zshall
(1)
Name
zshall - man page
Synopsis
Please see following description for synopsis
Description
User Commands ZSHALL(1)
NAME
zshall - the Z shell meta-man page
OVERVIEW
Because zsh contains many features, the zsh manual has been
split into a number of sections. This manual page includes
all the separate manual pages in the following order:
zshroadmap Informal introduction to the manual
zshmisc Anything not fitting into the other sections
zshexpn Zsh command and parameter expansion
zshparam Zsh parameters
zshoptions Zsh options
zshbuiltins Zsh built-in functions
zshzle Zsh command line editing
zshcompwid Zsh completion widgets
zshcompsys Zsh completion system
zshcompctl Zsh completion control
zshmodules Zsh loadable modules
zshcalsys Zsh built-in calendar functions
zshtcpsys Zsh built-in TCP functions
zshzftpsys Zsh built-in FTP client
zshcontrib Additional zsh functions and utilities
DESCRIPTION
Zsh is a UNIX command interpreter (shell) usable as an
interactive login shell and as a shell script command pro-
cessor. Of the standard shells, zsh most closely resembles
ksh but includes many enhancements. Zsh has command line
editing, builtin spelling correction, programmable command
completion, shell functions (with autoloading), a history
mechanism, and a host of other features.
AUTHOR
Zsh was originally written by Paul Falstad <pf@zsh.org>.
Zsh is now maintained by the members of the zsh-workers
mailing list <zsh-workers@zsh.org>. The development is cur-
rently coordinated by Peter Stephenson <pws@zsh.org>. The
coordinator can be contacted at <coordinator@zsh.org>, but
matters relating to the code should generally go to the
mailing list.
AVAILABILITY
Zsh is available from the following anonymous FTP sites.
These mirror sites are kept frequently up to date. The
sites marked with (H) may be mirroring ftp.cs.elte.hu
instead of the primary site.
Primary site
ftp://ftp.zsh.org/pub/
http://www.zsh.org/pub/
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Australia
ftp://ftp.zsh.org/pub/
http://www.zsh.org/pub/
http://mirror.dejanseo.com.au/pub/zsh/
Hungary
ftp://ftp.cs.elte.hu/pub/zsh/
http://www.cs.elte.hu/pub/zsh/
The up-to-date source code is available via anonymous
CVS and Git from Sourceforge. See http://source-
forge.net/projects/zsh/ for details. A summary of
instructions for the CVS and Git archives can be found
at http://zsh.sourceforget.net/.
MAILING LISTS
Zsh has 3 mailing lists:
<zsh-announce@zsh.org>
Announcements about releases, major changes in the
shell and the monthly posting of the Zsh FAQ. (moder-
ated)
<zsh-users@zsh.org>
User discussions.
<zsh-workers@zsh.org>
Hacking, development, bug reports and patches.
To subscribe or unsubscribe, send mail to the associated
administrative address for the mailing list.
<zsh-announce-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-users-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-workers-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-announce-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-users-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-workers-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
YOU ONLY NEED TO JOIN ONE OF THE MAILING LISTS AS THEY ARE
NESTED. All submissions to zsh-announce are automatically
forwarded to zsh-users. All submissions to zsh-users are
automatically forwarded to zsh-workers.
If you have problems subscribing/unsubscribing to any of the
mailing lists, send mail to <listmaster@zsh.org>. The mail-
ing lists are maintained by Karsten Thygesen
<karthy@kom.auc.dk>.
The mailing lists are archived; the archives can be accessed
via the administrative addresses listed above. There is
also a hypertext archive, maintained by Geoff Wing
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<gcw@zsh.org>, available at http://www.zsh.org/mla/.
THE ZSH FAQ
Zsh has a list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), main-
tained by Peter Stephenson <pws@zsh.org>. It is regularly
posted to the newsgroup comp.unix.shell and the zsh-announce
mailing list. The latest version can be found at any of the
Zsh FTP sites, or at http://www.zsh.org/FAQ/. The contact
address for FAQ-related matters is <faqmaster@zsh.org>.
THE ZSH WEB PAGE
Zsh has a web page which is located at http://www.zsh.org/.
This is maintained by Karsten Thygesen <karthy@zsh.org>, of
SunSITE Denmark. The contact address for web-related mat-
ters is <webmaster@zsh.org>.
THE ZSH USERGUIDE
A userguide is currently in preparation. It is intended to
complement the manual, with explanations and hints on issues
where the manual can be cabbalistic, hierographic, or down-
right mystifying (for example, the word `hierographic' does
not exist). It can be viewed in its current state at
http://zsh.sourceforge.net/Guide/. At the time of writing,
chapters dealing with startup files and their contents and
the new completion system were essentially complete.
THE ZSH WIKI
A `wiki' website for zsh has been created at http://www.zsh-
wiki.org/. This is a site which can be added to and modi-
fied directly by users without any special permission. You
can add your own zsh tips and configurations.
INVOCATION
The following flags are interpreted by the shell when
invoked to determine where the shell will read commands
from:
-c Take the first argument as a command to execute, rather
than reading commands from a script or standard input.
If any further arguments are given, the first one is
assigned to $0, rather than being used as a positional
parameter.
-i Force shell to be interactive. It is still possible to
specify a script to execute.
-s Force shell to read commands from the standard input.
If the -s flag is not present and an argument is given,
the first argument is taken to be the pathname of a
script to execute.
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If there are any remaining arguments after option process-
ing, and neither of the options -c or -s was supplied, the
first argument is taken as the file name of a script con-
taining shell commands to be executed. If the option
PATH_SCRIPT is set, and the file name does not contain a
directory path (i.e. there is no `/' in the name), first the
current directory and then the command path given by the
variable PATH are searched for the script. If the option is
not set or the file name contains a `/' it is used directly.
After the first one or two arguments have been appropriated
as described above, the remaining arguments are assigned to
the positional parameters.
For further options, which are common to invocation and the
set builtin, see zshoptions(1).
Options may be specified by name using the -o option. -o
acts like a single-letter option, but takes a following
string as the option name. For example,
zsh -x -o shwordsplit scr
runs the script scr, setting the XTRACE option by the corre-
sponding letter `-x' and the SH_WORD_SPLIT option by name.
Options may be turned off by name by using +o instead of -o.
-o can be stacked up with preceding single-letter options,
so for example `-xo shwordsplit' or `-xoshwordsplit' is
equivalent to `-x -o shwordsplit'.
Options may also be specified by name in GNU long option
style, `--option-name'. When this is done, `-' characters
in the option name are permitted: they are translated into
`_', and thus ignored. So, for example, `zsh
--sh-word-split' invokes zsh with the SH_WORD_SPLIT option
turned on. Like other option syntaxes, options can be
turned off by replacing the initial `-' with a `+'; thus
`+-sh-word-split' is equivalent to `--no-sh-word-split'.
Unlike other option syntaxes, GNU-style long options cannot
be stacked with any other options, so for example
`-x-shwordsplit' is an error, rather than being treated like
`-x --shwordsplit'.
The special GNU-style option `--version' is handled; it
sends to standard output the shell's version information,
then exits successfully. `--help' is also handled; it sends
to standard output a list of options that can be used when
invoking the shell, then exits successfully.
Option processing may be finished, allowing following argu-
ments that start with `-' or `+' to be treated as normal
arguments, in two ways. Firstly, a lone `-' (or `+') as an
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argument by itself ends option processing. Secondly, a spe-
cial option `--' (or `+-'), which may be specified on its
own (which is the standard POSIX usage) or may be stacked
with preceding options (so `-x-' is equivalent to `-x --').
Options are not permitted to be stacked after `--' (so
`-x-f' is an error), but note the GNU-style option form dis-
cussed above, where `--shwordsplit' is permitted and does
not end option processing.
Except when the sh/ksh emulation single-letter options are
in effect, the option `-b' (or `+b') ends option processing.
`-b' is like `--', except that further single-letter options
can be stacked after the `-b' and will take effect as nor-
mal.
COMPATIBILITY
Zsh tries to emulate sh or ksh when it is invoked as sh or
ksh respectively; more precisely, it looks at the first let-
ter of the name by which it was invoked, excluding any ini-
tial `r' (assumed to stand for `restricted'), and if that is
`s' or `k' it will emulate sh or ksh. Furthermore, if
invoked as su (which happens on certain systems when the
shell is executed by the su command), the shell will try to
find an alternative name from the SHELL environment variable
and perform emulation based on that.
In sh and ksh compatibility modes the following parameters
are not special and not initialized by the shell: ARGC,
argv, cdpath, fignore, fpath, HISTCHARS, mailpath, MANPATH,
manpath, path, prompt, PROMPT, PROMPT2, PROMPT3, PROMPT4,
psvar, status, watch.
The usual zsh startup/shutdown scripts are not executed.
Login shells source /etc/profile followed by $HOME/.profile.
If the ENV environment variable is set on invocation, $ENV
is sourced after the profile scripts. The value of ENV is
subjected to parameter expansion, command substitution, and
arithmetic expansion before being interpreted as a pathname.
Note that the PRIVILEGED option also affects the execution
of startup files.
The following options are set if the shell is invoked as sh
or ksh: NO_BAD_PATTERN, NO_BANG_HIST, NO_BG_NICE, NO_EQUALS,
NO_FUNCTION_ARGZERO, GLOB_SUBST, NO_GLOBAL_EXPORT, NO_HUP,
INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS, KSH_ARRAYS, NO_MULTIOS, NO_NOMATCH,
NO_NOTIFY, POSIX_BUILTINS, NO_PROMPT_PERCENT,
RM_STAR_SILENT, SH_FILE_EXPANSION, SH_GLOB, SH_OPTION_LET-
TERS, SH_WORD_SPLIT. Additionally the BSD_ECHO and
IGNORE_BRACES options are set if zsh is invoked as sh.
Also, the KSH_OPTION_PRINT, LOCAL_OPTIONS, PROMPT_BANG,
PROMPT_SUBST and SINGLE_LINE_ZLE options are set if zsh is
invoked as ksh.
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RESTRICTED SHELL
When the basename of the command used to invoke zsh starts
with the letter `r' or the `-r' command line option is sup-
plied at invocation, the shell becomes restricted. Emula-
tion mode is determined after stripping the letter `r' from
the invocation name. The following are disabled in
restricted mode:
o changing directories with the cd builtin
o changing or unsetting the PATH, path, MODULE_PATH, mod-
ule_path, SHELL, HISTFILE, HISTSIZE, GID, EGID, UID,
EUID, USERNAME, LD_LIBRARY_PATH, LD_AOUT_LIBRARY_PATH,
LD_PRELOAD and LD_AOUT_PRELOAD parameters
o specifying command names containing /
o specifying command pathnames using hash
o redirecting output to files
o using the exec builtin command to replace the shell
with another command
o using jobs -Z to overwrite the shell process' argument
and environment space
o using the ARGV0 parameter to override argv[0] for
external commands
o turning off restricted mode with set +r or unsetopt
RESTRICTED
These restrictions are enforced after processing the startup
files. The startup files should set up PATH to point to a
directory of commands which can be safely invoked in the
restricted environment. They may also add further restric-
tions by disabling selected builtins.
Restricted mode can also be activated any time by setting
the RESTRICTED option. This immediately enables all the
restrictions described above even if the shell still has not
processed all startup files.
STARTUP/SHUTDOWN FILES
Commands are first read from /etc/zshenv; this cannot be
overridden. Subsequent behaviour is modified by the RCS and
GLOBAL_RCS options; the former affects all startup files,
while the second only affects global startup files (those
shown here with an path starting with a /). If one of the
options is unset at any point, any subsequent startup
file(s) of the corresponding type will not be read. It is
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also possible for a file in $ZDOTDIR to re-enable
GLOBAL_RCS. Both RCS and GLOBAL_RCS are set by default.
Commands are then read from $ZDOTDIR/.zshenv. If the shell
is a login shell, commands are read from /etc/zprofile and
then $ZDOTDIR/.zprofile. Then, if the shell is interactive,
commands are read from /etc/zshrc and then $ZDOTDIR/.zshrc.
Finally, if the shell is a login shell, /etc/zlogin and
$ZDOTDIR/.zlogin are read.
When a login shell exits, the files $ZDOTDIR/.zlogout and
then /etc/zlogout are read. This happens with either an
explicit exit via the exit or logout commands, or an
implicit exit by reading end-of-file from the terminal.
