You may also find something like this useful to tweak the terminal behaviour, especially the arrow keys thingy.
(to put in ~/.bashrc)
Code:
# ls aliases
alias ll="ls -hl"
alias la="ls -Ah"
alias l="ls -CF"
alias cls="clear;ls"
#alias rm="rm -i" #safer, potentially annoying rm
###### use arrow keys to complete commands ala Octave ##
bind '"\e[A": history-search-backward'
bind '"\e[B": history-search-forward'
HISTSIZE=2000
export HISTCONTROL=erasedups # no duplicate entries
shopt -s histappend # append to history, don't overwrite it
# Save and reload the history after each command finishes
export PROMPT_COMMAND="history -a; history -r; $PROMPT_COMMAND"