# Allow easy file management via command line, for Rstudio and Jupyter environment

**URL:** <https://help.anvilproject.org/t/allow-easy-file-management-via-command-line-for-rstudio-and-jupyter-environment/305>\
**Category:** Feature Requests\
**Created:** [May 20, 2025, 5:24pm UTC](https://help.anvilproject.org/t/allow-easy-file-management-via-command-line-for-rstudio-and-jupyter-environment/305 "2025-05-20T17:24:01Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![truckload](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex027/user_avatar/help.anvilproject.org/truckload/32/154_2.png) [@truckload](https://help.anvilproject.org/u/truckload)\
**Post date:** [May 20, 2025, 5:24pm UTC](https://help.anvilproject.org/t/allow-easy-file-management-via-command-line-for-rstudio-and-jupyter-environment/305/1 "2025-05-20T17:24:01Z")

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Terra allows us to run Rstudio and Jupyter notebooks. It seems to me that the two GUI interfaces are mutually exclusive.

1. If I starts a VM with Rstudio, I don’t have the terminal tab on the menu on the right side. The way I can access the VM file system is to use terminal tab inside the Rstudio. The only problem with using Rstudio terminal inside Terra is, I CANNOT use keystroke to copy & paste. The only way to move the files across different gs location, seem to be via R package AnVILGCP, or MANUALLY TYPE the “gs://…/”. By the way, AnVILGCP does not come as one of the default package for Rstudio environment.

2. If I starts a Jupyter notebooks, I have the terminal tab on the menu on the right side. In the terminal tab, I can use keystroke Ctr+X, Ctr+V, and etc… But Jupyter environment does not allow me to open multiple files on the current VM. The terminal window only allow view one file at a time.

Can we have the terminal tab on for the Rstudio environment?  
Can we allow the Jupyter Notebook to have the open file option on the notebook manu bar?

 ![image](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex027/uploads/anvil/original/1X/5536a967c234f7dcbc9f90fb33db199ffcd44290.png)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![truckload](https://yyz1.discourse-cdn.com/flex027/user_avatar/help.anvilproject.org/truckload/32/154_2.png) [@truckload](https://help.anvilproject.org/u/truckload)\
**Post date:** [May 21, 2025, 7:09pm UTC](https://help.anvilproject.org/t/allow-easy-file-management-via-command-line-for-rstudio-and-jupyter-environment/305/2 "2025-05-21T19:09:40Z")

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After participated in the AnVIL demo session, I was taught a new trick to run bash script in RStudio. I can open a text editor for shell script, and submit the script to terminal.

Also I was told that I can copy and paste in the R terminal tab. The key point is, for different users, in some computer/browser operation system, we may need to use mouse right click to bring up the pop-up menu to facilitate the paste. For me, I cannot use keystroke in the terminal tab, but I can use the pop-up option, like shown in the picture. BTW, I can use keystroke if I am in the file editor, in the console without any issue.

 ![image](https://canada1.discourse-cdn.com/flex027/uploads/anvil/original/1X/04890c7155cb922207ed51e46f04352b0f4e8fe8.png)

Shout out to AnVIL support team to answer my questions.

I have to say, without an editor in Jupyter notebook to allow user to edit their text file, it is a little inconvenient.