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Software

This tutorial covers the two most important pieces of software in your arsenal; your terminal and text editor, as well as how to start customizing and configuring them to your beeds.

Table of Contents

In this document, you will learn how to:

• Installing Homebrew
• Installing Python and Pip
• Using the Man and Help Commands
• Customizing the macOS Terminal with Themes & Plugins
• Installing Sublime Text 4
• Adding Sublime Packages

Installing Homebrew

Homebrew is a package manager for macOS that will come in handy throughout this tutorial.

1. Open the Terminal app on your Mac. You can find it in the Utilities folder within the Applications folder or use Spotlight Search to find it.
2. In the Terminal window, paste the following command and press Enter:

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Homebrew/install/HEAD/install.sh)"

3. The installation script will start running, and you will be prompted to enter your password. This is the password you use to log in to your Mac. Type it in and press Enter.
4. The installation script will then download and install Homebrew on your Mac. This process may take several minutes, depending on your internet connection speed.
5. Once the installation is complete, you can test that Homebrew is installed by typing the following command in the Terminal window and pressing Enter:

brew --version

6. Homebrew is installed correctly, the version number should be displayed in the Terminal window.

That’s it! Homebrew is now installed on your Mac, and you can use it to install a wide variety of command-line tools and software packages.

Setting up your Terminal on macOS

The terminal for macOS is a command-line interface that provides access to the underlying operating system of a Mac computer. It allows users to execute various commands, such as running scripts, managing files and directories, installing packages and applications, and controlling system settings. In other words, the terminal serves as a powerful tool for users who want to interact with their computer in a more direct and precise way. It can be particularly useful for developers, system administrators, and power users who need to perform complex tasks quickly and efficiently.

Commonly used commands

The macOS terminal is what allows you to interact with the Operating System.
The most important commands to know are in the table below, especially the man command.

Command-line arguments

Each of those commands allows for different "arguments" (also known as flags). For example, with the rm command:

⚠️ Using the man and help commands.

The man command and help command are like instruction manuals for how to use different commands on a computer. man shows instructions for commands that are built into the computer system, while help shows instructions for commands that you can use in the command line.

Customizing the macOS Terminal with Themes & Plugins

The terminal is better when you stylize it!

Changing Themes

1. Open the Terminal app on your Mac. You can find it in the Utilities folder within the Applications folder, or use Spotlight Search to find it.
2. In the menu bar at the top of the screen, click on Terminal > Preferences. Alternatively, you can use the keyboard shortcut Command + , to open the preferences window.
3. In the Preferences window, click on the Profiles tab.
4. Select the profile that you want to change the theme for by clicking on it in the list on the left-hand side of the window.
5. On the right-hand side of the window, you can customize the theme by changing the text, background, and cursor colors, as well as the font style and size. You can also choose from several built-in themes by clicking on the "Color Presets" dropdown menu.
6. Once you’ve made your desired changes, close the Preferences window. Your new theme will be applied to the Terminal.

Adding Terminal Plugins

1. Install Zsh4Humans by running brew install zsh4humans in the terminal
2. Install Powerlevel10K by entering brew install romkatv/powerlevel10k/powerlevel10k into your terminal
3. Add Powerlevel10K to your shell configuration, so it’s easier to use echo "source $(brew --prefix)/opt/powerlevel10k/powerlevel10k.zsh-theme" >>~/.zshrc
4. Restart your terminal or run source ~/.zshrc for the changes to take effect.

Sublime Text 4

Next, we are going to install a simple text editor for working with Raspberry Pi and cybersecurity projects.

1. Go to Sublime Text 4 to download the latest version
2. In Sublime click View > Show Console
3. Paste the code from Package Control (also below) into console and press Enter

import urllib.request,os,hashlib; h = '6f4c264a24d933ce70df5dedcf1dcaee' + 'ebe013ee18cced0ef93d5f746d80ef60'; pf = 'Package Control.sublime-package'; ipp = sublime.installed_packages_path(); urllib.request.install_opener( urllib.request.build_opener( urllib.request.ProxyHandler()) ); by = urllib.request.urlopen( 'http://packagecontrol.io/' + pf.replace(' ', '%20')).read(); dh = hashlib.sha256(by).hexdigest(); print('Error validating download (got %s instead of %s), please try manual install' % (dh, h)) if dh != h else open(os.path.join( ipp, pf), 'wb' ).write(by)

Adding Sublime Packages
Let’s install our first package, the Dracula Theme. To do this

1. Press Command + Shift + P it will bring up Package control.
2. Search for Dracula Color Scheme and press enter
3. Go to Sublime Text > Preferences > Color Scheme > Select Dracula

Install the Markdown Preview package for Sublime Text

This will make it very easy for you to be able to write in markdown and preview it.

1. Open Sublime Text 4 on your computer.
2. Open the Package Control panel by pressing Ctrl+Shift+P (Windows) or Cmd+Shift+P (macOS).
3. In the panel, type Install Package and press Enter. This will bring up a search bar where you can search for packages.
4. Type "Markdown Preview" in the search bar and press Enter. This will search for the package in the Package Control repository.
5. When the search results appear, select Markdown Preview from the list of packages and press Enter. This will begin the installation process.
6. Wait for the package to download and install. This process may take a few seconds or minutes, depending on your internet connection speed.
7. Once the package is installed, you should be able to use it to preview Markdown files in Sublime Text 4.
8. Open a Markdown file in Sublime Text 4, and then open the Markdown Preview panel by pressing Ctrl+Shift+P (Windows) or Cmd+Shift+P (macOS) and selecting Markdown Preview: Preview in Browser"` from the list of commands.
9. A new browser tab will open, displaying a preview of the Markdown file.