Arch Linux Commands Cheat Sheet [Free PDF Download]

Arch Linux is a popular Linux distribution known for its simplicity and flexibility. It’s a Linux distribution that updates on a rolling basis, so users are required to keep up to date. Hence, operating Arch Linux is challenging for complete beginners. In this cheat sheet, I will provide quick and useful commands that will help both new and experienced users alike while working in Arch Linux.

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Arch Linux Commands List

Like, other Linux distros Arch Linux has various commands to perform different tasks. Using these commands, a user can interact with the operating system, manage packages and files, connect with network and so on. The below lists contain commands of different categories available in Arch Linux.

System Management

System commands in Arch Linux include tools for managing packages, monitoring system performance, controlling system services, and accessing system logs. Frequently used commands of this type are listed below:

Commands	Description
systemctl	Manage system services
journalctl	Query and view system logs
hostnamectl	Set or view the hostname of the system
timedatectl	Set or view the system time and time zone
hwclock	Display or set the hardware clock
shutdown	Shut down or reboot the system
reboot	Reboot the system
lsblk	Display information about block devices
dmidecode	Display information about the system’s hardware components
hwinfo	Display detailed information about the system’s hardware components
lshw	Display detailed information about the system’s hardware components
lspcmcia	Display information about PCMCIA devices
lsdev	Display information about all devices on the system
lsmod	Display information about loaded kernel modules
modprobe	Add or remove kernel modules
dmesg	Displays bootup messages
systemd-analyze	Analyze and display system boot-up performance
systemd-nspawn	Create and manage containers
docker	Create and manage containers
podman	Alternative to docker that manages containers and images
sync	Flush file system buffers to disk
uptime	Display system uptime and load averages
free	Display information about system memory usage
chroot	Change the root directory of a process
cron	Schedule periodic tasks
at	Schedule one-time tasks
crontab	Manage cron jobs for a user
smartctl	monitoring and controlling the SMART attributes of hard drives and SSDs
history	Display a list of previously executed commands
ltrace	Trace library calls
strace	Trace and analyze system calls and signals made by a process
valgrind	Debug and profile programs
gdb	Debug programs
pidof	Find the process ID of a running program
pgrep	Find the process ID of a running program based on its name or other criteria
pkill	Send a signal to a running process based on its name or other criteria

Package Management

Package management is crucial for any Linux distribution to employ it for the desired purpose. In Arch Linux, package management commands are used to install, remove, and update software packages, dependencies, and libraries. Below are the most useful package management commands of Arch Linux.

Commands	Description
pacman	Install, remove, upgrade and manage packages
yay	AUR helper used to install packages from the Arch User Repository
flatpak	Install and manage applications in flatpak format
snap	Install and manage applications in snap format
makepkg	Create and manage Arch Linux packages

File Management

Using commands of this section one can create, copy, move and delete files and directories. Here is a short list of file management commands available in Arch Linux.

Commands	Description
ls	Display list of files and directories
cd	Change the current working directory
rm	Remove files and directories
cp	Copy files and directories
mv	Move files and directories
nano	Simple text editor
vi	A more advanced text editor
chmod	Change file permissions
chown	Change file ownerships
cat	Concatenate and display files
less	Show files one page at a time
head	By default display first ten lines of a file
tail	Display the last lines of a file
wc	Counts the number of lines, words and characters in a file
sort	Sort lines of text
uniq	Remove duplicate lines of text
cut	Extract columns of text from a file
paste	Merge lines of text from different files
sed	Perform text transformations on a file
awk	Manipulate and analyze text data
diff	Compare two files and directories
patch	Apply changes to a file or directory
alias	Create custom command shortcut
which	Display the location of a command
locate	Quickly find files and directories on the system
updatedb	Update the locate database
lsof	List open files and their associated processes
ps	Display information about running processes
kill	Send a signal to a process
renice	Change the priority of a process
nice	Start a process with specific priority
dd	Copy and convert data between files and devices
fdisk	Create and manage disk partitions
mkfs	Create a file system on a disk partition
mount	Mount file systems
umount	Unmount file systems
fsck	Check and repair file systems
blkid	Display information about block devices
hdparm	Configure hard disk device parameters
lspci	Display information about PCI devices
lsusb	Display information about USB devices
tree	Displays directory structure in a tree format
ln	Create links between files and directories
mkdir	Create directories
rmdir	Remove empty directories
touch	Update the modification and access time of a file or create a new empty file
file	Determine the type of file
hexdump	Display the contents of a file in hexadecimal format
md5sum	Calculate the MD5 checksum of a file
cpio	Create and extract cpio archives
sftp	Transfer files securely over SSH
sha256sum	Calculate the SHA-256 checksum of a file
find	Search files and directories
df	View Disk space usage
du	Estimates file space usage
grep	Search for text within files
ack	Seach and process text files
ripgrep	Search and process text files
top	Display real-time information about system resource usage
htop	An interactive process viewer and system monitor, similar to top but with more features and customizability
screen	Run multiple shell sessions or programs within a single terminal window or across multiple terminals
fuser	Identify which processes are using a specific file or directory
realpath	Display the absolute path of a file or directory
truncate	Shrink or extend the size of a file
stat	Display file or file system status

Network Management

There are lot of commands in Arch Linux that are designed for managing and troubleshooting network-related issues. These commands allow users to configure network settings, check connectivity and diagnose connectivity problems.

