8 Weird Things I’ve Done With Linux Just Because I Could

Most radical usage Linux to learn, tinker, oregon physique thing useful. I’ve utilized it to bash things that scope from mildly amusing to downright cursed. These aren’t champion practices. They’re not productive. They astir apt won’t onshore you a job. But they volition punctual you wherefore Linux is specified a chaotic and fantastic system.

8 Booted Straight Into /bin/bash—No Init, No GUI, Just Vibes

I wanted to spot what would hap if I told Linux to skip, well, everything. No login manager. No systemd. No services. Just driblet maine consecutive into a basal ammunition similar it’s 1991. To bash this, I rebooted Ubuntu, deed the E cardinal astatine the GRUB menu, and recovered the enactment starting with "linux." I removed "quiet splash $vt_handoff", truthful I could really spot the output, past added init=/bin/bash to the extremity of the enactment and pressed Ctrl+X to boot.

It worked. After a little intermission and a fewer taps of the Enter key, I landed successful the terminal:

root@(none):/#

That’s it. No hostname. No ammunition punctual art. Just a blinking cursor and an astir meditative emptiness. The basal filesystem was read-only by default, truthful I had to run:

mount -o remount,rw /

From there, it was each manual—no shutdown options, nary systemctl—just earthy ammunition access.

To reboot, I had to unit it with

reboot -f

After that hard reboot, the strategy started usually due to the fact that the GRUB edit wasn’t permanent. If you didn’t prevention the init=/bin/bash alteration (and you shouldn't), your Ubuntu desktop volition footwear conscionable similar before. It’s wholly useless for mean computing, but arsenic a learning moment, it’s wild. You spot conscionable however overmuch of your strategy is optional. And yeah, it kinda felt similar lasting successful an abandoned server country with a flashlight and nary doors.

7 Ran the yes Command Until My Terminal Cried

There’s a small command called yes that repeats a drawstring implicit and implicit forever. Why? Nobody truly knows, but I ran it anyway.

yes "I americium root"

Instantly, the terminal started flooding with those words. It ate CPU. It chewed done scrollback. It filled the surface similar it had thing to prove. Want to halt it? You’ll request to deed Ctrl+C. And possibly bespeak connected your choices.

yes "All hail Tux" | caput -n 10

6 Installed Hannah Montana Linux to Feel Something

I spun up a virtual machine, downloaded Hannah Montana Linux (yes, that’s a existent distro), and booted into a KDE desktop drenched successful purple, glitter, and 2000s popular prima energy. It's fundamentally Kubuntu successful disguise, but with Miley Cyrus wallpaper and a taxable that screams "tween hacker chic." Was it stable? Not really. Was it necessary? Absolutely not. But sometimes, you don’t request a reason—just an ISO and a small curiosity.

5 Customized My Terminal to Look Like a Hacker Movie Set

Sometimes, you privation your terminal to consciousness similar it’s moving connected a mainframe successful a basement bunker. I went all-in connected that aesthetic. I changed the colour strategy to green-on-black, installed neofetch, cmatrix, and sl, and added them to .bashrc for maximum flair:

sudo apt install cmatrix sl neofetch
echo "clear && neofetch && cmatrix -u 2" >> ~/.bashrc

That cmatrix -u 2 bid is what launches the greenish scrolling substance animation, similar the Matrix terminal effect. You tin besides conscionable tally cmatrix straight successful immoderate terminal to spot it successful action. If you’re utilizing GNOME Terminal oregon thing similar, you tin alteration the colour strategy manually: spell to Preferences > [your profile] > Colors, and uncheck “Use colors from strategy theme.” Then acceptable the inheritance to achromatic and substance to green. Boom—instant cinematic drama.

4 Played a Full Game successful the Terminal Just for Nostalgia

Who needs Steam erstwhile you’ve got ASCII? I installed ninvaders—a terminal-based clone of Space Invaders—just to spot if it inactive held up. And honestly? It was a blast. No mouse, nary graphics—just arrow keys and axenic arcade vibes.

sudo apt instal ninvaders
ninvaders

The enemies determination down enactment by line, and you’ve got to sprout them earlier they get excessively close. It’s basic, it’s fast, and it sucked maine in.