However, if the shell terminates due to exec'ing another
process, the logout files are not read. These are also
affected by the RCS and GLOBAL_RCS options. Note also that
the RCS option affects the saving of history files, i.e. if
RCS is unset when the shell exits, no history file will be
saved.
If ZDOTDIR is unset, HOME is used instead. Files listed
above as being in /etc may be in another directory, depend-
ing on the installation.
As /etc/zshenv is run for all instances of zsh, it is impor-
tant that it be kept as small as possible. In particular,
it is a good idea to put code that does not need to be run
for every single shell behind a test of the form `if [[ -o
rcs ]]; then ...' so that it will not be executed when zsh
is invoked with the `-f' option.
Any of these files may be pre-compiled with the zcompile
builtin command (see zshbuiltins(1)). If a compiled file
exists (named for the original file plus the .zwc extension)
and it is newer than the original file, the compiled file
will be used instead.
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NAME
zshroadmap - informal introduction to the zsh manual
The Zsh Manual, like the shell itself, is large and often
complicated. This section of the manual provides some
pointers to areas of the shell that are likely to be of par-
ticular interest to new users, and indicates where in the
rest of the manual the documentation is to be found.
WHEN THE SHELL STARTS
When it starts, the shell reads commands from various files.
These can be created or edited to customize the shell. See
the section Startup/Shutdown Files in zsh(1).
If no personal initialization files exist for the current
user, a function is run to help you change some of the most
common settings. It won't appear if your administrator has
disabled the zsh/newuser module. The function is designed
to be self-explanatory. You can run it by hand with
`autoload -Uz zsh-newuser-install; zsh-newuser-install -f'.
See also the section User Configuration Functions in zshcon-
trib(1).
INTERACTIVE USE
Interaction with the shell uses the builtin Zsh Line Editor,
ZLE. This is described in detail in zshzle(1).
The first decision a user must make is whether to use the
Emacs or Vi editing mode as the keys for editing are sub-
stantially different. Emacs editing mode is probably more
natural for beginners and can be selected explicitly with
the command bindkey -e.
A history mechanism for retrieving previously typed lines
(most simply with the Up or Down arrow keys) is available;
note that, unlike other shells, zsh will not save these
lines when the shell exits unless you set appropriate vari-
ables, and the number of history lines retained by default
is quite small (30 lines). See the description of the shell
variables (referred to in the documentation as parameters)
HISTFILE, HISTSIZE and SAVEHIST in zshparam(1).
The shell now supports the UTF-8 character set (and also
others if supported by the operating system). This is
(mostly) handled transparently by the shell, but the degree
of support in terminal emulators is variable. There is some
discussion of this in the shell FAQ, http://zsh.dot-
src.org/FAQ/ . Note in particular that for combining char-
acters to be handled the option COMBINING_CHARS needs to be
set. Because the shell is now more sensitive to the defini-
tion of the character set, note that if you are upgrading
from an older version of the shell you should ensure that
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the appropriate variable, either LANG (to affect all aspects
of the shell's operation) or LC_CTYPE (to affect only the
handling of character sets) is set to an appropriate value.
This is true even if you are using a single-byte character
set including extensions of ASCII such as ISO-8859-1 or
ISO-8859-15. See the description of LC_CTYPE in zsh-
param(1).
Completion
Completion is a feature present in many shells. It allows
the user to type only a part (usually the prefix) of a word
and have the shell fill in the rest. The completion system
in zsh is programmable. For example, the shell can be set
to complete email addresses in arguments to the mail command
from your ~/.abook/addressbook; usernames, hostnames, and
even remote paths in arguments to scp, and so on. Anything
that can be written in or glued together with zsh can be the
source of what the line editor offers as possible comple-
tions.
Zsh has two completion systems, an old, so called compctl
completion (named after the builtin command that serves as
its complete and only user interface), and a new one,
referred to as compsys, organized as library of builtin and
user-defined functions. The two systems differ in their
interface for specifying the completion behavior. The new
system is more customizable and is supplied with completions
for many commonly used commands; it is therefore to be pre-
ferred.
The completion system must be enabled explicitly when the
shell starts. For more information see zshcompsys(1).
Extending the line editor
Apart from completion, the line editor is highly extensible
by means of shell functions. Some useful functions are pro-
vided with the shell; they provide facilities such as:
insert-composed-char
composing characters not found on the keyboard
match-words-by-style
configuring what the line editor considers a word when
moving or deleting by word
history-beginning-search-backward-end, etc.
alternative ways of searching the shell history
replace-string, replace-pattern
functions for replacing strings or patterns globally in
the command line
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edit-command-line
edit the command line with an external editor.
See the section `ZLE Functions' in zshcontrib(1) for
descriptions of these.
OPTIONS
The shell has a large number of options for changing its be-
haviour. These cover all aspects of the shell; browsing the
full documentation is the only good way to become acquainted
with the many possibilities. See zshoptions(1).
PATTERN MATCHING
The shell has a rich set of patterns which are available for
file matching (described in the documentation as `filename
generation' and also known for historical reasons as `glob-
bing') and for use when programming. These are described in
the section `Filename Generation' in zshexpn(1).
Of particular interest are the following patterns that are
not commonly supported by other systems of pattern matching:
** for matching over multiple directories
~, ^ the ability to exclude patterns from matching when the
EXTENDED_GLOB option is set
(...)
glob qualifiers, included in parentheses at the end of
the pattern, which select files by type (such as direc-
tories) or attribute (such as size).
GENERAL COMMENTS ON SYNTAX
Although the syntax of zsh is in ways similar to the Korn
shell, and therefore more remotely to the original UNIX
shell, the Bourne shell, its default behaviour does not
entirely correspond to those shells. General shell syntax
is introduced in the section `Shell Grammar' in zshmisc(1).
One commonly encountered difference is that variables sub-
stituted onto the command line are not split into words.
See the description of the shell option SH_WORD_SPLIT in the
section `Parameter Expansion' in zshexpn(1). In zsh, you
can either explicitly request the splitting (e.g. ${=foo})
or use an array when you want a variable to expand to more
than one word. See the section `Array Parameters' in zsh-
param(1).
PROGRAMMING
The most convenient way of adding enhancements to the shell
is typically by writing a shell function and arranging for
it to be autoloaded. Functions are described in the section
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`Functions' in zshmisc(1). Users changing from the C shell
and its relatives should notice that aliases are less used
in zsh as they don't perform argument substitution, only
simple text replacement.
A few general functions, other than those for the line edi-
tor described above, are provided with the shell and are
described in zshcontrib(1). Features include:
promptinit
a prompt theme system for changing prompts easily, see
the section `Prompt Themes'
zsh-mime-setup
a MIME-handling system which dispatches commands
according to the suffix of a file as done by graphical
file managers
zcalc
a calculator
zargs
a version of xargs that makes the find command redun-
dant
zmv a command for renaming files by means of shell pat-
terns.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
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NAME
zshmisc - everything and then some
SIMPLE COMMANDS & PIPELINES
A simple command is a sequence of optional parameter assign-
ments followed by blank-separated words, with optional redi-
rections interspersed. The first word is the command to be
executed, and the remaining words, if any, are arguments to
the command. If a command name is given, the parameter
assignments modify the environment of the command when it is
executed. The value of a simple command is its exit status,
or 128 plus the signal number if terminated by a signal.
For example,
echo foo
is a simple command with arguments.
A pipeline is either a simple command, or a sequence of two
or more simple commands where each command is separated from
the next by `|' or `|&'. Where commands are separated by
`|', the standard output of the first command is connected
to the standard input of the next. `|&' is shorthand for
`2>&1 |', which connects both the standard output and the
standard error of the command to the standard input of the
next. The value of a pipeline is the value of the last com-
mand, unless the pipeline is preceded by `!' in which case
the value is the logical inverse of the value of the last
command. For example,
echo foo | sed 's/foo/bar/'
is a pipeline, where the output (`foo' plus a newline) of
the first command will be passed to the input of the second.
If a pipeline is preceded by `coproc', it is executed as a
coprocess; a two-way pipe is established between it and the
parent shell. The shell can read from or write to the
coprocess by means of the `>&p' and `<&p' redirection opera-
tors or with `print -p' and `read -p'. A pipeline cannot be
preceded by both `coproc' and `!'. If job control is
active, the coprocess can be treated in other than input and
output as an ordinary background job.
A sublist is either a single pipeline, or a sequence of two
or more pipelines separated by `&&' or `||'. If two pipe-
lines are separated by `&&', the second pipeline is executed
only if the first succeeds (returns a zero status). If two
pipelines are separated by `||', the second is executed only
if the first fails (returns a nonzero status). Both opera-
tors have equal precedence and are left associative. The
value of the sublist is the value of the last pipeline
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executed. For example,
dmesg | grep panic && print yes
is a sublist consisting of two pipelines, the second just a
simple command which will be executed if and only if the
grep command returns a zero status. If it does not, the
value of the sublist is that return status, else it is the
status returned by the print (almost certainly zero).
A list is a sequence of zero or more sublists, in which each
sublist is terminated by `;', `&', `&|', `&!', or a newline.
This terminator may optionally be omitted from the last sub-
list in the list when the list appears as a complex command
inside `(...)' or `{...}'. When a sublist is terminated by
`;' or newline, the shell waits for it to finish before exe-
cuting the next sublist. If a sublist is terminated by a
`&', `&|', or `&!', the shell executes the last pipeline in
it in the background, and does not wait for it to finish
(note the difference from other shells which execute the
whole sublist in the background). A backgrounded pipeline
returns a status of zero.
More generally, a list can be seen as a set of any shell
commands whatsoever, including the complex commands below;
this is implied wherever the word `list' appears in later
descriptions. For example, the commands in a shell function
form a special sort of list.
PRECOMMAND MODIFIERS
A simple command may be preceded by a precommand modifier,
which will alter how the command is interpreted. These mod-
ifiers are shell builtin commands with the exception of
nocorrect which is a reserved word.
- The command is executed with a `-' prepended to its
argv[0] string.
builtin
The command word is taken to be the name of a builtin
command, rather than a shell function or external com-
mand.
command [ -pvV ]
The command word is taken to be the name of an external
command, rather than a shell function or builtin. If
the POSIX_BUILTINS option is set, builtins will also be
executed but certain special properties of them are
suppressed. The -p flag causes a default path to be
searched instead of that in $path. With the -v flag,
command is similar to whence and with -V, it is equiva-
lent to whence -v.
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exec [ -cl ] [ -a argv0 ]
The following command together with any arguments is
run in place of the current process, rather than as a
sub-process. The shell does not fork and is replaced.
The shell does not invoke TRAPEXIT, nor does it source
zlogout files. The options are provided for compati-
bility with other shells.
The -c option clears the environment.
The -l option is equivalent to the - precommand modi-
fier, to treat the replacement command as a login
shell; the command is executed with a - prepended to
its argv[0] string. This flag has no effect if used
together with the -a option.
The -a option is used to specify explicitly the argv[0]
string (the name of the command as seen by the process
itself) to be used by the replacement command and is
directly equivalent to setting a value for the ARGV0
environment variable.
nocorrect
Spelling correction is not done on any of the words.
This must appear before any other precommand modifier,
as it is interpreted immediately, before any parsing is
done. It has no effect in non-interactive shells.
noglob
Filename generation (globbing) is not performed on any
of the words.
COMPLEX COMMANDS
A complex command in zsh is one of the following:
if list then list [ elif list then list ] ... [ else list ]
fi
The if list is executed, and if it returns a zero exit
status, the then list is executed. Otherwise, the elif
list is executed and if its status is zero, the then
list is executed. If each elif list returns nonzero
status, the else list is executed.
for name ... [ in word ... ] term do list done
where term is at least one newline or ;. Expand the
list of words, and set the parameter name to each of
them in turn, executing list each time. If the in word
is omitted, use the positional parameters instead of
the words.
More than one parameter name can appear before the list
of words. If N names are given, then on each execution
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of the loop the next N words are assigned to the corre-
sponding parameters. If there are more names than
remaining words, the remaining parameters are each set
to the empty string. Execution of the loop ends when
there is no remaining word to assign to the first name.
