The following commands will work in Mac and Linux terminals as well as Windows PowerShell.
| Action | Command |
|---|---|
| Display current directory | pwd |
| Show directory contents | ls |
| Change directory | cd <directory_name> |
| Go up a directory | cd .. |
| Create a directory | mkdir <directory_name> |
| Delete a directory | rm -r <directory_name> |
| Move a file or folder | mv <filename> <destination> |
| Cancel current operation | ctrl + C / Command + C |
Each operating system has a different shortcut for running Python's .py files in the terminal.
| Command | Mac | Linux | Windows |
|---|---|---|---|
py <filename>.py |
✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
python3 <filename>.py |
✓ | ✓ | ✗ |
python <filename>.py |
✗ | ✓ | ✗ |
When these commands are run without a filename, the Python interpreter will run in the terminal.
Also, the terminal will need to be navigated to the folder containing the file before the file will be able to be run. Use the ls command to list the contents of the current directory and use cd to change into the directory where the file lives.