Linux: How To Copy and Paste From the Command Line

To copy and paste from the command line on a Linux system, you can use the xclip utility. xclip is a command-line interface to the X Window System clipboard, which allows you to copy and paste text between the command line and other applications.

Here is an example of how to use xclip to copy and paste from the command line:

1. Install xclip. If you don't already have xclip installed on your system, you can install it using your system's package manager. For example, on a Debian-based system, you can use the apt command to install xclip:

$ sudo apt install xclip

2. Copy text from the command line to the clipboard. To copy text from the command line to the clipboard, you can use the echo command to print the text and pipe it to xclip.

For example, to copy the text "Hello, world!" to the clipboard, you can use the following command:

$ echo "Hello, world!" | xclip -sel clip

This will copy the text to the clipboard, and you can then paste it into other applications using the usual paste command (e.g., Ctrl+V or Shift+Insert).

3. Paste text from the clipboard to the command line. To paste text from the clipboard to the command line, you can use the xclip command with the -out option to print the contents of the clipboard.

For example, to paste the text from the clipboard to the command line, you can use the following command:

$ xclip -out

This will print the contents of the clipboard to the command line.

4. (Optional) Use the -selection option to specify the clipboard to use. By default, xclip uses the "clipboard" clipboard, but you can use the -selection option to specify a different clipboard.

For example, to copy text from the command line to the "primary" clipboard, you can use the following command:

$ echo "Hello, world!" | xclip -sel primary

And to paste text from the "primary" clipboard to the command line, you can use the following command:

$ xclip -out -selection primary

These are just a few examples of how to use xclip to copy and paste from the command line. You can use the xclip --help command to see a complete list of options and usage examples.