It is only possible for in to appear as the first name
in the list, else it will be treated as marking the end
of the list.
for (( [expr1] ; [expr2] ; [expr3] )) do list done
The arithmetic expression expr1 is evaluated first (see
the section `Arithmetic Evaluation'). The arithmetic
expression expr2 is repeatedly evaluated until it eval-
uates to zero and when non-zero, list is executed and
the arithmetic expression expr3 evaluated. If any
expression is omitted, then it behaves as if it evalu-
ated to 1.
while list do list done
Execute the do list as long as the while list returns a
zero exit status.
until list do list done
Execute the do list as long as until list returns a
nonzero exit status.
repeat word do list done
word is expanded and treated as an arithmetic expres-
sion, which must evaluate to a number n. list is then
executed n times.
The repeat syntax is disabled by default when the shell
starts in a mode emulating another shell. It can be
enabled with the command `enable -r repeat'
... esac
case word in [ [(] pattern [ | pattern ] ... ) list
(;;|;&|;|) ]
Execute the list associated with the first pattern that
matches word, if any. The form of the patterns is the
same as that used for filename generation. See the
section `Filename Generation'.
If the list that is executed is terminated with ;&
rather than ;;, the following list is also executed.
The rule for the terminator of the following list ;;,
;& or ;| is applied unless the esac is reached.
If the list that is executed is terminated with ;| the
shell continues to scan the patterns looking for the
next match, executing the corresponding list, and
applying the rule for the corresponding terminator ;;,
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;& or ;|. Note that word is not re-expanded; all
applicable patterns are tested with the same word.
select name [ in word ... term ] do list done
where term is one or more newline or ; to terminate the
words. Print the set of words, each preceded by a num-
ber. If the in word is omitted, use the positional
parameters. The PROMPT3 prompt is printed and a line
is read from the line editor if the shell is interac-
tive and that is active, or else standard input. If
this line consists of the number of one of the listed
words, then the parameter name is set to the word cor-
responding to this number. If this line is empty, the
selection list is printed again. Otherwise, the value
of the parameter name is set to null. The contents of
the line read from standard input is saved in the
parameter REPLY. list is executed for each selection
until a break or end-of-file is encountered.
( list )
Execute list in a subshell. Traps set by the trap
builtin are reset to their default values while execut-
ing list.
{ list }
Execute list.
{ try-list } always { always-list }
First execute try-list. Regardless of errors, or
break, continue, or return commands encountered within
try-list, execute always-list. Execution then contin-
ues from the result of the execution of try-list; in
other words, any error, or break, continue, or return
command is treated in the normal way, as if always-list
were not present. The two chunks of code are referred
to as the `try block' and the `always block'.
Optional newlines or semicolons may appear after the
always; note, however, that they may not appear between
the preceding closing brace and the always.
An `error' in this context is a condition such as a
syntax error which causes the shell to abort execution
of the current function, script, or list. Syntax
errors encountered while the shell is parsing the code
do not cause the always-list to be executed. For exam-
ple, an erroneously constructed if block in try-list
would cause the shell to abort during parsing, so that
always-list would not be executed, while an erroneous
substitution such as ${*foo*} would cause a run-time
error, after which always-list would be executed.
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An error condition can be tested and reset with the
special integer variable TRY_BLOCK_ERROR. Outside an
always-list the value is irrelevant, but it is ini-
tialised to -1. Inside always-list, the value is 1 if
an error occurred in the try-list, else 0. If
TRY_BLOCK_ERROR is set to 0 during the always-list, the
error condition caused by the try-list is reset, and
shell execution continues normally after the end of
always-list. Altering the value during the try-list is
not useful (unless this forms part of an enclosing
always block).
Regardless of TRY_BLOCK_ERROR, after the end of
always-list the normal shell status $? is the value
returned from always-list. This will be non-zero if
there was an error, even if TRY_BLOCK_ERROR was set to
zero.
The following executes the given code, ignoring any
errors it causes. This is an alternative to the usual
convention of protecting code by executing it in a sub-
shell.
{
# code which may cause an error
} always {
# This code is executed regardless of the error.
(( TRY_BLOCK_ERROR = 0 ))
}
# The error condition has been reset.
An exit command (or a return command executed at the
outermost function level of a script) encountered in
try-list does not cause the execution of always-list.
Instead, the shell exits immediately after any EXIT
trap has been executed.
function word ... [ () ] [ term ] { list }
word ... () [ term ] { list }
word ... () [ term ] command
where term is one or more newline or ;. Define a func-
tion which is referenced by any one of word. Normally,
only one word is provided; multiple words are usually
only useful for setting traps. The body of the func-
tion is the list between the { and }. See the section
`Functions'.
If the option SH_GLOB is set for compatibility with
other shells, then whitespace may appear between
between the left and right parentheses when there is a
single word; otherwise, the parentheses will be
treated as forming a globbing pattern in that case.
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time [ pipeline ]
The pipeline is executed, and timing statistics are
reported on the standard error in the form specified by
the TIMEFMT parameter. If pipeline is omitted, print
statistics about the shell process and its children.
[[ exp ]]
Evaluates the conditional expression exp and return a
zero exit status if it is true. See the section `Con-
ditional Expressions' for a description of exp.
ALTERNATE FORMS FOR COMPLEX COMMANDS
Many of zsh's complex commands have alternate forms. These
are non-standard and are likely not to be obvious even to
seasoned shell programmers; they should not be used anywhere
that portability of shell code is a concern.
The short versions below only work if sublist is of the form
`{ list }' or if the SHORT_LOOPS option is set. For the if,
while and until commands, in both these cases the test part
of the loop must also be suitably delimited, such as by `[[
... ]]' or `(( ... ))', else the end of the test will not be
recognized. For the for, repeat, case and select commands
no such special form for the arguments is necessary, but the
other condition (the special form of sublist or use of the
SHORT_LOOPS option) still applies.
if list { list } [ elif list { list } ] ... [ else { list }
]
An alternate form of if. The rules mean that
if [[ -o ignorebraces ]] {
print yes
}
works, but
if true { # Does not work!
print yes
}
does not, since the test is not suitably delimited.
if list sublist
A short form of the alternate `if'. The same limita-
tions on the form of list apply as for the previous
form.
for name ... ( word ... ) sublist
A short form of for.
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for name ... [ in word ... ] term sublist
where term is at least one newline or ;. Another short
form of for.
for (( [expr1] ; [expr2] ; [expr3] )) sublist
A short form of the arithmetic for command.
foreach name ... ( word ... ) list end
Another form of for.
while list { list }
An alternative form of while. Note the limitations on
the form of list mentioned above.
until list { list }
An alternative form of until. Note the limitations on
the form of list mentioned above.
repeat word sublist
This is a short form of repeat.
... }
case word { [ [(] pattern [ | pattern ] ... ) list
(;;|;&|;|) ]
An alternative form of case.
select name [ in word term ] sublist
where term is at least one newline or ;. A short form
of select.
RESERVED WORDS
The following words are recognized as reserved words when
used as the first word of a command unless quoted or dis-
abled using disable -r:
do done esac then elif else fi for case if while function
repeat time until select coproc nocorrect foreach end ! [[ {
}
Additionally, `}' is recognized in any position if neither
the IGNORE_BRACES option nor the IGNORE_CLOSE_BRACES option
is set.
ERRORS
Certain errors are treated as fatal by the shell: in an
interactive shell, they cause control to return to the com-
mand line, and in a non-interactive shell they cause the
shell to be aborted. In older versions of zsh, a non-inter-
active shell running a script would not abort completely,
but would resume execution at the next command to be read
from the script, skipping the remainder of any functions or
shell constructs such as loops or conditions; this somewhat
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illogical behaviour can be recovered by setting the option
CONTINUE_ON_ERROR.
Fatal errors found in non-interactive shells include:
Failure to parse shell options passed when invoking the
shell
Failure to change options with the set builtin
Parse errors of all sorts, including failures to parse
mathematical expressions
Failures to set or modify variable behaviour with typeset,
local, declare, export, integer, float
Execution of incorrectly positioned loop control structures
(continue, break)
Attempts to use regular expression with no regular expres-
sion
module available
Disallowed operations when the RESTRICTED options is set
Failure to create a pipe needed for a pipeline
Failure to create a multio
Failure to autoload a module needed for a declared shell
feature
Errors creating command or process substitutions
Syntax errors in glob qualifiers
File generation errors where not caught by the option
BAD_PATTERN
All bad patterns used for matching within case statements
File generation failures where not caused by NO_MATCH or
All file generation errors where the pattern was used to
create a
multio
Memory errors where detected by the shell
Invalid subscripts to shell variables
Attempts to assign read-only variables
type
Logical errors with variables such as assignment to the
wrong
Use of invalid variable names
Errors in variable substitution syntax
Failure to convert characters in $'...' expressions
similar options
If the POSIX_BUILTINS option is set, more errors associated
with shell builtin commands are treated as fatal, as speci-
fied by the POSIX standard.
COMMENTS
In non-interactive shells, or in interactive shells with the
INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS option set, a word beginning with the
third character of the histchars parameter (`#' by default)
causes that word and all the following characters up to a
newline to be ignored.
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ALIASING
Every token in the shell input is checked to see if there is
an alias defined for it. If so, it is replaced by the text
of the alias if it is in command position (if it could be
the first word of a simple command), or if the alias is
global. If the text ends with a space, the next word in the
shell input is treated as though it were in command position
for purposes of alias expansion. An alias is defined using
the alias builtin; global aliases may be defined using the
-g option to that builtin.
Alias expansion is done on the shell input before any other
expansion except history expansion. Therefore, if an alias
is defined for the word foo, alias expansion may be avoided
by quoting part of the word, e.g. \foo. Any form of quoting
works, although there is nothing to prevent an alias being
defined for the quoted form such as \foo as well. For use
with completion, which would remove an initial backslash
followed by a character that isn't special, it may be more
convenient to quote the word by starting with a single
quote, i.e. 'foo; completion will automatically add the
trailing single quote.
There is a commonly encountered problem with aliases illus-
trated by the following code:
alias echobar='echo bar'; echobar
This prints a message that the command echobar could not be
found. This happens because aliases are expanded when the
code is read in; the entire line is read in one go, so that
when echobar is executed it is too late to expand the newly
defined alias. This is often a problem in shell scripts,
functions, and code executed with `source' or `.'. Conse-
quently, use of functions rather than aliases is recommended
in non-interactive code.
Note also the unhelpful interaction of aliases and function
definitions:
alias func='noglob func'
func() {
echo Do something with $*
}
Because aliases are expanded in function definitions, this
causes the following command to be executed:
noglob func() {
echo Do something with $*
}
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which defines noglob as well as func as functions with the
body given. To avoid this, either quote the name func or
use the alternative function definition form `function
func'. Ensuring the alias is defined after the function
works but is problematic if the code fragment might be
re-executed.
QUOTING
A character may be quoted (that is, made to stand for
itself) by preceding it with a `\'. `\' followed by a new-
line is ignored.
A string enclosed between `$'' and `'' is processed the same
way as the string arguments of the print builtin, and the
resulting string is considered to be entirely quoted. A
literal `'' character can be included in the string by using
the `\'' escape.
All characters enclosed between a pair of single quotes ('')
that is not preceded by a `$' are quoted. A single quote
cannot appear within single quotes unless the option
RC_QUOTES is set, in which case a pair of single quotes are
turned into a single quote. For example,
print ''''
outputs nothing apart from a newline if RC_QUOTES is not
set, but one single quote if it is set.
Inside double quotes (""), parameter and command substitu-
tion occur, and `\' quotes the characters `\', ``', `"', and
`$'.
REDIRECTION
If a command is followed by & and job control is not active,
then the default standard input for the command is the empty
file /dev/null. Otherwise, the environment for the execu-
tion of a command contains the file descriptors of the
invoking shell as modified by input/output specifications.
The following may appear anywhere in a simple command or may
precede or follow a complex command. Expansion occurs
before word or digit is used except as noted below. If the
result of substitution on word produces more than one file-
name, redirection occurs for each separate filename in turn.
< word
Open file word for reading as standard input.
<> word
Open file word for reading and writing as standard
input. If the file does not exist then it is created.
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> word
Open file word for writing as standard output. If the
file does not exist then it is created. If the file
exists, and the CLOBBER option is unset, this causes an
error; otherwise, it is truncated to zero length.
>| word
>! word
Same as >, except that the file is truncated to zero
length if it exists, even if CLOBBER is unset.
>> word
Open file word for writing in append mode as standard
output. If the file does not exist, and the CLOBBER
option is unset, this causes an error; otherwise, the
file is created.
>>| word
>>! word
Same as >>, except that the file is created if it does
not exist, even if CLOBBER is unset.
