In Computing, a command is a directive to a computer program acting as an interpreter of some kind, in order to perform a specific task. Most commonly a command is a directive to some kind of command line interface, such as a shell.

Specifically, the term command is used in imperative programming computer languages. These languages are called this, because statements in these languages are usually written in a manner similar to the imperative mood used in many natural languages. If one views a statement in an imperative languages as being like a sentence in a natural language, then a command is generally like a verb in such a language.

Many programs allow specially formatted arguments, known as flags, which modify the default behaviour of the command, while further s.

=Examples=

Here are some commands given to a Unix or Unix-like operating system:

Cd (DOS / Unix Command) /home/pete This cd command changes the user s place in the directory tree from their current position to the directory /home/pete.

echo hello This echo command prints the text hello out to the standard output stream, which, in this case, will just print the text out on the screen

Ls -ltr Filesystem Hierarchy Standard This ls command lists files in the directory /bin, also listing all the files in long format (the flag -l), sorted by time (the flag -t), and in reverse order (the flag -r).

=See also=