Commands	Description
ip	Display and manage network
ping	Tests connectivity of a host
netstat	Display information about network connections, routing tables, and network interfaces
wget	Download files from the internet
curl	Transfer data from or to a server
ssh	Establish a secure shell connection to a remote server
scp	Securely copy files between servers
rsync	Synchronize files and directories between servers
tcpdump	Capture and analyze network traffic
nmap	Perform network exploration and security auditing
arp	Display and modify the ARP table
ss	Display information about network connections
iwconfig	Display and configure wireless network interfaces
ifconfig	Configure network interfaces
route	View and modify routing table
traceroute	Traces the route of a host
dig	Retrieve DNS records of a domain
host	Obtains information about a domain name or IP address
iptables	Configure Linux firewall
ipset	Manage ip sets
ssh-keygen	Generate and manage SSH keys
ssh-copy-id	Copy SSH keys to a remote server
byobu	Terminal multiplexer and session manager that includes additional features
cifs-utils	Mount and manage CIFS
mtr	Continuously monitors network connections and their quality
tig	Text-based interface for Git that provides a visual representation of Git branches, commit history, and changes
nmon	Display real-time system and hardware statistics, including CPU usage, disk I/O, and network traffic
hping3	Packet crafting and testing tool that can send various types of network packets
arp-scan	Discover hosts and network devices by sending ARP packets, and display their MAC and IP addresses
gparted	A graphical partition editor that allows to create, resize, move, and copy disk partitions
sshfs	Mount a remote file system over SSH protocol
slurm	A network load blancer and cluster management tool
jshon	Parse, manipulate and analyze JSON data in shell scripts
xdg-open	Open files or URLs with the default application configured in the system
ranger	A file manager and directory browser that supports various features like previews, bookmarks, and plugin integration
ddrescue	copy data from one file or block device to another
ytop	Display real-time information about system resourses
vnstat	Monitor network traffic and record and display bandwidth usage of interfaces
nc	Establish and manage network connections
iftop	Monitor network traffic in real-time
nethogs	Shows bandwidth usage by process

User and Group Management

User management commands are used to create, modify and delete users and groups. Some frequently used user management commands are as follows:

Commands	Description
tmux	Manage multiple terminal sessions
whois	Query WHOIS databases
w	Display information about currently logged-in users
last	Display information about previous logins
glances	System monitoring tool with a web interface
iotop	Monitor input/output usage by processes and storage devices
uname	Display information about the system’s kernel and operating system version.

Compression and Archiving

Arch Linux has multiple commands to create, manage and extract files and directories from compressed archives. The most useful commands of this type are listed below:

Commands	Description
zip	Create and manipulate ZIP archive files
tar	Archive and compress files
unzip	Extract files from ZIP archives
bzip2	Compress and decompress files using the bzip2 algorithm
gzip	Compress and decompress files using the gzip algorithm
xz	Compress and decompress files using the xz algorithm
openssl	Manage digital certificates and perform encryption and decryption operations
ncdu	Analyze disk usage in a directory tree
7z	Extract files from 7z archives
e	Monitor the progress of data transfer between two processes
fdupes	Find and remove duplicate files in a directory tree, and can compare files
p7zip	Compress and decompress files and directories in various archive formats, including 7z, zip, tar, and gzip
qpdf	Manipulate and transform PDF files

Miscellaneous

There are many other Arch Linux commands that don’t fit into a specific category or have multiple usages. Learning these commands will definitely save the time and effort of a user.

Commands	Description
youtube-dl	Download videos and audio from various sources
newsboat	Fetch and display news articles from various sources
pandoc	Convert documents between various markup and document formats
mpd	Plays audio files from a local or remote directory
sshuttle	Tunnels all network traffic through an SSH connection, and can bypass various network restrictions and firewalls
feh	Supports various image formats and can display them in a slideshow or as a background wallpaper
mutt	A command-line email client
pine	command-line email client with a more traditional interface
elinks	Web browser with more advanced features than Lynx
lynx	A text-based web browser
strings	Extract human-readable strings from binary files
gpg	Encrypt and decrypt files and messages using public-key cryptography
sqlite3	a command-line tool for managing SQLite databases, and can create, modify, and query tables and records in a file-based database system

Conclusion

In conclusion, the Arch Linux cheat sheet covers a variety of commands, including package management, system configuration, networking and others. By following the commands outlined in the cheat sheet, users can easily customize their Arch Linux system and perform necessary tasks.

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