<<[-] word
The shell input is read up to a line that is the same
as word, or to an end-of-file. No parameter expansion,
command substitution or filename generation is per-
formed on word. The resulting document, called a
here-document, becomes the standard input.
If any character of word is quoted with single or dou-
ble quotes or a `\', no interpretation is placed upon
the characters of the document. Otherwise, parameter
and command substitution occurs, `\' followed by a new-
line is removed, and `\' must be used to quote the
characters `\', `$', ``' and the first character of
word.
Note that word itself does not undergo shell expansion.
Backquotes in word do not have their usual effect;
instead they behave similarly to double quotes, except
that the backquotes themselves are passed through
unchanged. (This information is given for completeness
and it is not recommended that backquotes be used.)
Quotes in the form $'...' have their standard effect of
expanding backslashed references to special characters.
If <<- is used, then all leading tabs are stripped from
word and from the document.
<<< word
Perform shell expansion on word and pass the result to
standard input. This is known as a here-string.
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Compare the use of word in here-documents above, where
word does not undergo shell expansion.
<& number
>& number
The standard input/output is duplicated from file
descriptor number (see dup2(2)).
<& -
>& - Close the standard input/output.
<& p
>& p The input/output from/to the coprocess is moved to the
standard input/output.
>& word
&> word
(Except where `>& word' matches one of the above syn-
taxes; `&>' can always be used to avoid this ambigu-
ity.) Redirects both standard output and standard
error (file descriptor 2) in the manner of `> word'.
Note that this does not have the same effect as `> word
2>&1' in the presence of multios (see the section
below).
>&| word
>&! word
&>| word
&>! word
Redirects both standard output and standard error (file
descriptor 2) in the manner of `>| word'.
>>& word
&>> word
Redirects both standard output and standard error (file
descriptor 2) in the manner of `>> word'.
>>&| word
>>&! word
&>>| word
&>>! word
Redirects both standard output and standard error (file
descriptor 2) in the manner of `>>| word'.
If one of the above is preceded by a digit, then the file
descriptor referred to is that specified by the digit
instead of the default 0 or 1. The order in which redirec-
tions are specified is significant. The shell evaluates
each redirection in terms of the (file descriptor, file)
association at the time of evaluation. For example:
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... 1>fname 2>&1
first associates file descriptor 1 with file fname. It then
associates file descriptor 2 with the file associated with
file descriptor 1 (that is, fname). If the order of redi-
rections were reversed, file descriptor 2 would be associ-
ated with the terminal (assuming file descriptor 1 had been)
and then file descriptor 1 would be associated with file
fname.
The `|&' command separator described in Simple Commands &
Pipelines in zshmisc(1) is a shorthand for `2>&1 |'.
The various forms of process substitution, `<(list)', and
`=(list())' for input and `>(list)' for output, are often
used together with redirection. For example, if word in an
output redirection is of the form `>(list)' then the output
is piped to the command represented by list. See Process
Substitution in zshexpn(1).
OPENING FILE DESCRIPTORS USING PARAMETERS
When the shell is parsing arguments to a command, and the
shell option IGNORE_BRACES is not set, a different form of
redirection is allowed: instead of a digit before the opera-
tor there is a valid shell identifier enclosed in braces.
The shell will open a new file descriptor that is guaranteed
to be at least 10 and set the parameter named by the identi-
fier to the file descriptor opened. No whitespace is
allowed between the closing brace and the redirection char-
acter. For example:
... {myfd}>&1
This opens a new file descriptor that is a duplicate of file
descriptor 1 and sets the parameter myfd to the number of
the file descriptor, which will be at least 10. The new
file descriptor can be written to using the syntax >&$myfd.
The syntax {varid}>&-, for example {myfd}>&-, may be used to
close a file descriptor opened in this fashion. Note that
the parameter given by varid must previously be set to a
file descriptor in this case.
It is an error to open or close a file descriptor in this
fashion when the parameter is readonly. However, it is not
an error to read or write a file descriptor using <&$param
or >&$param if param is readonly.
If the option CLOBBER is unset, it is an error to open a
file descriptor using a parameter that is already set to an
open file descriptor previously allocated by this mechanism.
Unsetting the parameter before using it for allocating a
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file descriptor avoids the error.
Note that this mechanism merely allocates or closes a file
descriptor; it does not perform any redirections from or to
it. It is usually convenient to allocate a file descriptor
prior to use as an argument to exec. The syntax does not in
any case work when used around complex commands such as
parenthesised subshells or loops, where the opening brace is
interpreted as part of a command list to be executed in the
current shell.
The following shows a typical sequence of allocation, use,
and closing of a file descriptor:
integer myfd
exec {myfd}>~/logs/mylogfile.txt
print This is a log message. >&$myfd
exec {myfd}>&-
Note that the expansion of the variable in the expression
>&$myfd occurs at the point the redirection is opened. This
is after the expansion of command arguments and after any
redirections to the left on the command line have been pro-
cessed.
MULTIOS
If the user tries to open a file descriptor for writing more
than once, the shell opens the file descriptor as a pipe to
a process that copies its input to all the specified out-
puts, similar to tee, provided the MULTIOS option is set, as
it is by default. Thus:
date >foo >bar
writes the date to two files, named `foo' and `bar'. Note
that a pipe is an implicit redirection; thus
date >foo | cat
writes the date to the file `foo', and also pipes it to cat.
If the MULTIOS option is set, the word after a redirection
operator is also subjected to filename generation (glob-
bing). Thus
: > *
will truncate all files in the current directory, assuming
there's at least one. (Without the MULTIOS option, it would
create an empty file called `*'.) Similarly, you can do
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echo exit 0 >> *.sh
If the user tries to open a file descriptor for reading more
than once, the shell opens the file descriptor as a pipe to
a process that copies all the specified inputs to its output
in the order specified, similar to cat, provided the MULTIOS
option is set. Thus
sort <foo <fubar
or even
sort <f{oo,ubar}
is equivalent to `cat foo fubar | sort'.
Expansion of the redirection argument occurs at the point
the redirection is opened, at the point described above for
the expansion of the variable in >&$myfd.
Note that a pipe is an implicit redirection; thus
cat bar | sort <foo
is equivalent to `cat bar foo | sort' (note the order of the
inputs).
If the MULTIOS option is unset, each redirection replaces
the previous redirection for that file descriptor. However,
all files redirected to are actually opened, so
echo foo > bar > baz
when MULTIOS is unset will truncate bar, and write `foo'
into baz.
There is a problem when an output multio is attached to an
external program. A simple example shows this:
cat file >file1 >file2
cat file1 file2
Here, it is possible that the second `cat' will not display
the full contents of file1 and file2 (i.e. the original con-
tents of file repeated twice).
The reason for this is that the multios are spawned after
the cat process is forked from the parent shell, so the par-
ent shell does not wait for the multios to finish writing
data. This means the command as shown can exit before file1
and file2 are completely written. As a workaround, it is
possible to run the cat process as part of a job in the
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current shell:
{ cat file } >file >file2
Here, the {...} job will pause to wait for both files to be
written.
REDIRECTIONS WITH NO COMMAND
When a simple command consists of one or more redirection
operators and zero or more parameter assignments, but no
command name, zsh can behave in several ways.
If the parameter NULLCMD is not set or the option CSH_NULL-
CMD is set, an error is caused. This is the csh behavior
and CSH_NULLCMD is set by default when emulating csh.
If the option SH_NULLCMD is set, the builtin `:' is inserted
as a command with the given redirections. This is the
default when emulating sh or ksh.
Otherwise, if the parameter NULLCMD is set, its value will
be used as a command with the given redirections. If both
NULLCMD and READNULLCMD are set, then the value of the lat-
ter will be used instead of that of the former when the re-
direction is an input. The default for NULLCMD is `cat' and
for READNULLCMD is `more'. Thus
< file
shows the contents of file on standard output, with paging
if that is a terminal. NULLCMD and READNULLCMD may refer to
shell functions.
COMMAND EXECUTION
If a command name contains no slashes, the shell attempts to
locate it. If there exists a shell function by that name,
the function is invoked as described in the section `Func-
tions'. If there exists a shell builtin by that name, the
builtin is invoked.
Otherwise, the shell searches each element of $path for a
directory containing an executable file by that name. If
the search is unsuccessful, the shell prints an error mes-
sage and returns a nonzero exit status.
If execution fails because the file is not in executable
format, and the file is not a directory, it is assumed to be
a shell script. /bin/sh is spawned to execute it. If the
program is a file beginning with `#!', the remainder of the
first line specifies an interpreter for the program. The
shell will execute the specified interpreter on operating
systems that do not handle this executable format in the
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kernel.
If no external command is found but a function com-
mand_not_found_handler exists the shell executes this func-
tion with all command line arguments. The function should
return status zero if it successfully handled the command,
or non-zero status if it failed. In the latter case the
standard handling is applied: `command not found' is printed
to standard error and the shell exits with status 127. Note
that the handler is executed in a subshell forked to execute
an external command, hence changes to directories, shell
parameters, etc. have no effect on the main shell.
FUNCTIONS
Shell functions are defined with the function reserved word
or the special syntax `funcname ()'. Shell functions are
read in and stored internally. Alias names are resolved
when the function is read. Functions are executed like com-
mands with the arguments passed as positional parameters.
(See the section `Command Execution'.)
Functions execute in the same process as the caller and
share all files and present working directory with the
caller. A trap on EXIT set inside a function is executed
after the function completes in the environment of the
caller.
The return builtin is used to return from function calls.
Function identifiers can be listed with the functions
builtin. Functions can be undefined with the unfunction
builtin.
AUTOLOADING FUNCTIONS
A function can be marked as undefined using the autoload
builtin (or `functions -u' or `typeset -fu'). Such a func-
tion has no body. When the function is first executed, the
shell searches for its definition using the elements of the
fpath variable. Thus to define functions for autoloading, a
typical sequence is:
fpath=(~/myfuncs $fpath)
autoload myfunc1 myfunc2 ...
The usual alias expansion during reading will be suppressed
if the autoload builtin or its equivalent is given the
option -U. This is recommended for the use of functions sup-
plied with the zsh distribution. Note that for functions
precompiled with the zcompile builtin command the flag -U
must be provided when the .zwc file is created, as the cor-
responding information is compiled into the latter.
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For each element in fpath, the shell looks for three possi-
ble files, the newest of which is used to load the defini-
tion for the function:
element.zwc
A file created with the zcompile builtin command, which
is expected to contain the definitions for all func-
tions in the directory named element. The file is
treated in the same manner as a directory containing
files for functions and is searched for the definition
of the function. If the definition is not found, the
search for a definition proceeds with the other two
possibilities described below.
If element already includes a .zwc extension (i.e. the
extension was explicitly given by the user), element is
searched for the definition of the function without
comparing its age to that of other files; in fact,
there does not need to be any directory named element
without the suffix. Thus including an element such as
`/usr/local/funcs.zwc' in fpath will speed up the
search for functions, with the disadvantage that func-
tions included must be explicitly recompiled by hand
before the shell notices any changes.
element/function.zwc
A file created with zcompile, which is expected to con-
tain the definition for function. It may include other
function definitions as well, but those are neither
loaded nor executed; a file found in this way is
searched only for the definition of function.
element/function
A file of zsh command text, taken to be the definition
for function.
In summary, the order of searching is, first, in the parents
of directories in fpath for the newer of either a compiled
directory or a directory in fpath; second, if more than one
of these contains a definition for the function that is
sought, the leftmost in the fpath is chosen; and third,
within a directory, the newer of either a compiled function
or an ordinary function definition is used.
If the KSH_AUTOLOAD option is set, or the file contains only
a simple definition of the function, the file's contents
will be executed. This will normally define the function in
question, but may also perform initialization, which is exe-
cuted in the context of the function execution, and may
therefore define local parameters. It is an error if the
function is not defined by loading the file.
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Otherwise, the function body (with no surrounding `func-
name() {...}') is taken to be the complete contents of the
file. This form allows the file to be used directly as an
executable shell script. If processing of the file results
in the function being re-defined, the function itself is not
re-executed. To force the shell to perform initialization
and then call the function defined, the file should contain
initialization code (which will be executed then discarded)
in addition to a complete function definition (which will be
retained for subsequent calls to the function), and a call
to the shell function, including any arguments, at the end.
For example, suppose the autoload file func contains
func() { print This is func; }
print func is initialized
then `func; func' with KSH_AUTOLOAD set will produce both
messages on the first call, but only the message `This is
func' on the second and subsequent calls. Without
KSH_AUTOLOAD set, it will produce the initialization message
on the first call, and the other message on the second and
subsequent calls.
