Linux知识：为什么要用字符~来表示home目录

On Unix-like operating systems (including BSD, GNU/Linux and Mac OS X), tilde often indicates the current user's home directory: for example, if the current user's home directory is 

/home/bloggsj

,
then 

cd

, 

cd
~

, 

cd
/home/bloggsj

 or 

cd
$HOME

 are equivalent. This practice derives from the Lear-Siegler ADM-3A terminal in common use during the 1970s, which happened to have the tilde symbol and the word "Home" (for moving the cursor to the upper left) on the same key.





Photo of Lear-Siegler ADM-3A keyboard you can find on this site.



This terminal is also the source of shortcuts used in the 

vim

 editor: h, j, k, l for
left, down, up, right.