Command line interface is also the most powerful and at times the most usable interface (in a lot of cases you simply can not do certain things in the GUI, and UI that prevents you from doing something is by definition less usable).
Given the choice between GUI and command line to achieve a task I would always choose command line way. Command line takes a while to understand and use effectively. So yes there is initial cost to reach certain proficiency, but then new world of possibilities opens and you become freakishly effective and powerful in expressing yourself and telling computer what to do, so much so that resorting to GUI (clicking on pictures) becomes hopelessly frustrating most of the time.
There is a hierarchy of skills needed to be effective in the CLI:
1. Learn to touch type at decent speed
2. Learn advanced text editor (really this comes down to Vim/Emacs, either one of them will serve your for the rest of your life).
3. Learn general purpose tools to do basic filesystem things (manipulate files, traverse directories etc).
4. Learn general purpose tools to transform structured text to arbitrary "shape". Things like sed, awk are considered advanced here, but simpler things like cut, tr, colrm, paste etc are often powerful enough and sufficient to achieve the task.
5. Learn to search for information. Learn find command, learn grep (ack/ag), learn regular expressions (amplifying the power of your sed/awk scripts).
6. Learn more specialized tools for specific problems
7. Learn a scripting language of your choice and stick with it. Python, Perl or Ruby are great choices but some are better suited for certain tasks or areas of specialization.
Note that any UNIX distro shipped in the last 10 years has all of these tools pre-installed. All you need is to spend some time practicing. Some things like touch typing and advanced editor may take longer time because of muscle memory involved, but basics of simpler tools can be learned in a few minutes to hours.
And of course while doing any of this, you will be interacting with your shell, so learn its basic and some advanced features.
After all this, you are really a master of your data. Finding, extracting, slicing, presenting data etc become trivial chores.
Given the choice between GUI and command line to achieve a task I would always choose command line way. Command line takes a while to understand and use effectively. So yes there is initial cost to reach certain proficiency, but then new world of possibilities opens and you become freakishly effective and powerful in expressing yourself and telling computer what to do, so much so that resorting to GUI (clicking on pictures) becomes hopelessly frustrating most of the time.
There is a hierarchy of skills needed to be effective in the CLI:
1. Learn to touch type at decent speed
2. Learn advanced text editor (really this comes down to Vim/Emacs, either one of them will serve your for the rest of your life).
3. Learn general purpose tools to do basic filesystem things (manipulate files, traverse directories etc).
4. Learn general purpose tools to transform structured text to arbitrary "shape". Things like sed, awk are considered advanced here, but simpler things like cut, tr, colrm, paste etc are often powerful enough and sufficient to achieve the task.
5. Learn to search for information. Learn find command, learn grep (ack/ag), learn regular expressions (amplifying the power of your sed/awk scripts).
6. Learn more specialized tools for specific problems
7. Learn a scripting language of your choice and stick with it. Python, Perl or Ruby are great choices but some are better suited for certain tasks or areas of specialization.
Note that any UNIX distro shipped in the last 10 years has all of these tools pre-installed. All you need is to spend some time practicing. Some things like touch typing and advanced editor may take longer time because of muscle memory involved, but basics of simpler tools can be learned in a few minutes to hours.
And of course while doing any of this, you will be interacting with your shell, so learn its basic and some advanced features.
After all this, you are really a master of your data. Finding, extracting, slicing, presenting data etc become trivial chores.