Programmers and scientists staring at a black or white background screen, with just a cursor blinking and typing their way away into hysteria or melancholy had always been the stuff of pure science fiction to me.
I had been using a computer for over ten years and I could not remember ever having used that black-screen-with-white-cursor program let alone type myself into hysteria with it. I patiently waited for an opportunity to experience the hysteria those programmers and scientists had while using the mysterious program.
Well, as part of my preparations for @Andela’s BootCamp, my opportunity finally arrived to use the program. I found out the program was known as the Command Line Interface (CLI) and I was utterly disappointed. I was utterly disappointed at the misrepresentations hundreds of movies I had watched made about the hysteric states users of CLI got into. But I was not disappointed with the power and usefulness of the CLI.
The CLI is a text-based interface that is used to operate software and operating systems while allowing the user to respond to visual prompts by typing single commands into the interface and receiving a reply in the same way. (https://www.techopedia.com/definition/3337/command-line-interface-cli)
Perhaps the best way to understand the CLI is to contrast it with the Graphical User Interface (GUI). The GUI is what you see when you open a typical Windows or Mac system; a collection of graphics, images, audio etc. that allows you to navigate the system with ease. The GUI allows you to perform actions such as opening a file by just clicking on a image of the file, delete a file by clicking on a text and much more by interfacing with pretty looking graphics. The CLI is quite the opposite. Imagine performing all those tasks by just typing a command into a cursor prompt; now that’s the CLI.
As tedious as it may sound (yea, the CLI can be quite tedious: you are not allowed to misspell a word, you obviously have to know the command before you can type it and so much more), the CLI is actually quite useful.
The CLI can actually be much more faster than using the GUI (provided you know the commands). The CLI uses much less memory and much less processing time. For much more complex tasks, the CLI can be scripted to automate tasks and the CLI is actually independent of the operating system. The CLI can also operate on reduced display hardware requirements e.g. a simple low-resolution monitor is sufficient. (https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-Command-Line-Interface)
Aside from its ability to make you look like a geek, perhaps the greatest advantage of the CLI is how low-level and yet sophisticated it is. For me, the CLI commands are like individual Lego™ blocks. They provide you unparalleled ability to build what you want.
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