this post was submitted on 13 Sep 2025
89 points (88.0% liked)
Selfhosted
60451 readers
935 users here now
A place to share alternatives to popular online services that can be self-hosted without giving up privacy or locking you into a service you don't control.
Rules:
-
Be civil.
-
No spam.
-
Posts are to be related to self-hosting.
-
Don't duplicate the full text of your blog or readme if you're providing a link.
-
Submission headline should match the article title.
-
No trolling.
-
Promotion posts require active participation, with an account that is at least 30 days old. F/LOSS without a paywall has exceptions, with requirements. See the rules link for details.
Resources:
- selfh.st Newsletter and index of selfhosted software and apps
- awesome-selfhosted software
- awesome-sysadmin resources
- Self-Hosted Podcast from Jupiter Broadcasting
Any issues on the community? Report it using the report flag.
Questions? DM the mods!
founded 3 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
cut --helpandman cutcan teach you more than anyone here.But: "|" takes the output of the former command, and uses it as input for the latter. So it's like copying the output of "echo [...]", executing "cut -d '/' -f 6", and pasting it into that. Then copy the output of "cut", execute "base64 -d" and paste it there. Except the pipe ("|") automates that on one line.
And yes, cut takes a string (so a list of characters, for example the url), splits it at what -d specifies (eg. cut -d '/' splits at "/"), so it now internally has a list of strings, "https:", "", "link.sfchronicle.com", "external", 41488169.38548", "aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuaG90ZG9nYmlsbHMuY29tL2hhbWJ1cmdlci1tb2xkcy9idXJnZXItZG9nLW1vbGQ_c2lkPTY4MTNkMTljYzM0ZWJjZTE4NDA1ZGVjYSZzcz1QJnN0X3JpZD1udWxsJnV0bV9zb3VyY2U9bmV3c2xldHRlciZ1dG1fbWVkaXVtPWVtYWlsJnV0bV90ZXJtPWJyaWVmaW5nJnV0bV9jYW1wYWlnbj1zZmNfYml0ZWN1cmlvdXM" and "6813d19cc34ebce18405decaB7ef84e41", and from that list outputs whatever is specified by -f (so eg. -f 6 means the 6th of those strings. And -f 2-3 means the 2nd to 3rd string. And -5 means everything up to and including the fifth, and 3- means everything after and including the third).
But all of that is explained better in the manpage (man cut). And the best way to learn is to just fuck around. So
echo "t es t str i n g, 1" | cut ...and try various arguments.