Essential Bash Shortcuts and Mouse Tips for macOS Terminal Power Users

Whether you’re navigating code, wrangling logs, or building scripts, mastering your terminal workflow is a developer superpower. If you spend hours in your terminal on macOS, this post is your cheat sheet for Bash command line shortcuts and mouse tips that can drastically boost your productivity.

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🔑 Must-Know Bash Keyboard Shortcuts

These work in most macOS terminal emulators (Terminal.app, iTerm2, etc.) and are built into GNU Readline, which Bash uses for line editing.

Shortcut	Description
Ctrl + A	Move cursor to the start of the line
Ctrl + E	Move cursor to the end of the line
Ctrl + U	Delete from cursor to the beginning of the line
Ctrl + K	Delete from cursor to the end of the line
Ctrl + W	Delete the word before the cursor
Ctrl + L	Clear the screen (same as clear command)
Ctrl + C	Cancel the current command
Ctrl + D	Logout or exit shell / delete character at cursor
Ctrl + Y	Paste the last killed (deleted) text
Alt + B	Move back one word
Alt + F	Move forward one word
Ctrl + R	Reverse search command history (start typing to match)
!!	Run the previous command
!$	Run the last argument of previous command

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🖱️ Mouse and UI Tips for macOS Terminal

These are small things that make a huge difference, especially on Mac.

1. Triple Click to Select the Entire Line

Triple-clicking anywhere on a line in Terminal selects the whole command — useful for copying multi-line output or logs.

2. Option + Drag for Rectangular Selection (iTerm2)

Using iTerm2? Hold Option while dragging to select text vertically (column mode) — handy for copying logs or data in columns.

3. Option + Click to Move Cursor (macOS Terminal & iTerm2)

Click anywhere while holding Option to move your cursor directly to that position — no arrow keys needed!

Works in both Terminal.app and iTerm2. A hidden gem for fast editing.

4. Double Click to Select a Word

Useful when you want to copy just part of a file path, variable name, or command.

5. Command + Click to Open Links or Paths

In iTerm2 or Terminal, if you see a file path or URL, Cmd + Click will open it in the default app or editor.

Example:

vim ~/Projects/myapp/main.py

You can Cmd + Click main.py to open in VS Code or your preferred editor.

6. Copy with Mouse, Paste with Cmd + V

On macOS Terminal:

• Select text with the mouse (auto-copies it)
• Press Cmd + V to paste — or right-click and choose Paste

⚠️ In Terminal.app, Cmd + V may not always work as expected for pasting large content. iTerm2 handles this better.

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🛠️ Bonus Tips for a More Productive Shell

Enable Mouse Support in less

Add this to your ~/.bash_profile or ~/.zshrc if you use less a lot:

export LESS='-R --mouse'

Use pbcopy and pbpaste

Copy output directly from command line:

cat file.txt | pbcopy
pbpaste > newfile.txt

Use Aliases for Long Commands

alias gs='git status'
alias ll='ls -alF'

Use open Command to Launch Files from CLI

On macOS:

open .
open somefile.txt

This will open the current directory or file with the default app (Finder, VS Code, etc.).

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🚀 TL;DR – Speed Up Your Terminal Life

• Navigate smarter: Ctrl + A, Ctrl + E, Alt + B/F
• Edit faster: Ctrl + U/K/W, Ctrl + Y
• Search history: Ctrl + R
• Use the mouse efficiently: triple-click, Option-click, Option-drag
• Mac clipboard integration: pbcopy, pbpaste
• Open files fast: Cmd + Click or open <file>

Once you commit these to muscle memory, you’ll feel like a terminal ninja. Happy hacking!