Apple's Terminal app is a direct interface to OS X's bash shell — part of its UNIX underpinnings. When you open it, Terminal presents you with a white text screen, logged in with your OS X user account by default. Terminal is a versatile command line system that comes with every Mac computer. Here's how to open Terminal on a Mac, with a few commands you can use. The terminal app is in the Utilities folder—which is found the Applications folder. The BSD UNIX command we'll be using is open. Below is the manual page ('man' for short), shown. Double-click the “Utilities” folder to open it. Inside, you will find Terminal. Double-click the Terminal.app icon and the Terminal will open. Keep the Terminal in Your Dock for Faster Access. After launching Terminal, if you’d like to quickly access it again in the future, you can choose to keep its icon in your Dock. Just right-click.

Terminal User Guide

Each window in Terminal represents an instance of a shell process. The window contains a prompt that indicates you can enter a command. The prompt you see depends on your Terminal and shell preferences, but it often includes the name of the host you’re logged in to, your current working folder, your user name, and a prompt symbol. For example, if a user named michael is using the default zsh shell, the prompt appears as:

This indicates that the user named michael is logged in to a computer named MacBook-Pro, and the current folder is his home folder, indicated by the tilde (~).

Open Terminal

On your Mac, do one of the following:

Click the Launchpad icon in the Dock, type Terminal in the search field, then click Terminal.
In the Finder , open the /Applications/Utilities folder, then double-click Terminal.

Quit Terminal

In the Terminal app on your Mac, choose Terminal > Quit Terminal.

Quit a shell session

In the Terminal app on your Mac, in the window running the shell process you want to quit, type exit, then press Return.

This ensures that commands actively running in the shell are closed. If anything’s still in progress, a dialog appears.

Mac Launch App From Terminal

If you want to change the shell exit behavior, see Change Profiles Shell preferences.

See alsoApple Support article: Use zsh as the default shell on your MacExecute commands and run tools in Terminal on MacChange the default shell in Terminal on MacOpen new Terminal windows and tabs on MacUse profiles to change the look of Terminal windows on MacApple Developer website: Command Line Primer

When users configure files on the Mac OS platform, sometimes they need to configure some files in the MAC terminal. At this time, they need to open app applications in the terminal with commands. However, many users do not use terminal commands. Xiaobian provides a tutorial for you to open app applications under the terminal.

Open the terminal and input open / applications / xxx (application name). App, for example, openiTunesInput: open / applications/ iTunes.app (note that you need a space after open and then enter the slash /)

Mac command to open application in terminal

from:http://macosx.com/forums/howto-faqs/29520-how-launch-application-terminal.html

The command is simply open (which can also be used for opening directories). The most basic example of launching an application:

open /path/to/some.app

More complex possibilities also exist:

open “/Volumes/Macintosh HD/foo.txt”

opens the document in the default application for its type (as determined by LaunchServices).

open /Applications/

Mac Terminal Application

opens that directory in the Finder.

open -a /Applications/TextEdit.app “/Volumes/Macintosh HD/foo.txt”

Open Terminal On Mac

opens the document in the application specified (in this case, TextEdit).

open -e “/Volumes/Macintosh HD/foo.txt”

opens the document in TextEdit (the -e option specifies TextEdit).

Os Launch Application From Terminal

open http://www.apple.com/

opens the URL in the default browser (lynx, naturally *wink*)

open “file://localhost/Volumes/Macintosh HD/foo.txt”

Mac Launch App Via Terminal

opens the document in the default application for its type (as determined by LaunchServices).

open “file://localhost/Volumes/Macintosh HD/Applications/”

Mac Terminal Launch App

opens that directory in the Finder.