What does this command do? Know before you run it

The command explainer breaks a terminal command into its parts and says what each one does, in plain English. It warns you about the things that cause real trouble, such as deleting whole folders, running a script straight from the internet, or giving a program full control of your computer. It runs in your browser and nothing is sent anywhere. It is free.

How to use it, step by step

1. Copy the command you want to check, from a guide, a forum or a chat.
2. Paste it into the terminal window above, after the $ sign.
3. Read the summary at the top. Blue means nothing looks risky, yellow means be careful, red means stop.
4. Read what each part does, then decide whether to run it.

What it warns about

• Deleting files and folders for good, such as rm -rf or Remove-Item -Recurse.
• Running a script straight from the internet, such as curl ... | bash or iwr ... | iex.
• Administrator power with sudo, and permission changes like chmod 777.
• Hidden or encoded commands, disk wipes, and Git commands that throw work away.

Which commands it knows

The everyday commands on Mac, Linux and Windows: files and folders, searching, downloading, archives, Git, npm, Python, Docker, SSH, package managers, PowerShell and the Snowkit Shell commands. When it meets a program it does not know, it tells you so instead of guessing.

Privacy

Commands often contain file paths, server names or keys. Everything you paste stays in this tab and is never uploaded.

Questions

Does it run the command?

No. It only reads it. Nothing is run, on this page or on your computer.

If it says nothing looks risky, is it safe?

Not always. It catches the common dangers, but any command runs with your permissions. Make sure it does what you expect, and only run commands from sources you trust.