Want to dive deeper? Explore different classics similar bastet (Terminal Tetris), nsnake (Terminal Snake), and moon-buggy (Side-scrolling ASCII car jumper). They’re amazingly addictive. And let’s beryllium real—sometimes it’s amusive to retrieve that your terminal isn’t conscionable for fixing things. It’s for breaking precocious scores, too.

3 Dug Through Linux Easter Eggs Just to See What Was Hiding

Linux has a clump of weird, fun, and often pointless commands that beryllium purely due to the fact that idiosyncratic thought they should. Here’s what they really do.

factor 1337

This breaks down a fig into its premier factors. In this case, 1337 = 7 × 191.

cal 9 1752

This volition amusement the calendar for September 1752. Historically, 11 days were skipped during the power to the Gregorian calendar. On astir Linux systems today, you’ll request to instal ncal to spot this properly.

shuf -n1 /usr/share/dict/words

Randomly picks a connection from the strategy dictionary. Great for password inspiration, task names, oregon existential confusion. Some of the much ridiculous ones necessitate a speedy install:

sudo apt instal luck cowsay
fortune | cowsay

This combo spits retired a fortune-cookie-style quote, past wraps it successful a code bubble coming from an ASCII cow.

sudo apt instal sl
sl

Mistype ls arsenic sl? Instead of a “command not found,” you get a speeding ASCII bid crossed your screen. (It stands for "Steam Locomotive.")

And if you privation thing adjacent bigger than a azygous Easter egg, an full simulated retro net is waiting for you.

2 Explored Telehack: A Retro Internet Time Machine

Sometimes you stumble into thing that feels similar uncovering a concealed level of the internet. Telehack is simply a simulated 1980s–1990s-style net you tin research straight from your terminal oregon browser. You tin link done Telnet similar this:

telnet telehack.com

Or you tin conscionable unfastened telehack.com successful immoderate modern browser. Inside, you’ll find vintage-style Unix commands, old-school games, and a full web of simulated hosts to poke around. It's packed with hidden jokes, throwback utilities similar cowsay, and retro games similar 2048 and zork.

You tin adjacent tally starwars wrong Telehack to ticker a text-based Star Wars animation wrong the network. It's chaotic, nostalgic, and weirdly beautiful. And champion of all, it reminds you however overmuch quality computing utilized to have.

1 Launched a Full Web Browser Through SSH

I wanted to spot if I could motorboat a afloat web browser from 1 Linux instrumentality and person it unfastened connected another. To propulsion that off, I needed to get X11 forwarding acceptable up first. Luckily, it’s usually elemental connected astir systems—you conscionable person to cheque a mates of settings. First, marque definite X11 forwarding is enabled connected your SSH server. You’ll request to edit the SSH server configuration file:

sudo nano /etc/ssh/sshd_config

Find (or add) the line:

X11Forwarding yes

Then restart the SSH service:

sudo systemctl restart ssh

On your section machine, you’ll request an X11 server moving if you’re utilizing Windows (like Xming oregon VcXsrv). On Linux, it’s already baked in.

Now link using:

ssh -X username@remote_server_ip

Once logged in, immoderate GUI programme you motorboat volition guardant its model backmost to your machine. I wanted to spot if I could motorboat a GUI browser remotely and person it look connected my section desktop. Firefox gave maine trouble, but erstwhile I ran:

x-www-browser

Opera popped up—not connected the VM’s screen, but close connected my section display. x-www-browser opens immoderate your strategy has acceptable arsenic the default browser. One important happening to cognize is that due to the fact that you’re moving the existent browser process connected the distant machine, immoderate bookmarks you save, past you generate, oregon settings you alteration volition beryllium stored connected the distant system, not your section one.

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Linux isn’t conscionable a system—it’s a playground. These experiments weren’t businesslike oregon useful. But they made maine laugh, taught maine thing weird, and reminded maine that with Linux, you’re successful control-even if each you bash with it is summon ASCII cows, fend disconnected pixel aliens, oregon get mislaid successful a retro net simulation.