer was written in Bell Laboratories and it is implemented as a troff preprocessor. This program is used managing bibliographic references and it is used to cite them in troff documents. It is offered in most of the UNIX packages. It refers with text and reference file.

9) Explain about lpr filename?
This command is used to print a file. If you want to change the default print you can change the printer by using the P option. For double sided print you can use lpr-Pvalkyr-d. This is very useful command in UNIX present in many packages.

10) Explain about lprm job number?
This command is used to remove documents from the printer queue. The job number or the queue number can be found by using lpq. Printer name should be specified but this is not necessary if you want to use your default printer.

11) Brief about the command ff?
This command finds files present anywhere on the system. This command is used to find document location where you forgot the directory in which you kept the file but you do remember about the name. This command is not restricted in finding files it displays files and documents relevant to the name.

12) Brief about finger username?
This command is used to give information about the user; it gives out a profile about the user. This command is very useful for administrators as it gives the log information, email, current log information, etc. finger also displays information such as phone number and name when they use a file called .plan.

13) Explain about the command elm?
This command lets you to send email message from your system. This command is not the only one which sends email there are lots of other messenger systems which can facilitate the process of sending a mail. This command behaves differently on different machines.

14) Brief about the command kill PID?
This command ends the process to which it was assigned (ID). This command cannot be used in multi systems in the network. ID can be obtained by the command ps. This command ignores completely the state at which the process is it kills the process.

15) Explain about the command lynx?
This command helps you to browse web from an ordinary terminal. Text can be seen but not the pictures. URL can be assigned as an argument to the G command. Help section can be obtained by pressing H and Q makes the program to quit.

16) Brief about the command nn?
This command allows you to read the news. First you can read about the local news and then the remote news. "nnl” command makes or allows you to read local news and nnr command is used to read remote news. Manual and help information is available with many popular packages.

17) Brief about ftp hostname?
This command lets you download information, documents, etc from a remote ftp. First it is important to configure an FTP for the process to begin. Some of the important commands relevant to the usage of FTP are as follows get, put, mget, mput, etc. If you are planning to transfer files other than ASCII defined it is imperative to use binary mode.