Get Instant Linux Command Answers with the howdoi CLI Tool

Installation Steps

howdoi requires PHP 5.0 or newer and can be installed in two commands:

$ mkdir -p ~/bin && wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/san-kumar/howdoi/master/howdoi -O ~/bin/howdoi && chmod +x ~/bin/howdoi
$ sudo ln -s ~/bin/howdoi /usr/local/bin/howdoi

Basic Usage Syntax

The tool is invoked as: howdoi [-n -v -h] — question Options:

-n – number of answers to return (default 1)

-v – verbose output, showing the full answer instead of just the command snippet

-h – display help information

Example Queries

Quick command lookup

Find how to extract a .bz2 archive: $ howdoi extract a bz2 file Result:

-j, --bzip2
    filter the archive through bzip2
    tar -xvjf file.tar.bz2
Source: https://askubuntu.com/questions/707861/how-to-extract-tar-bz2

Detailed tutorial

Ask how to add a program to cron: $ howdoi -v add a program to cron Result includes a short explanation and a command example:

Put a shell script in one of these folders: /etc/cron.daily, /etc/cron.hourly, /etc/cron.monthly or /etc/cron.weekly.
If these are not enough for you, you can add more specific tasks e.g. twice a month or every 5 minutes. Go to the terminal and type:
crontab -e
…snip
Source: https://askubuntu.com/questions/2368/how-do-i-set-up-a-cron-job

Multiple answers

Request two ways to attach to a screen session: $ howdoi -n 2 attach to a screen Result provides two distinct commands and their usage:

screen -S myprogramrunningunderscreen
screen -ls
There are screens on:
   4964.myprogramrunningunderscreen (05/31/2013 09:42:29 PM) (Detached)
   4874.pts-1.creeper (05/31/2013 09:39:12 PM) (Detached)
Source: https://askubuntu.com/questions/302662/reattaching-to-an-existing-screen-session

screen -d -r
Source: https://askubuntu.com/questions/302662/reattaching-to-an-existing-screen-session

Other useful queries

Upgrade PHP to the latest version:

$ howdoi upgrade to latest php
sudo apt-get upgrade
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ondrej/php
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ondrej/php5-oldstable
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ondrej/php5
sudo apt-add-repository ppa:ondrej/php5-5.6
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install php5.5
sudo apt-get install php5.6
sudo apt-get install php7.0
do-release-upgrade
Source: https://askubuntu.com/questions/565784/how-do-i-upgrade-php-version-to-the-latest-stable-released-version

Project Origin

The howdoi tool was created by Indian developer San Kumar and open‑sourced on GitHub (https://github.com/san-kumar/howdoi) in May 2019. It pulls answers from AskUbuntu and presents them in a conversational, command‑line friendly format, helping Linux newcomers obtain solutions quickly.