First you need to set your preferred shell to be bash. bash is wonderful as shells go. Here's how to have it full time in Mac OS X.

You can make bash your default shell with NetInfo Manager in the Utilities folder. Open NetInfo Manager, select users, select the user whose default shell you want to change, click the lock to make changes, and then find the shell property and change the value from /bin/tcsh to /bin/bash. Save your changes and exit from NetInfo Manager.

Now that you've got bash, you can use these handy hot keys from ugu.com:

ctrl-l

clear screen

ctrl-r

does a search in the previously given commands so that you don't have to repeat long command.

ctrl-u

clears the typing before the hotkey.

ctrl-a

takes you to the begining of the command you are currently typing.

ctrl-e

takes you to the end of the command you are currently typing in.

esc-b

takes you back by one word while typing a command.

ctrl-c

kills the current command or process.

ctrl-d

kills the shell.

ctrl-h

deletes one letter at a time from the command you are typing in.

ctrl-z

puts the currently running process in background, the process can be brought back to run state by using fg command.

esc-p

like ctrl-r lets you search through the previously given commands.

esc-.

gives the last command you typed.

Yay for bash!

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