It is also possible to create a function that is not marked
as autoloaded, but which loads its own definition by search-
ing fpath, by using `autoload -X' within a shell function.
For example, the following are equivalent:
myfunc() {
autoload -X
}
myfunc args...
and
unfunction myfunc # if myfunc was defined
autoload myfunc
myfunc args...
In fact, the functions command outputs `builtin autoload -X'
as the body of an autoloaded function. This is done so that
eval "$(functions)"
produces a reasonable result. A true autoloaded function
can be identified by the presence of the comment `# unde-
fined' in the body, because all comments are discarded from
defined functions.
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To load the definition of an autoloaded function myfunc
without executing myfunc, use:
autoload +X myfunc
ANONYMOUS FUNCTIONS
If no name is given for a function, it is `anonymous' and is
handled specially. Either form of function definition may
be used: a `()' with no preceding name, or a `function' with
an immediately following open brace. The function is exe-
cuted immediately at the point of definition and is not
stored for future use. The function name is set to
`(anon)'.
Arguments to the function may be specified as words follow-
ing the closing brace defining the function, hence if there
are none no arguments (other than $0) are set. This is a
difference from the way other functions are parsed: normal
function definitions may be followed by certain keywords
such as `else' or `fi', which will be treated as arguments
to anonymous functions, so that a newline or semicolon is
needed to force keyword interpretation.
Note also that the argument list of any enclosing script or
function is hidden (as would be the case for any other func-
tion called at this point).
Redirections may be applied to the anonymous function in the
same manner as to a current-shell structure enclosed in
braces. The main use of anonymous functions is to provide a
scope for local variables. This is particularly convenient
in start-up files as these do not provide their own local
variable scope.
For example,
variable=outside
function {
local variable=inside
print "I am $variable with arguments $*"
} this and that
print "I am $variable"
outputs the following:
I am inside with arguments this and that
I am outside
Note that function definitions with arguments that expand to
nothing, for example `name=; function $name { ... }', are
not treated as anonymous functions. Instead, they are
treated as normal function definitions where the definition
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is silently discarded.
SPECIAL FUNCTIONS
Certain functions, if defined, have special meaning to the
shell.
Hook Functions
For the functions below, it is possible to define an array
that has the same name as the function with `_functions'
appended. Any element in such an array is taken as the name
of a function to execute; it is executed in the same context
and with the same arguments as the basic function. For
example, if $chpwd_functions is an array containing the val-
ues `mychpwd', `chpwd_save_dirstack', then the shell
attempts to execute the functions `chpwd', `mychpwd' and
`chpwd_save_dirstack', in that order. Any function that
does not exist is silently ignored. A function found by
this mechanism is referred to elsewhere as a `hook func-
tion'. An error in any function causes subsequent functions
not to be run. Note further that an error in a precmd hook
causes an immediately following periodic function not to run
(though it may run at the next opportunity).
chpwd
Executed whenever the current working directory is
changed.
periodic
If the parameter PERIOD is set, this function is exe-
cuted every $PERIOD seconds, just before a prompt.
Note that if multiple functions are defined using the
array periodic_functions only one period is applied to
the complete set of functions, and the scheduled time
is not reset if the list of functions is altered.
Hence the set of functions is always called together.
precmd
Executed before each prompt. Note that precommand
functions are not re-executed simply because the com-
mand line is redrawn, as happens, for example, when a
notification about an exiting job is displayed.
preexec
Executed just after a command has been read and is
about to be executed. If the history mechanism is
active (and the line was not discarded from the history
buffer), the string that the user typed is passed as
the first argument, otherwise it is an empty string.
The actual command that will be executed (including
expanded aliases) is passed in two different forms: the
second argument is a single-line, size-limited version
of the command (with things like function bodies
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elided); the third argument contains the full text that
is being executed.
zshaddhistory
Executed when a history line has been read interac-
tively, but before it is executed. The sole argument
is the complete history line (so that any terminating
newline will still be present).
If any of the hook functions returns status 1 (or any
non-zero value other than 2, though this is not guaran-
teed for future versions of the shell) the history line
will not be saved, although it lingers in the history
until the next line is executed, allowing you to reuse
or edit it immediately.
If any of the hook functions returns status 2 the his-
tory line will be saved on the internal history list,
but not written to the history file. In case of a con-
flict, the first non-zero status value is taken.
A hook function may call `fc -p ...' to switch the his-
tory context so that the history is saved in a differ-
ent file from the that in the global HISTFILE parame-
ter. This is handled specially: the history context is
automatically restored after the processing of the his-
tory line is finished.
The following example function works with one of the
options INC_APPEND_HISTORY or SHARE_HISTORY set, in
order that the line is written out immediately after
the history entry is added. It first adds the history
line to the normal history with the newline stripped,
which is usually the correct behaviour. Then it
switches the history context so that the line will be
written to a history file in the current directory.
zshaddhistory() {
print -sr -- ${1%%$'\n'}
fc -p .zsh_local_history
}
zshexit
Executed at the point where the main shell is about to
exit normally. This is not called by exiting sub-
shells, nor when the exec precommand modifier is used
before an external command. Also, unlike TRAPEXIT, it
is not called when functions exit.
Trap Functions
The functions below are treated specially but do not have
corresponding hook arrays.
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TRAPNAL
If defined and non-null, this function will be executed
whenever the shell catches a signal SIGNAL, where NAL
is a signal name as specified for the kill builtin.
The signal number will be passed as the first parameter
to the function.
If a function of this form is defined and null, the
shell and processes spawned by it will ignore SIGNAL.
The return status from the function is handled spe-
cially. If it is zero, the signal is assumed to have
been handled, and execution continues normally. Other-
wise, the shell will behave as interrupted except that
the return status of the trap is retained.
Programs terminated by uncaught signals typically
return the status 128 plus the signal number. Hence
the following causes the handler for SIGINT to print a
message, then mimic the usual effect of the signal.
TRAPINT() {
print "Caught SIGINT, aborting."
return $(( 128 + $1 ))
}
The functions TRAPZERR, TRAPDEBUG and TRAPEXIT are
never executed inside other traps.
TRAPDEBUG
If the option DEBUG_BEFORE_CMD is set (as it is by
default), executed before each command; otherwise exe-
cuted after each command. See the description of the
trap builtin in zshbuiltins(1) for details of addi-
tional features provided in debug traps.
TRAPEXIT
Executed when the shell exits, or when the current
function exits if defined inside a function. The value
of $? at the start of execution is the exit status of
the shell or the return status of the function exiting.
TRAPZERR
Executed whenever a command has a non-zero exit status.
However, the function is not executed if the command
occurred in a sublist followed by `&&' or `||'; only
the final command in a sublist of this type causes the
trap to be executed. The function TRAPERR acts the
same as TRAPZERR on systems where there is no SIGERR
(this is the usual case).
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The functions beginning `TRAP' may alternatively be defined
with the trap builtin: this may be preferable for some
uses. Setting a trap with one form removes any trap of the
other form for the same signal; removing a trap in either
form removes all traps for the same signal. The forms
TRAPNAL() {
# code
}
('function traps') and
trap '
# code
' NAL
('list traps') are equivalent in most ways, the exceptions
being the following:
o Function traps have all the properties of normal func-
tions, appearing in the list of functions and being
called with their own function context rather than the
context where the trap was triggered.
o The return status from function traps is special,
whereas a return from a list trap causes the surround-
ing context to return with the given status.
o Function traps are not reset within subshells, in
accordance with zsh behaviour; list traps are reset, in
accordance with POSIX behaviour.
JOBS
If the MONITOR option is set, an interactive shell asso-
ciates a job with each pipeline. It keeps a table of cur-
rent jobs, printed by the jobs command, and assigns them
small integer numbers. When a job is started asynchronously
with `&', the shell prints a line to standard error which
looks like:
[1] 1234
indicating that the job which was started asynchronously was
job number 1 and had one (top-level) process, whose process
ID was 1234.
If a job is started with `&|' or `&!', then that job is
immediately disowned. After startup, it does not have a
place in the job table, and is not subject to the job con-
trol features described here.
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If you are running a job and wish to do something else you
may hit the key ^Z (control-Z) which sends a TSTP signal to
the current job: this key may be redefined by the susp
option of the external stty command. The shell will then
normally indicate that the job has been `suspended', and
print another prompt. You can then manipulate the state of
this job, putting it in the background with the bg command,
or run some other commands and then eventually bring the job
back into the foreground with the foreground command fg. A
^Z takes effect immediately and is like an interrupt in that
pending output and unread input are discarded when it is
typed.
A job being run in the background will suspend if it tries
to read from the terminal.
Note that if the job running in the foreground is a shell
function, then suspending it will have the effect of causing
the shell to fork. This is necessary to separate the func-
tion's state from that of the parent shell performing the
job control, so that the latter can return to the command
line prompt. As a result, even if fg is used to continue
the job the function will no longer be part of the parent
shell, and any variables set by the function will not be
visible in the parent shell. Thus the behaviour is differ-
ent from the case where the function was never suspended.
Zsh is different from many other shells in this regard.
The same behaviour is found when the shell is executing code
as the right hand side of a pipeline or any complex shell
construct such as if, for, etc., in order that the entire
block of code can be managed as a single job. Background
jobs are normally allowed to produce output, but this can be
disabled by giving the command `stty tostop'. If you set
this tty option, then background jobs will suspend when they
try to produce output like they do when they try to read
input.
When a command is suspended and continued later with the fg
or wait builtins, zsh restores tty modes that were in effect
when it was suspended. This (intentionally) does not apply
if the command is continued via `kill -CONT', nor when it is
continued with bg.
There are several ways to refer to jobs in the shell. A job
can be referred to by the process ID of any process of the
job or by one of the following:
%number
The job with the given number.
%string
Any job whose command line begins with string.
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%?string
Any job whose command line contains string.
%% Current job.
%+ Equivalent to `%%'.
%- Previous job.
The shell learns immediately whenever a process changes
state. It normally informs you whenever a job becomes
blocked so that no further progress is possible. If the
NOTIFY option is not set, it waits until just before it
prints a prompt before it informs you. All such notifica-
tions are sent directly to the terminal, not to the standard
output or standard error.
When the monitor mode is on, each background job that com-
pletes triggers any trap set for CHLD.
When you try to leave the shell while jobs are running or
suspended, you will be warned that `You have suspended (run-
ning) jobs'. You may use the jobs command to see what they
are. If you do this or immediately try to exit again, the
shell will not warn you a second time; the suspended jobs
will be terminated, and the running jobs will be sent a
SIGHUP signal, if the HUP option is set.
To avoid having the shell terminate the running jobs, either
use the nohup command (see nohup(1)) or the disown builtin.
SIGNALS
The INT and QUIT signals for an invoked command are ignored
if the command is followed by `&' and the MONITOR option is
not active. The shell itself always ignores the QUIT sig-
nal. Otherwise, signals have the values inherited by the
shell from its parent (but see the TRAPNAL special functions
in the section `Functions').
Certain jobs are run asynchronously by the shell other than
those explicitly put into the background; even in cases
where the shell would usually wait for such jobs, an
explicit exit command or exit due to the option ERR_EXIT
will cause the shell to exit without waiting. Examples of
such asynchronous jobs are process substitution, see the
section PROCESS SUBSTITUTION in the zshexpn(1) manual page,
and the handler processes for multios, see the section MUL-
TIOS in the zshmisc(1) manual page.
ARITHMETIC EVALUATION
The shell can perform integer and floating point arithmetic,
either using the builtin let, or via a substitution of the
form $((...)). For integers, the shell is usually compiled
to use 8-byte precision where this is available, otherwise
precision is 4 bytes. This can be tested, for example, by
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giving the command `print - $(( 12345678901 ))'; if the num-
ber appears unchanged, the precision is at least 8 bytes.
Floating point arithmetic always uses the `double' type with
whatever corresponding precision is provided by the compiler
and the library.
The let builtin command takes arithmetic expressions as
arguments; each is evaluated separately. Since many of the
arithmetic operators, as well as spaces, require quoting, an
alternative form is provided: for any command which begins
with a `((', all the characters until a matching `))' are
treated as a quoted expression and arithmetic expansion per-
formed as for an argument of let. More precisely, `((...))'
is equivalent to `let "..."'. The return status is 0 if the
arithmetic value of the expression is non-zero, 1 if it is
zero, and 2 if an error occurred.
