tildetown-handbook

This handbook aims to provide people with referenceable, educational material related to interactions with tilde.town.

This handbook is for people with less of a technical background who want to learn more about the interactions you can have while using tilde.town.

Table of contents

• Requirements
• Conventions used in this handbook
• Getting started
  • For macOS users
  • For Windows Subsystem for Linux users
  • For Ubuntu users
  • For cmdr users
  • For PuTTY users
  • Testing out your command line interface

Requirements

• Basic understanding of files and directories
• A UNIX-like environment, such as:
  • Ubuntu
  • Linux Mint
  • Manjaro
  • Windows Subsystem for Linux
  • macOS
  • Homebrew
  • scoop.sh
  • Chocolatey
  • cmdr
  • Cygwin
  • PuTTY
  • and many more

Conventions used in this handbook

• Notes signify additional information.
• Tips signify alternative methods to procedures.
• Examples provide a visual reference of how a procedure would be carried out in the real world.
• Monospaced font signifies directory names, file names, file contents, and commands.

Getting started

One of tilde.town's goals is to transform the command line from a scary-looking technical tool into a tool for creating beautiful things.

Because of this, you will need to open your UNIX-like environment's command line interface. For me, it's a little icon on my desktop that looks like a blank, black screen, but it may be different for you.

I will list off how you can find your command line interface for a few UNIX-like environments in the sections listed below, and then we will test the environment to make sure everything is working.

• For macOS users
• For Windows Subsystem for Linux users
• For Ubuntu users
• For cmdr users
• For PuTTY users
• Testing out your command line interface

For macOS users

You can use one of the following procedures below for finding the built-in app called "Terminal":

• Open the Spotlight app and search for the word "terminal"
• Open your Applications > Utilities directory and double-click the Terminal app

For Windows Subsystem for Linux users

• Open your start menu and search for the word "Ubuntu"

Note: The steps above assumed you chose Ubuntu as the Linux distribution for Windows Subsystem for Linux during your installation.

For Ubuntu users

You can use one of the following procedures below for finding the built-in terminal application:

• Type Ctrl+Shift+t
• Click the Ubuntu icon and search for the word "terminal"

For cmdr users

• Open the cmdr application

For PuTTY users

• PuTTY isn't a command line interface itself, but it acts as a tool to connect to other computers, so you can use their command line interface. This will be covered in the Connecting to tilde.town section.

Testing out your command line interface

After you think you have found your environment's command line interface, you'll be using it in the rest of this handbook.

Note: I'll be calling the command line a "terminal" from now on.

As a test for good measure, let's try running our first command. Try typing the following line into your terminal:

ls

That should "return"[1]{#1-source} several items. For me, it returned:

Desktop Downloads Documents Images Videos Music

If ls returned what seems to be the files or directories on your computer, then you have everything you need!

[1]{#1}: "return" is technical jargon used to describe how something on a computer sends data somewhere. In this case, the text representing your files and directories is the data, and that text is being sent to your screen.