Console applications

From Linux 101, The beginner's guide to all things Linux.

Console applications are programs which are meant to be run from a text console, and do not have a graphical user interface.

Virtually anything you do in Linux can be done with a console applications. Some examples:

• Simple image changes (resizing, filling, adding text, colors, etc)
• Listen to MP3 or Ogg Vorbis music files without using a graphical user interface.
• Web browsing, E-mail, and the like

Console applications are extremely popular with more experienced Linux users because, with experience, one can get things done very quickly using the keyboard and console. Most of these users do not hold anything against using a graphical desktop; in fact they often run their consoles from within an X Windows session. There are applications available to virtually every graphical environment within Linux that can emulate console terminals.

There are many ways to make console applications even more useful, such as using the screen application to keep console applications running between user sessions. Some console applications are the most powerful programs of their classification ever written (they surpass their GUI cousins).

You should not be too concerned about learning to use console applications when you are first starting out with Linux. The graphical environment will allow you to do the things you want without a steep learning curve. You will find console applications to be very powerful as you gain experience. You can do some incredibly powerful things much faster at a console typing than clicking through menus and the like in a GUI.