Appendix C The Command-Line Interface 223THE OFFICIAL RASPBERRY PI BEGINNER’S GUIDE
Loading the Terminal
The CLI is accessed through the Terminal, a software package which loads what is technically
known as a virtual teletype (VTY) terminal, a name dating back to the early days of computers
when users issued commands via a large electromechanical typewriter rather than a keyboard
and monitor. To load the Terminal package, click on the raspberry icon to load the menu,
choose the Accessories category, then click on Terminal.
The Terminal window can be dragged around the desktop, resized, maximised, and
minimised just like any other window. You can also make the writing in it bigger if it’s hard to
see, or smaller if you want to fit more in the window: click the Edit menu and choose Zoom In
or Zoom Out respectively, or press and hold the CTRL key on the keyboard followed by + or -.
The prompt
The first thing you see in a Terminal is the prompt, which is waiting for your instructions.
The prompt on a Raspberry Pi running Raspbian looks like this:
pi@raspberrypi:~ $The first part of the prompt, pi, is your user name; the second part, after the @, is the host
name of the computer you’re using, which is raspberrypi by default. After the ‘:’ is a tilde,
~, which is a shorthand way of referring to your home directory and represents your current
working directory (CWD). Finally, the $ symbol indicates that your user is an unprivileged user,
meaning that you need a password to carry out tasks like adding or removing software.
Getting around
Try typing the following then pressing the ENTER key:
cd Desktop