Ubuntu

what is that "|" symbol (really noob question)

Asked by Phil Kliewer

OK, this probably is a really lame ubuntu noob question, but I'm trying to recover the boot-loader after installing Windows, and I've found the instructions to it here

https://help.ubuntu.com/community/RecoveringUbuntuAfterInstallingWindows

and am trying to follow it, but ¼ way down the page, where it says "Verify if your partition is correct" it says next to type

mount | tail -1

what in the world is that "|" symbol? (I hope this isn't on the same level as "hit any key" and looking for a key that has 'any' on it)

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Phil Kliewer
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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#1

Its called a pipe

you can pipe the output of one command into another command, so if you want to output the boot messages but only see the ones with the word "disk" in you can run dmesg and PIPE the text into grep

dmesg | grep -i disk

(-i just makes it case insensitive)

Pipes are VERY powerful tools.

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Phil Kliewer (hayoumissed) said : 		#2

Okaaaaay... how do I ~type~ that pipe bugger in terminal when I want to use it?

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Ian Ace (iaculallad) said : 		#3

To help you understand more on piping and redirection, try reading the link below:

http://www.linux-tutorial.info/modules.php?name=MContent&pageid=21

HTH.

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actionparsnip (andrew-woodhead666) said : 		#4

The button is ususally on the key next to Z on a UK keyboard, on a US keyboard a believe it's near ENTER:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/ff/Pc104_wide_delete_short_enter_xfree86_us_keyboard_full_size.png

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marcus aurelius (adbiz) said : 		#5

the "|" is the shifted backslash "\" key. it should be close to your ENTER key. on some keyboards ,it's beside the 1 key.

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Phil Kliewer (hayoumissed) said : 		#6

OK, got it

thanks everyone for the help