Okay Here I go. I'm new to Linux. I installed a OS on my lap top and a VMware Virtualization copy on my desk top. When I use the CAT command from the terminal I get the message: No such file or directory. I have a file on my desktop named story that I want to read. At my prompt I typed cat desktop/story. this should display the content of story. But instead it gives the message: (No such file or directory). It does the same on both the OS(desktop) and Desktop (virtualization)

Thanks
Family

linux/unix is case sensitive, so probably you need to type DESKTOP instead of desktop.
Furthermore you need to learn about the directory structure on linux to be able to find a directory (like DESKTOP in your case) or a file (like story).
Whay kind of OS did you install?

It would help if you told us which of the many Linux desktops you are using (or if you don't know, at least the name of your distribution) because different desktops handle their shortcuts in different ways. But usually the desktop directory is called Desktop, not desktop. Linux is case-sensitive.

@Pan64: I don't think it's likely to be DESKTOP. I've never seen a directory with a name like that.

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So probably Desktop. at least on my ubuntu (and in general, using Gnome).

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Just change my-file to actual file name

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Might also be better to use less rather than cat, in case it is more than a screenful of text.

The problem was as stated. I just needed to Cap the (D). Use Desktop instead of desktop.

Thank you guys for helping me with this problem!!

Family

OK, mark it as solved. Then if anyone else has the same problem, your thread will jump out at him.

Yes, please mark it as solved. Probably offtopic, but I have an additonal remark:
Is not really correct: the terminal did respond (definitely), but the response was not what you want. Next time (and in general) please try to understand that message (this time: No such file or directory). Actually this was the correct response to the command you entered.

That's quite a difficult concept for a newbie to understand. Because Windows error messages are usually not very informative, users get accustomed to the idea that an error message simply means that something or other went wrong.

@Family. Linux error messages are usually very informative indeed, so it is worth reading the message carefully. In most cases it will tell you exactly what you did wrong; some error messages even tell you what to do to put it right. In this case, the message made it clear that it was either the filename or the directory name that did not correspond to anything the cat command could find. That usually means the name was wrongly spelled.

If the command had been wrong, it would have said "cat: command not found".