For example, the following statement
(( val = 2 + 1 ))
is equivalent to
let "val = 2 + 1"
both assigning the value 3 to the shell variable val and
returning a zero status.
Integers can be in bases other than 10. A leading `0x' or
`0X' denotes hexadecimal. Integers may also be of the form
`base#n', where base is a decimal number between two and
thirty-six representing the arithmetic base and n is a num-
ber in that base (for example, `16#ff' is 255 in hexadeci-
mal). The base# may also be omitted, in which case base 10
is used. For backwards compatibility the form `[base]n' is
also accepted.
An integer expression or a base given in the form `base#n'
may contain underscores (`_') after the leading digit for
visual guidance; these are ignored in computation. Examples
are 1_000_000 or 0xffff_ffff which are equivalent to 1000000
and 0xffffffff respectively.
It is also possible to specify a base to be used for output
in the form `[#base]', for example `[#16]'. This is used
when outputting arithmetical substitutions or when assigning
to scalar parameters, but an explicitly defined integer or
floating point parameter will not be affected. If an inte-
ger variable is implicitly defined by an arithmetic expres-
sion, any base specified in this way will be set as the
variable's output arithmetic base as if the option `-i base'
to the typeset builtin had been used. The expression has no
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precedence and if it occurs more than once in a mathematical
expression, the last encountered is used. For clarity it is
recommended that it appear at the beginning of an expres-
sion. As an example:
typeset -i 16 y
print $(( [#8] x = 32, y = 32 ))
print $x $y
outputs first `8#40', the rightmost value in the given out-
put base, and then `8#40 16#20', because y has been explic-
itly declared to have output base 16, while x (assuming it
does not already exist) is implicitly typed by the arith-
metic evaluation, where it acquires the output base 8.
If the C_BASES option is set, hexadecimal numbers in the
standard C format, for example 0xFF instead of the usual
`16#FF'. If the option OCTAL_ZEROES is also set (it is not
by default), octal numbers will be treated similarly and
hence appear as `077' instead of `8#77'. This option has no
effect on the output of bases other than hexadecimal and
octal, and these formats are always understood on input.
When an output base is specified using the `[#base]' syntax,
an appropriate base prefix will be output if necessary, so
that the value output is valid syntax for input. If the #
is doubled, for example `[##16]', then no base prefix is
output.
Floating point constants are recognized by the presence of a
decimal point or an exponent. The decimal point may be the
first character of the constant, but the exponent character
e or E may not, as it will be taken for a parameter name.
All numeric parts (before and after the decimal point and in
the exponent) may contain underscores after the leading
digit for visual guidance; these are ignored in computation.
An arithmetic expression uses nearly the same syntax and
associativity of expressions as in C.
In the native mode of operation, the following operators are
supported (listed in decreasing order of precedence):
+ - ! ~ ++ --
unary plus/minus, logical NOT, complement,
{pre,post}{in,de}crement
<< >>
bitwise shift left, right
& bitwise AND
^ bitwise XOR
| bitwise OR
** exponentiation
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* / %
multiplication, division, modulus (remainder)
+ - addition, subtraction
< > <= >=
comparison
== !=
equality and inequality
&& logical AND
|| ^^
logical OR, XOR
? : ternary operator
= += -= *= /= %= &= ^= |= <<= >>= &&= ||= ^^= **=
assignment
, comma operator
The operators `&&', `||', `&&=', and `||=' are short-cir-
cuiting, and only one of the latter two expressions in a
ternary operator is evaluated. Note the precedence of the
bitwise AND, OR, and XOR operators.
With the option C_PRECEDENCES the precedences (but no other
properties) of the operators are altered to be the same as
those in most other languages that support the relevant
operators:
+ - ! ~ ++ --
unary plus/minus, logical NOT, complement,
{pre,post}{in,de}crement
** exponentiation
* / %
multiplication, division, modulus (remainder)
+ - addition, subtraction
<< >>
bitwise shift left, right
< > <= >=
comparison
== !=
equality and inequality
& bitwise AND
^ bitwise XOR
| bitwise OR
&& logical AND
^^ logical XOR
|| logical OR
? : ternary operator
= += -= *= /= %= &= ^= |= <<= >>= &&= ||= ^^= **=
assignment
, comma operator
Note the precedence of exponentiation in both cases is below
that of unary operators, hence `-3**2' evaluates as `9', not
-9. Use parentheses where necessary: `-(3**2)'. This is
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for compatibility with other shells.
Mathematical functions can be called with the syntax
`func(args)', where the function decides if the args is used
as a string or a comma-separated list of arithmetic expres-
sions. The shell currently defines no mathematical functions
by default, but the module zsh/mathfunc may be loaded with
the zmodload builtin to provide standard floating point
mathematical functions.
An expression of the form `##x' where x is any character
sequence such as `a', `^A', or `\M-\C-x' gives the value of
this character and an expression of the form `#foo' gives
the value of the first character of the contents of the
parameter foo. Character values are according to the char-
acter set used in the current locale; for multibyte charac-
ter handling the option MULTIBYTE must be set. Note that
this form is different from `$#foo', a standard parameter
substitution which gives the length of the parameter foo.
`#\' is accepted instead of `##', but its use is deprecated.
Named parameters and subscripted arrays can be referenced by
name within an arithmetic expression without using the
parameter expansion syntax. For example,
((val2 = val1 * 2))
assigns twice the value of $val1 to the parameter named
val2.
An internal integer representation of a named parameter can
be specified with the integer builtin. Arithmetic evalua-
tion is performed on the value of each assignment to a named
parameter declared integer in this manner. Assigning a
floating point number to an integer results in rounding down
to the next integer.
Likewise, floating point numbers can be declared with the
float builtin; there are two types, differing only in their
output format, as described for the typeset builtin. The
output format can be bypassed by using arithmetic substitu-
tion instead of the parameter substitution, i.e. `${float}'
uses the defined format, but `$((float))' uses a generic
floating point format.
Promotion of integer to floating point values is performed
where necessary. In addition, if any operator which
requires an integer (`~', `&', `|', `^', `%', `<<', `>>' and
their equivalents with assignment) is given a floating point
argument, it will be silently rounded down to the next inte-
ger.
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Scalar variables can hold integer or floating point values
at different times; there is no memory of the numeric type
in this case.
If a variable is first assigned in a numeric context without
previously being declared, it will be implicitly typed as
integer or float and retain that type either until the type
is explicitly changed or until the end of the scope. This
can have unforeseen consequences. For example, in the loop
for (( f = 0; f < 1; f += 0.1 )); do
# use $f
done
if f has not already been declared, the first assignment
will cause it to be created as an integer, and consequently
the operation `f += 0.1' will always cause the result to be
truncated to zero, so that the loop will fail. A simple fix
would be to turn the initialization into `f = 0.0'. It is
therefore best to declare numeric variables with explicit
types.
CONDITIONAL EXPRESSIONS
A conditional expression is used with the [[ compound com-
mand to test attributes of files and to compare strings.
Each expression can be constructed from one or more of the
following unary or binary expressions:
-a file
true if file exists.
-b file
true if file exists and is a block special file.
-c file
true if file exists and is a character special file.
-d file
true if file exists and is a directory.
-e file
true if file exists.
-f file
true if file exists and is a regular file.
-g file
true if file exists and has its setgid bit set.
-h file
true if file exists and is a symbolic link.
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-k file
true if file exists and has its sticky bit set.
-n string
true if length of string is non-zero.
-o option
true if option named option is on. option may be a
single character, in which case it is a single letter
option name. (See the section `Specifying Options'.)
-p file
true if file exists and is a FIFO special file (named
pipe).
-r file
true if file exists and is readable by current process.
-s file
true if file exists and has size greater than zero.
-t fd
true if file descriptor number fd is open and associ-
ated with a terminal device. (note: fd is not
optional)
-u file
true if file exists and has its setuid bit set.
-w file
true if file exists and is writable by current process.
-x file
true if file exists and is executable by current
process. If file exists and is a directory, then the
current process has permission to search in the direc-
tory.
-z string
true if length of string is zero.
-L file
true if file exists and is a symbolic link.
-O file
true if file exists and is owned by the effective user
ID of this process.
-G file
true if file exists and its group matches the effective
group ID of this process.
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User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
-S file
true if file exists and is a socket.
-N file
true if file exists and its access time is not newer
than its modification time.
file1 -nt file2
true if file1 exists and is newer than file2.
file1 -ot file2
true if file1 exists and is older than file2.
file1 -ef file2
true if file1 and file2 exist and refer to the same
file.
string = pattern
string == pattern
true if string matches pattern. The `==' form is the
preferred one. The `=' form is for backward compati-
bility and should be considered obsolete.
string != pattern
true if string does not match pattern.
string =~ regexp
true if string matches the regular expression regexp.
If the option RE_MATCH_PCRE is set regexp is tested as
a PCRE regular expression using the zsh/pcre module,
else it is tested as a POSIX extended regular expres-
sion using the zsh/regex module. Upon successful
match, some variables will be updated; no variables are
changed if the matching fails.
If the option BASH_REMATCH is not set the scalar param-
eter MATCH is set to the substring that matched the
pattern and the integer parameters MBEGIN and MEND to
the index of the start and end, respectively, of the
match in string, such that if string is contained in
variable var the expression `${var[$MBEGIN,$MEND]}' is
identical to `$MATCH'. The setting of the option
KSH_ARRAYS is respected. Likewise, the array match is
set to the substrings that matched parenthesised subex-
pressions and the arrays mbegin and mend to the indices
of the start and end positions, respectively, of the
substrings within string. The arrays are not set if
there were no parenthesised subexpresssions. For exam-
ple, if the string `a short string' is matched against
the regular expression `s(...)t', then (assuming the
option KSH_ARRAYS is not set) MATCH, MBEGIN and MEND
are `short', 3 and 7, respectively, while match, mbegin
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User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
and mend are single entry arrays containing the strings
`hor', `4' and `6, respectively.
If the option BASH_REMATCH is set the array
BASH_REMATCH is set to the substring that matched the
pattern followed by the substrings that matched paren-
thesised subexpressions within the pattern.
string1 < string2
true if string1 comes before string2 based on ASCII
value of their characters.
string1 > string2
true if string1 comes after string2 based on ASCII
value of their characters.
exp1 -eq exp2
true if exp1 is numerically equal to exp2. Note that
for purely numeric comparisons use of the ((...))
builtin described in the section `ARITHMETIC EVALUA-
TION' is more convenient than conditional expressions.
exp1 -ne exp2
true if exp1 is numerically not equal to exp2.
exp1 -lt exp2
true if exp1 is numerically less than exp2.
exp1 -gt exp2
true if exp1 is numerically greater than exp2.
exp1 -le exp2
true if exp1 is numerically less than or equal to exp2.
exp1 -ge exp2
true if exp1 is numerically greater than or equal to
exp2.
( exp )
true if exp is true.
! exp
true if exp is false.
exp1 && exp2
true if exp1 and exp2 are both true.
exp1 || exp2
true if either exp1 or exp2 is true.
Normal shell expansion is performed on the file, string and
pattern arguments, but the result of each expansion is
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 35
User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
constrained to be a single word, similar to the effect of
double quotes. Filename generation is not performed on any
form of argument to conditions. However, pattern metachar-
acters are active for the pattern arguments; the patterns
are the same as those used for filename generation, see zsh-
expn(1), but there is no special behaviour of `/' nor ini-
tial dots, and no glob qualifiers are allowed.
In each of the above expressions, if file is of the form
`/dev/fd/n', where n is an integer, then the test applied to
the open file whose descriptor number is n, even if the
underlying system does not support the /dev/fd directory.
In the forms which do numeric comparison, the expressions
exp undergo arithmetic expansion as if they were enclosed in
$((...)).
For example, the following:
[[ ( -f foo || -f bar ) && $report = y* ]] && print File exists.
tests if either file foo or file bar exists, and if so, if
the value of the parameter report begins with `y'; if the
complete condition is true, the message `File exists.' is
printed.
EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES
Prompt sequences undergo a special form of expansion. This
type of expansion is also available using the -P option to
the print builtin.
If the PROMPT_SUBST option is set, the prompt string is
first subjected to parameter expansion, command substitution
and arithmetic expansion. See zshexpn(1).
Certain escape sequences may be recognised in the prompt
string.
If the PROMPT_BANG option is set, a `!' in the prompt is
replaced by the current history event number. A literal `!'
may then be represented as `!!'.
