editing text ([almost] always works)

• backspace
• Ctrl + W: delete previous word
• Ctrl + U: delete line

(except in text editors)

quitting

• Ctrl + C: quit (SIGINT)
• Ctrl + Z: stop process (SIGTSTP) (resume with fg or bg or kill (with kill)
• Ctrl + D: quit (in a REPL) (more on page 20)
• q: quit (in some full screen programs)
• Enter: exit frozen SSH session

or the nuclear option:

$ ps aux | grep THING
bork 7213 ... THING
$ kill -9 7213

editing text

(these often work in a readline-like situation)

• arrow keys

• Ctrl + A or Home: beginning of line

• Ctrl + E or End: end of line

• Ctrl + arrow keys: left/right a word
  or sometimes Alt + arrow keys
  or Option + arrow keys
  or Alt+b / Alt+f

• Ctrl + K: delete line forward

• Ctrl + Y: paste (from Ctrl+K or Ctrl+U)

• Ctrl + H: might work if Backspace doesn’t

also many shells have a “vi mode” if that’s your jam

other useful stuff

• Ctrl + L: clear screen
• Ctrl + R: search history
• Ctrl + Q: unfreeze screen (that you froze with Ctrl+S, more on page 25)

copy and paste

in your terminal emulator, it’s usually:
Ctrl + Shift + C/V
or Cmd + C/V

mouse stuff that might work

• Option + click
• or Alt + click: place cursor
• scroll wheel: scroll