They are used for listing the contents of a directory and moving from one directory to another, just like Finder is used for browsing folders. The most frequent commands you will use are ls (list) and cd (change directory).

Terminal in OS X Getting disk usage information on a Mac is often gathered by selecting a file, directory, or hard drive and hitting Command-I. To format a disk using Apple’s Disk Utility, simply follow the steps below. Formatting a Disk Using Disk Utility Formatting a disk using Apple’s Disk Utility is the easiest and most straight-forward method of the two. We’ll be detailing both of these methods below. You can format a drive in OS X using two applications: Disk Utility and Terminal. Formatting an external drive on your Mac is quite easy, though it isn’t as evident and obvious as it is on a PC. Either way, you’ll want to format your drive accordingly. Most external drives ship in formats that are universally recognised amongst nearly all operating systems (FAT, I’m looking at you), but there may be times where you might want to completely wipe a drive and/or set it up to be compatible with Apple’s Mac lineup only.

Mac terminal commands external drive