If the PROMPT_PERCENT option is set, certain escape
sequences that start with `%' are expanded. Many escapes
are followed by a single character, although some of these
take an optional integer argument that should appear between
the `%' and the next character of the sequence. More com-
plicated escape sequences are available to provide condi-
tional expansion.
SIMPLE PROMPT ESCAPES
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User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
Special characters
%% A `%'.
%) A `)'.
Login information
%l The line (tty) the user is logged in on, without
`/dev/' prefix. If the name starts with `/dev/tty',
that prefix is stripped.
%M The full machine hostname.
%m The hostname up to the first `.'. An integer may fol-
low the `%' to specify how many components of the host-
name are desired. With a negative integer, trailing
components of the hostname are shown.
%n $USERNAME.
%y The line (tty) the user is logged in on, without
`/dev/' prefix. This does not treat `/dev/tty' names
specially.
Shell state
%# A `#' if the shell is running with privileges, a `%' if
not. Equivalent to `%(!.#.%%)'. The definition of
`privileged', for these purposes, is that either the
effective user ID is zero, or, if POSIX.1e capabilities
are supported, that at least one capability is raised
in either the Effective or Inheritable capability vec-
tors.
%? The return status of the last command executed just
before the prompt.
%_ The status of the parser, i.e. the shell constructs
(like `if' and `for') that have been started on the
command line. If given an integer number that many
strings will be printed; zero or negative or no integer
means print as many as there are. This is most useful
in prompts PS2 for continuation lines and PS4 for
debugging with the XTRACE option; in the latter case it
will also work non-interactively.
%d
/ Current working directory. If an integer follows the
`%', it specifies a number of trailing components of
the current working directory to show; zero means the
whole path. A negative integer specifies leading com-
ponents, i.e. %-1d specifies the first component.
%~ As %d and %/, but if the current working directory
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 37
User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
starts with $HOME, that part is replaced by a `~'. Fur-
thermore, if it has a named directory as its prefix,
that part is replaced by a `~' followed by the name of
the directory, but only if the result is shorter than
the full path; see Dynamic and Static named directories
in zshexpn(1).
%h
%! Current history event number.
%i The line number currently being executed in the script,
sourced file, or shell function given by %N. This is
most useful for debugging as part of $PS4.
%I The line number currently being executed in the file
%x. This is similar to %i, but the line number is
always a line number in the file where the code was
defined, even if the code is a shell function.
%j The number of jobs.
%L The current value of $SHLVL.
%N The name of the script, sourced file, or shell function
that zsh is currently executing, whichever was started
most recently. If there is none, this is equivalent to
the parameter $0. An integer may follow the `%' to
specify a number of trailing path components to show;
zero means the full path. A negative integer specifies
leading components.
%x The name of the file containing the source code cur-
rently being executed. This behaves as %N except that
function and eval command names are not shown, instead
the file where they were defined.
%c
%.
%C Trailing component of the current working directory.
An integer may follow the `%' to get more than one com-
ponent. Unless `%C' is used, tilde contraction is per-
formed first. These are deprecated as %c and %C are
equivalent to %1~ and %1/, respectively, while explicit
positive integers have the same effect as for the lat-
ter two sequences.
Date and time
%D The date in yy-mm-dd format.
%T Current time of day, in 24-hour format.
%t
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User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
%@ Current time of day, in 12-hour, am/pm format.
%* Current time of day in 24-hour format, with seconds.
%w The date in day-dd format.
%W The date in mm/dd/yy format.
%D{string}
string is formatted using the strftime function. See
strftime(3) for more details. Various zsh extensions
provide numbers with no leading zero or space if the
number is a single digit:
%f a day of the month
%K the hour of the day on the 24-hour clock
%L the hour of the day on the 12-hour clock
The GNU extension that a `-' between the % and the for-
mat character causes a leading zero or space to be
stripped is handled directly by the shell for the for-
mat characters d, f, H, k, l, m, M, S and y; any other
format characters are provided to strftime() with any
leading `-', present, so the handling is system depen-
dent. Further GNU extensions are not supported at
present.
Visual effects
%B (%b)
Start (stop) boldface mode.
%E Clear to end of line.
%U (%u)
Start (stop) underline mode.
%S (%s)
Start (stop) standout mode.
%F (%f)
Start (stop) using a different foreground colour, if
supported by the terminal. The colour may be specified
two ways: either as a numeric argument, as normal, or
by a sequence in braces following the %F, for example
%F{red}. In the latter case the values allowed are as
described for the fg zle_highlight attribute; see Char-
acter Highlighting in zshzle(1). This means that
numeric colours are allowed in the second format also.
%K (%k)
Start (stop) using a different bacKground colour. The
syntax is identical to that for %F and %f.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 39
User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
%{...%}
Include a string as a literal escape sequence. The
string within the braces should not change the cursor
position. Brace pairs can nest.
A positive numeric argument between the % and the { is
treated as described for %G below.
%G Within a %{...%} sequence, include a `glitch': that is,
assume that a single character width will be output.
This is useful when outputting characters that other-
wise cannot be correctly handled by the shell, such as
the alternate character set on some terminals. The
characters in question can be included within a %{...%}
sequence together with the appropriate number of %G
sequences to indicate the correct width. An integer
between the `%' and `G' indicates a character width
other than one. Hence %{seq%2G%} outputs seq and
assumes it takes up the width of two standard charac-
ters.
Multiple uses of %G accumulate in the obvious fashion;
the position of the %G is unimportant. Negative inte-
gers are not handled.
Note that when prompt truncation is in use it is advis-
able to divide up output into single characters within
each %{...%} group so that the correct truncation point
can be found.
CONDITIONAL SUBSTRINGS IN PROMPTS
%v The value of the first element of the psvar array
parameter. Following the `%' with an integer gives
that element of the array. Negative integers count
from the end of the array.
%(x.true-text.false-text)
Specifies a ternary expression. The character follow-
ing the x is arbitrary; the same character is used to
separate the text for the `true' result from that for
the `false' result. This separator may not appear in
the true-text, except as part of a %-escape sequence.
A `)' may appear in the false-text as `%)'. true-text
and false-text may both contain arbitrarily-nested
escape sequences, including further ternary expres-
sions.
The left parenthesis may be preceded or followed by a
positive integer n, which defaults to zero. A negative
integer will be multiplied by -1. The test character x
may be any of the following:
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User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
! True if the shell is running with privileges.
# True if the effective uid of the current process
is n.
? True if the exit status of the last command was n.
_ True if at least n shell constructs were started.
C
/ True if the current absolute path has at least n
elements relative to the root directory, hence /
is counted as 0 elements.
c
.
~ True if the current path, with prefix replacement,
has at least n elements relative to the root
directory, hence / is counted as 0 elements.
D True if the month is equal to n (January = 0).
d True if the day of the month is equal to n.
g True if the effective gid of the current process
is n.
j True if the number of jobs is at least n.
L True if the SHLVL parameter is at least n.
l True if at least n characters have already been
printed on the current line.
S True if the SECONDS parameter is at least n.
T True if the time in hours is equal to n.
t True if the time in minutes is equal to n.
v True if the array psvar has at least n elements.
V True if element n of the array psvar is set and
non-empty.
w True if the day of the week is equal to n (Sunday
= 0).
%<string<
%>string>
%[xstring]
Specifies truncation behaviour for the remainder of the
prompt string. The third, deprecated, form is equiva-
lent to `%xstringx', i.e. x may be `<' or `>'. The
numeric argument, which in the third form may appear
immediately after the `[', specifies the maximum per-
mitted length of the various strings that can be dis-
played in the prompt. The string will be displayed in
place of the truncated portion of any string; note this
does not undergo prompt expansion.
The forms with `<' truncate at the left of the string,
and the forms with `>' truncate at the right of the
string. For example, if the current directory is
`/home/pike', the prompt `%8<..<%/' will expand to
`..e/pike'. In this string, the terminating character
(`<', `>' or `]'), or in fact any character, may be
quoted by a preceding `\'; note when using print -P,
however, that this must be doubled as the string is
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 41
User Commands ZSHMISC(1)
also subject to standard print processing, in addition
to any backslashes removed by a double quoted string:
the worst case is therefore `print -P "%<\\\\<<..."'.
If the string is longer than the specified truncation
length, it will appear in full, completely replacing
the truncated string.
The part of the prompt string to be truncated runs to
the end of the string, or to the end of the next
enclosing group of the `%(' construct, or to the next
truncation encountered at the same grouping level (i.e.
truncations inside a `%(' are separate), which ever
comes first. In particular, a truncation with argument
zero (e.g. `%<<') marks the end of the range of the
string to be truncated while turning off truncation
from there on. For example, the prompt '%10<...<%~%<<%#
' will print a truncated representation of the current
directory, followed by a `%' or `#', followed by a
space. Without the `%<<', those two characters would
be included in the string to be truncated.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 42
User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
NAME
zshexpn - zsh expansion and substitution
DESCRIPTION
The following types of expansions are performed in the indi-
cated order in five steps:
History Expansion
This is performed only in interactive shells.
Alias Expansion
Aliases are expanded immediately before the command
line is parsed as explained under Aliasing in zsh-
misc(1).
Process Substitution
Parameter Expansion
Command Substitution
Arithmetic Expansion
Brace Expansion
These five are performed in one step in left-to-right
fashion. After these expansions, all unquoted occur-
rences of the characters `\', `'' and `"' are removed.
Filename Expansion
If the SH_FILE_EXPANSION option is set, the order of
expansion is modified for compatibility with sh and
ksh. In that case filename expansion is performed
immediately after alias expansion, preceding the set of
five expansions mentioned above.
Filename Generation
This expansion, commonly referred to as globbing, is
always done last.
The following sections explain the types of expansion in
detail.
HISTORY EXPANSION
History expansion allows you to use words from previous com-
mand lines in the command line you are typing. This simpli-
fies spelling corrections and the repetition of complicated
commands or arguments.
Immediately before execution, each command is saved in the
history list, the size of which is controlled by the HIST-
SIZE parameter. The one most recent command is always
retained in any case. Each saved command in the history
list is called a history event and is assigned a number,
beginning with 1 (one) when the shell starts up. The his-
tory number that you may see in your prompt (see EXPANSION
OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1)) is the number that is to
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 1
User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
be assigned to the next command.
Overview
A history expansion begins with the first character of the
histchars parameter, which is `!' by default, and may occur
anywhere on the command line; history expansions do not
nest. The `!' can be escaped with `\' or can be enclosed
between a pair of single quotes ('') to suppress its special
meaning. Double quotes will not work for this. Following
this history character is an optional event designator (see
the section `Event Designators') and then an optional word
designator (the section `Word Designators'); if neither of
these designators is present, no history expansion occurs.
Input lines containing history expansions are echoed after
being expanded, but before any other expansions take place
and before the command is executed. It is this expanded
form that is recorded as the history event for later refer-
ences.
By default, a history reference with no event designator
refers to the same event as any preceding history reference
on that command line; if it is the only history reference in
a command, it refers to the previous command. However, if
the option CSH_JUNKIE_HISTORY is set, then every history
reference with no event specification always refers to the
previous command.
For example, `!' is the event designator for the previous
command, so `!!:1' always refers to the first word of the
previous command, and `!!$' always refers to the last word
of the previous command. With CSH_JUNKIE_HISTORY set, then
`!:1' and `!$' function in the same manner as `!!:1' and
`!!$', respectively. Conversely, if CSH_JUNKIE_HISTORY is
unset, then `!:1' and `!$' refer to the first and last
words, respectively, of the same event referenced by the
nearest other history reference preceding them on the cur-
rent command line, or to the previous command if there is no
preceding reference.
The character sequence `^foo^bar' (where `^' is actually the
second character of the histchars parameter) repeats the
last command, replacing the string foo with bar. More pre-
cisely, the sequence `^foo^bar^' is synonymous with
`!!:s^foo^bar^', hence other modifiers (see the section
`Modifiers') may follow the final `^'. In particular,
`^foo^bar^:G' performs a global substitution.
If the shell encounters the character sequence `!"' in the
input, the history mechanism is temporarily disabled until
the current list (see zshmisc(1)) is fully parsed. The `!"'
is removed from the input, and any subsequent `!' characters
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 2
User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
have no special significance.
A less convenient but more comprehensible form of command
history support is provided by the fc builtin.
Event Designators
An event designator is a reference to a command-line entry
in the history list. In the list below, remember that the
initial `!' in each item may be changed to another character
by setting the histchars parameter.
