So I've read a lot but am still confused. is BASH specifically Unix while shell, terminal, commandline are all 'generic terms'? For example, if I say "shell", it is not yet determined that if I'm specifically referring to Linux shell or MacOS shell or some other operating system's shell right? on the other hand, if I say BASH, then I'm only talking about Unix. right? Also very in-depth explanation of the relations and slightest differences between all of them would be appreciated.
2 Answers
A terminal is the software application on your computer that takes inputs and shows the output.
People usually but incorrectly refer to the terminal and shell interchangeably. The actual definition defines the shell as the command-line interpreter, essentially what translates the input you give to the terminal. So the shell is part of the terminal.
Again, the command-line is what interprets your input, also part of the shell+terminal. It's the text input box.
Bash is an example of a shell. You likely have seen it on Linux or Mac computers. Different shells interpret differently.
I typically use the term shell to reference any command line interface, so in Windows I call the DOS prompt the shell, in MacOS and Linux I call bash the shell. Although I don't think the MacOS version of the bash shell works 100% the same as Unix/Linux bash.
Bash stands for Bourne Again Shell and is usually the default shell in Linux systems today, but there are tons of other shells available in Linux like the Korn shell (ksh), Debian Almquist Shell (dash) the Z shell (zsh) and many more.
A comparison of shells can be found here: Comparison of command shells
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