If you’re trying to get the most out of Linux, you need to learn to use the command line. If you don’t, you wind up frustrated, and may find that a lot of features cannot be made to work properly.
Case in point: I just repartitioned a Windows laptop and threw Ubuntu on the new partition. I was pleased to see that the wireless was Linux-friendly and worked with no configuration. However, when I tried to connect to my home network, I found myself stymied…. Why?
I was using the GUI tool to configure the wireless card; it looks quite nice. You can simply select your wireless interface from the list of interfaces, click “configure” and then find your wireless network and enter your key.
Except that it just would not work.
Finally, I turned to the command line; typed in “iwconfig eth1″ and saw that the security mode was listed as “Open.” Well, that was wrong, but there was no way to change it from the GUI. A quick scan of the man page for iwconfig showed that you could fix this with the command “iwconfig eth1 restricted PUTKEYHERE” (where “eth1″ is your wireless interface, of course; wlan0 might be more appropriate, but whatever).
Voila — wifi was working almost as soon as I hit “enter”. If I had stuck with the GUI tool, I would have had to give up and plug myself into the router.
The command line still rules — not because it is “geekier” or “more low level” or anything like that. It rules because the GUI tools lack the functionality that you can get from the command line tools.
Now, that could be fixed, certainly. Beyond this simple fact, the command line can be made to do magic tricks that no GUI will ever be likely to emulate, but that is admittedly in the realm of hardcore *nix geekery and not necessarily of much interest to the Average User. That being said, even the Average User is likely to want to connect to a Wireless network… so until the GUI tools can do at least all the options of the command line tools they replace — the command line wins.
While I agree with your sentiment, I think your example is poor. What you are describing is a bug in the GUI environment, which should be fixed (and I suspect is fixed in Feisty). Your implication from this example is not that the command line is good, but rather than the GUI is bad/broken, which is unhelpful.
The CLI _is_ great, and provides a level of functionality that should not be placed in a GUI, and some things are just handled better in the CLI. GUIs are also great, and provide a level of intuitivity and simplicity that is difficult from the CLI.
Sigh…
Yes. Once again, I must agree… my example highlight a bug in a GUI rather than a specific reason the command line actually, in fact, rules.
However, in my defense, I was writing this with the present state of desktop Linux in mind… in which case buggy GUIs, much as I hate to admit it, are still a fact of life. To really express that, I should have written the post differently — I think what I was really thinking is that, in this case, had I not known to use the command line, I would have been stuck.
With pipes/redirection/scripting and other features, the command line has abilities that not only shouldn’t be put into a GUI, but can’t be… You’re right though, my example did not demonstrate that.