Ever wanted to know the progress of a long running operation? Copying a file, importing a mysql db, etc. Pipe Viewer (pv) is what you need: http://www.ivarch.com/programs/pv.shtml.
It lets you monitor the progress of any piped command and gives you time elapsed, speed, time left, and a progress bar (wget style).
Pipe Viewer dramatically increased my productivity for large scale data processing. In particular, it lets you quickly know whether something will take 5 minutes, or 2 hours, so you can plan accordingly. It's painful watching people try to do this without pv.
It lets you monitor the progress of any piped command and gives you time elapsed, speed, time left, and a progress bar (wget style).
Copy a file:
Import mysql db: More tricks: http://blog.urfix.com/9-tricks-pv-pipe-viewer/edit: To install on OS X just do