What is the terminal?
Talking to your computer by typing
⏱ Est. ~6 min
01 · Read
The terminal is a tool for interacting with your computer through a text interface: you type commands instead of clicking icons and menus.
💡 Picture thisThink of your computer like a restaurant. The graphical interface (Finder, the Desktop) is like dining in — you read the menu, point at things, the waiter brings them. The terminal is like calling the kitchen directly — you use specific words to tell the chef what you want. Same food, different way of ordering.
Key points
- The terminal does the same things as the graphical interface — clicking is replaced by typing
- Engineers love the terminal because: many things are faster, some tools only run in the terminal, and you can automate repetitive work
- On Mac it's called Terminal.app (built-in). On Windows it's PowerShell or Windows Terminal
- The $ in the terminal is called the "prompt" — it means the terminal is waiting for you to type a command
02 · Read
💻 Windows users, read this (Mac / Linux can skip)
This course teaches Unix-style terminal commands (like ls, cd, mkdir, grep). Mac and Linux support them out of the box — just open the built-in terminal and go.
Windows is different — the built-in PowerShell and CMD use a different command set (Get-ChildItem, Remove-Item). You have a few options, recommended from top to bottom:
1. (Most recommended) WSL — Windows Subsystem for Linux Microsoft's official Linux environment that runs inside Windows. Open PowerShell (as Administrator) and type: wsl --install Wait for it to finish (about 5–10 minutes), reboot, set a Linux username and password, and you have a full Linux terminal. Everything in this course works 100% as-is — no command translation needed.
2. Git Bash If you've already installed Git for Windows, it comes with Git Bash — a small Unix-style terminal that runs most of the commands in this course. Lighter than WSL.
3. Native PowerShell Claude Code runs in PowerShell too, but most of the ls, mv, grep commands we teach need to be rewritten. Only use this if the first two don't work for you.
We recommend WSL — set it up once and every chapter from here on works exactly as written.
Key points
- Mac / Linux: the built-in terminal works as-is — skip ahead
- Windows: WSL is recommended (wsl --install, one line), or Git Bash
- Once WSL is set up, every Unix command in this course works 100%
- Claude Code itself runs on Mac, Linux, WSL, Git Bash, and PowerShell
03 · Terminal preview
See how the terminal works. These three commands show "where you are", "what's in the current folder", and "how to move into another folder".
(This section is interactive — please enable JavaScript.)
04 · Quiz
What is the terminal?
- A window where system error messages pop up
- A special app for watching videos
- A text interface for interacting with the computer by typing commands
- An external device you plug into your computer
05 · Quiz
What does the $ symbol mean in the terminal?
- The command costs money
- Something went wrong
- Shorthand for the home directory
- The prompt — the terminal is waiting for you to type a command
06 · Quiz
Why do engineers prefer the terminal?
- Because it's faster for a lot of things, and some tools only run in the terminal
- Because programming breaks in graphical interfaces
- Because the terminal is easier to learn than clicking
- Because the terminal uses less memory
Other lessons in this chapter
⚠ The full interactive experience needs JavaScript. Please enable it and reload.
※ This is an independent Traditional Chinese teaching project — not an official Anthropic product. Claude™ is a trademark of Anthropic, PBC.