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Useful Terminal Commands

A collection of terminal commands I frequently use for project maintenance, file management, dependency analysis, and PowerShell automation.

Related

For PowerShell syntax, variables, and pipeline concepts, see PowerShell. For the Unix/bash equivalents, see Linux. For git-specific commands, see Git Commands.

Project Analysis​

Run ESLint​

npx eslint .

Lint the current project.

Find Unused Imports​

npx unimport

Detect unused imports in the project.

Find Unused Dependencies​

npx depcheck

Identify dependencies that are not being used.

Package Manager Maintenance​

Update Global Package Managers​

npm install -g npm@latest pnpm@latest yarn; bun upgrade

Updates npm, pnpm, and yarn to their latest versions globally, then upgrades Bun itself.

Running Bash Scripts from PowerShell​

Run a Bash Script Using Git's Bundled Bash​

"C:\Program Files\Git\bin\bash.exe" update-all-labels.sh

Runs a .sh script from PowerShell using the bash executable bundled with Git for Windows. Useful when a script relies on bash-only syntax that PowerShell can't interpret natively.

Directory Tree Commands​

Display Source Tree​

tree src /F

Show the complete file tree under src.

Display Current Directory Tree (ASCII)​

tree . /F /A

Generate an ASCII-compatible tree.

Save Directory Tree to a File​

tree . /F /A > tree.txt

Export the tree structure to tree.txt.

File Operations​

Delete a File​

Remove-Item src\components\drink_utilities\defaultData.js

Delete a specific file.

Rename a File​

Rename-Item nelitfy.toml netlify.toml

Rename a file.

Create a New File​

New-Item pnpm-guide.md
New-Item -Path . -Name "data.json" -ItemType "File"

Create a new file.

Get All File Extensions in a Directory​

Get-ChildItem -File | Select-Object -ExpandProperty Extension | Sort-Object -Unique

List every unique file extension present in the current directory.

Count Files by Extension​

Get-ChildItem -File -Recurse |
    Group-Object Extension |
    Sort-Object Count -Descending |
    Select-Object Count, Name

Shows how many files of each extension exist, sorted by count descending.

Batch Rename Files by Pattern​

Get-ChildItem -File | Where-Object { $_.Extension -in '.jpeg', '.jpg', '.png' } |
Rename-Item -NewName { "Bob - $($_.Name)" }

Prepend "Bob - " to every JPEG/PNG filename in the current directory.

List All Files and Empty Directories​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse | Where-Object { $_.Attributes -ne 'Directory' -or (Get-ChildItem $_.FullName -Force).Count -eq 0 } | Select-Object FullName

Lists all files and any empty directories, by full path.

Recently Modified Files​

Sort Files by Last Modified Date​

Get-ChildItem | Sort-Object LastWriteTime -Descending

Display files ordered by most recently modified.

List Directories and Subdirectories​

Get-ChildItem -Directory | ForEach-Object {
    Write-Host "`n $($_.Name)" -ForegroundColor Cyan
    Get-ChildItem $_.FullName -Directory | ForEach-Object {
        Write-Host "    $($_.Name)"
    }
}

Output top-level directories and their immediate subdirectories.

Feeding Project Structure to AI​

Handy for grabbing a clean snapshot of a project's file/folder structure — e.g. to paste into an AI prompt — while excluding noise like node_modules, .git, and build output.

List All Files Recursively, Excluding Common Junk Folders​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File -Exclude node_modules |
Where-Object { $_.FullName -notmatch '\\(node_modules|\.git|dist|build|\.next|\.cache)\\' } |
Select-Object -ExpandProperty FullName

Recursively lists every file's full path, filtering out anything inside node_modules, .git, dist, build, .next, or .cache.

Same, but Relative Paths Only​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Where-Object { $_.FullName -notmatch '\\(node_modules|\.git|dist|build|\.next|\.cache)\\' } |
Resolve-Path -Relative

Same filtering, but outputs paths relative to the current directory — cleaner for pasting into a prompt.

Save the Filtered Structure to a File​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Where-Object { $_.FullName -notmatch '\\(node_modules|\.git|dist|build|\.next|\.cache)\\' } |
Resolve-Path -Relative |
Out-File structure.txt

Writes the filtered file list to structure.txt for easy copy-pasting.

Tree View Excluding node_modules​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -Directory |
Where-Object { $_.FullName -notmatch '\\(node_modules|\.git|dist|build|\.next|\.cache)\\' } |
Select-Object -ExpandProperty FullName

Lists only directories (not files), still excluding common junk folders — useful for a quick high-level structure overview.

PowerShell History​

Locate PowerShell History File​

(Get-PSReadLineOption).HistorySavePath

Returns the path where PowerShell command history is stored.

Image Utilities​

Find Images Smaller Than or Equal to 1280px Wide​

Get-ChildItem -File | ForEach-Object {
    try {
        $img = [System.Drawing.Image]::FromFile($_.FullName)

        if ($img.Width -le 1280) {
            [PSCustomObject]@{
                FileName = $_.Name
                Width    = $img.Width
                Height   = $img.Height
            }
        }

        $img.Dispose()
    }
    catch {
        # Skip files that aren't valid images
    }
}

Useful for identifying images that may be too small for certain use cases.

Duplicate File Detection​

Show Duplicate Files​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Get-FileHash -Algorithm MD5 |
Group-Object Hash |
Where-Object { $_.Count -gt 1 } |
ForEach-Object {
    $_.Group | Select-Object Path, Length
}

Displays duplicate files grouped by MD5 hash.

Display Paths of Duplicate Files​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Get-FileHash -Algorithm MD5 |
Group-Object Hash |
Where-Object { $_.Count -gt 1 } |
ForEach-Object { $_.Group.Path }

Outputs only duplicate file paths.

Duplicate File Cleanup​

Delete All Duplicate Files​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Get-FileHash -Algorithm MD5 |
Group-Object Hash |
Where-Object { $_.Count -gt 1 } |
ForEach-Object { $_.Group.Path } |
Remove-Item -Force

Deletes every file belonging to a duplicate group.

Keep One Copy and Remove Remaining Duplicates​

Get-ChildItem -Recurse -File |
Get-FileHash -Algorithm MD5 |
Group-Object Hash |
Where-Object { $_.Count -gt 1 } |
ForEach-Object {
    $_.Group | Select-Object -Skip 1 | ForEach-Object {
        Remove-Item $_.Path -Force
    }
}

Preserves the first file in each duplicate set and removes the rest.

Notes​

  • Most commands are designed for PowerShell.
  • Duplicate detection uses MD5 hashes.
  • Always review files before running deletion commands.
  • Consider committing changes to Git before performing bulk file operations.