! Start a history expansion, except when followed by a
blank, newline, `=' or `('. If followed immediately by
a word designator (see the section `Word Designators'),
this forms a history reference with no event designator
(see the section `Overview').
!! Refer to the previous command. By itself, this expan-
sion repeats the previous command.
!n Refer to command-line n.
!-n Refer to the current command-line minus n.
!str Refer to the most recent command starting with str.
!?str[?]
Refer to the most recent command containing str. The
trailing `?' is necessary if this reference is to be
followed by a modifier or followed by any text that is
not to be considered part of str.
!# Refer to the current command line typed in so far. The
line is treated as if it were complete up to and
including the word before the one with the `!#' refer-
ence.
!{...}
Insulate a history reference from adjacent characters
(if necessary).
Word Designators
A word designator indicates which word or words of a given
command line are to be included in a history reference. A
`:' usually separates the event specification from the word
designator. It may be omitted only if the word designator
begins with a `^', `$', `*', `-' or `%'. Word designators
include:
0 The first input word (command).
n The nth argument.
^ The first argument. That is, 1.
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User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
$ The last argument.
% The word matched by (the most recent) ?str search.
x-y A range of words; x defaults to 0.
* All the arguments, or a null value if there are none.
x* Abbreviates `x-$'.
x- Like `x*' but omitting word $.
Note that a `%' word designator works only when used in one
of `!%', `!:%' or `!?str?:%', and only when used after a !?
expansion (possibly in an earlier command). Anything else
results in an error, although the error may not be the most
obvious one.
Modifiers
After the optional word designator, you can add a sequence
of one or more of the following modifiers, each preceded by
a `:'. These modifiers also work on the result of filename
generation and parameter expansion, except where noted.
a Turn a file name into an absolute path: prepends the
current directory, if necessary, and resolves any use
of `..' and `.' in the path. Note that the transforma-
tion takes place even if the file or any intervening
directories do not exist.
A As `a', but also resolve use of symbolic links where
possible. Note that resolution of `..' occurs before
resolution of symbolic links. This call is equivalent
to a unless your system has the realpath system call
(modern systems do).
c Resolve a command name into an absolute path by search-
ing the command path given by the PATH variable. This
does not work for commands containing directory parts.
Note also that this does not usually work as a glob
qualifier unless a file of the same name is found in
the current directory.
e Remove all but the part of the filename extension fol-
lowing the `.'; see the definition of the filename
extension in the description of the r modifier below.
Note that according to that definition the result will
be empty if the string ends with a `.'.
h Remove a trailing pathname component, leaving the head.
This works like `dirname'.
l Convert the words to all lowercase.
p Print the new command but do not execute it. Only
works with history expansion.
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User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
q Quote the substituted words, escaping further substitu-
tions. Works with history expansion and parameter
expansion, though for parameters it is only useful if
the resulting text is to be re-evaluated such as by
eval.
Q Remove one level of quotes from the substituted words.
r Remove a filename extension leaving the root name.
Strings with no filename extension are not altered. A
filename extension is a `.' followed by any number of
characters (including zero) that are neither `.' nor
`/' and that continue to the end of the string. For
example, the extension of `foo.orig.c' is `.c', and
`dir.c/foo' has no extension.
s/l/r[/]
Substitute r for l as described below. The substitu-
tion is done only for the first string that matches l.
For arrays and for filename generation, this applies to
each word of the expanded text. See below for further
notes on substitutions.
The forms `gs/l/r' and `s/l/r/:G' perform global sub-
stitution, i.e. substitute every occurrence of r for l.
Note that the g or :G must appear in exactly the posi-
tion shown.
See further notes on this form of substitution below.
& Repeat the previous s substitution. Like s, may be
preceded immediately by a g. In parameter expansion
the & must appear inside braces, and in filename gener-
ation it must be quoted with a backslash.
t Remove all leading pathname components, leaving the
tail. This works like `basename'.
u Convert the words to all uppercase.
x Like q, but break into words at whitespace. Does not
work with parameter expansion.
The s/l/r/ substitution works as follows. By default the
left-hand side of substitutions are not patterns, but char-
acter strings. Any character can be used as the delimiter
in place of `/'. A backslash quotes the delimiter charac-
ter. The character `&', in the right-hand-side r, is
replaced by the text from the left-hand-side l. The `&' can
be quoted with a backslash. A null l uses the previous
string either from the previous l or from the contextual
scan string s from `!?s'. You can omit the rightmost
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 5
User Commands ZSHEXPN(1)
delimiter if a newline immediately follows r; the rightmost
`?' in a context scan can similarly be omitted. Note the
same record of the last l and r is maintained across all
forms of expansion.
Note that if a `&' is used within glob qualifers an extra
backslash is needed as a & is a special character in this
case.
If the option HIST_SUBST_PATTERN is set, l is treated as a
pattern of the usual form described in the section FILENAME
GENERATION below. This can be used in all the places where
modifiers are available; note, however, that in globbing
qualifiers parameter substitution has already taken place,
so parameters in the replacement string should be quoted to
ensure they are replaced at the correct time. Note also
that complicated patterns used in globbing qualifiers may
need the extended glob qualifier notation (#q:s/.../.../) in
order for the shell to recognize the expression as a glob
qualifier. Further, note that bad patterns in the substitu-
tion are not subject to the NO_BAD_PATTERN option so will
cause an error.
When HIST_SUBST_PATTERN is set, l may start with a # to
indicate that the pattern must match at the start of the
string to be substituted, and a % may appear at the start or
after an # to indicate that the pattern must match at the
end of the string to be substituted. The % or # may be
quoted with two backslashes.
For example, the following piece of filename generation code
with the EXTENDED_GLOB option:
print *.c(#q:s/#%(#b)s(*).c/'S${match[1]}.C'/)
takes the expansion of *.c and applies the glob qualifiers
in the (#q...) expression, which consists of a substitution
modifier anchored to the start and end of each word (#%).
This turns on backreferences ((#b)), so that the parenthe-
sised subexpression is available in the replacement string
as ${match[1]}. The replacement string is quoted so that
the parameter is not substituted before the start of file-
name generation.
The following f, F, w and W modifiers work only with parame-
ter expansion and filename generation. They are listed here
to provide a single point of reference for all modifiers.
f Repeats the immediately (without a colon) following
modifier until the resulting word doesn't change any
more.
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F:expr:
Like f, but repeats only n times if the expression expr
evaluates to n. Any character can be used instead of
the `:'; if `(', `[', or `{' is used as the opening
delimiter, the closing delimiter should be ')', `]', or
`}', respectively.
w Makes the immediately following modifier work on each
word in the string.
W:sep:
Like w but words are considered to be the parts of the
string that are separated by sep. Any character can be
used instead of the `:'; opening parentheses are han-
dled specially, see above.
PROCESS SUBSTITUTION
Each part of a command argument that takes the form
`<(list)', `>(list)' or `=(list)' is subject to process sub-
stitution. The expression may be preceded or followed by
other strings except that, to prevent clashes with commonly
occurring strings and patterns, the last form must occur at
the start of a command argument, and the forms are only
expanded when first parsing command or assignment arguments.
Process substitutions may be used following redirection
operators; in this case, the substitution must appear with
no trailing string.
In the case of the < or > forms, the shell runs the commands
in list as a subprocess of the job executing the shell com-
mand line. If the system supports the /dev/fd mechanism,
the command argument is the name of the device file corre-
sponding to a file descriptor; otherwise, if the system sup-
ports named pipes (FIFOs), the command argument will be a
named pipe. If the form with > is selected then writing on
this special file will provide input for list. If < is
used, then the file passed as an argument will be connected
to the output of the list process. For example,
paste <(cut -f1 file1) <(cut -f3 file2) |
tee >(process1) >(process2) >/dev/null
cuts fields 1 and 3 from the files file1 and file2 respec-
tively, pastes the results together, and sends it to the
processes process1 and process2.
If =(...) is used instead of <(...), then the file passed as
an argument will be the name of a temporary file containing
the output of the list process. This may be used instead of
the < form for a program that expects to lseek (see
lseek(2)) on the input file.
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There is an optimisation for substitutions of the form
=(<<<arg), where arg is a single-word argument to the
here-string redirection <<<. This form produces a file name
containing the value of arg after any substitutions have
been performed. This is handled entirely within the current
shell. This is effectively the reverse of the special form
$(<arg) which treats arg as a file name and replaces it with
the file's contents.
The = form is useful as both the /dev/fd and the named pipe
implementation of <(...) have drawbacks. In the former
case, some programmes may automatically close the file
descriptor in question before examining the file on the com-
mand line, particularly if this is necessary for security
reasons such as when the programme is running setuid. In
the second case, if the programme does not actually open the
file, the subshell attempting to read from or write to the
pipe will (in a typical implementation, different operating
systems may have different behaviour) block for ever and
have to be killed explicitly. In both cases, the shell
actually supplies the information using a pipe, so that pro-
grammes that expect to lseek (see lseek(2)) on the file will
not work.
Also note that the previous example can be more compactly
and efficiently written (provided the MULTIOS option is set)
as:
paste <(cut -f1 file1) <(cut -f3 file2) \
> >(process1) > >(process2)
The shell uses pipes instead of FIFOs to implement the lat-
ter two process substitutions in the above example.
There is an additional problem with >(process); when this is
attached to an external command, the parent shell does not
wait for process to finish and hence an immediately follow-
ing command cannot rely on the results being complete. The
problem and solution are the same as described in the sec-
tion MULTIOS in zshmisc(1). Hence in a simplified version
of the example above:
paste <(cut -f1 file1) <(cut -f3 file2) > >(process)
(note that no MULTIOS are involved), process will be run
asynchronously as far as the parent shell is concerned. The
workaround is:
{ paste <(cut -f1 file1) <(cut -f3 file2) } > >(process)
The extra processes here are spawned from the parent shell
which will wait for their completion.
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Another problem arises any time a job with a substitution
that requires a temporary file is disowned by the shell,
including the case where `&!' or `&|' appears at the end of
a command containing a subsitution. In that case the tempo-
rary file will not be cleaned up as the shell no longer has
any memory of the job. A workaround is to use a subshell,
for example,
(mycmd =(myoutput)) &!
as the forked subshell will wait for the command to finish
then remove the temporary file.
A general workaround to ensure a process substitution
endures for an appropriate length of time is to pass it as a
parameter to an anonymous shell function (a piece of shell
code that is run immediately with function scope). For
example, this code:
() {
print File $1:
cat $1
} =(print This be the verse)
outputs something resembling the following
File /tmp/zsh6nU0kS:
This be the verse
The temporary file created by the process substitution will
be deleted when the function exits.
PARAMETER EXPANSION
The character `$' is used to introduce parameter expansions.
See zshparam(1) for a description of parameters, including
arrays, associative arrays, and subscript notation to access
individual array elements.
Note in particular the fact that words of unquoted parame-
ters are not automatically split on whitespace unless the
option SH_WORD_SPLIT is set; see references to this option
below for more details. This is an important difference
from other shells.
In the expansions discussed below that require a pattern,
the form of the pattern is the same as that used for file-
name generation; see the section `Filename Generation'.
Note that these patterns, along with the replacement text of
any substitutions, are themselves subject to parameter
expansion, command substitution, and arithmetic expansion.
In addition to the following operations, the colon modifiers
described in the section `Modifiers' in the section `History
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Expansion' can be applied: for example, ${i:s/foo/bar/}
performs string substitution on the expansion of parameter
$i.
${name}
The value, if any, of the parameter name is substi-
tuted. The braces are required if the expansion is to
be followed by a letter, digit, or underscore that is
not to be interpreted as part of name. In addition,
more complicated forms of substitution usually require
the braces to be present; exceptions, which only apply
if the option KSH_ARRAYS is not set, are a single sub-
script or any colon modifiers appearing after the name,
or any of the characters `^', `=', `~', `#' or `+'
appearing before the name, all of which work with or
without braces.
If name is an array parameter, and the KSH_ARRAYS
option is not set, then the value of each element of
name is substituted, one element per word. Otherwise,
the expansion results in one word only; with
KSH_ARRAYS, this is the first element of an array. No
field splitting is done on the result unless the
SH_WORD_SPLIT option is set. See also the flags = and
s:string:.
${+name}
If name is the name of a set parameter `1' is substi-
tuted, otherwise `0' is substituted.
${name-word}
${name:-word}
If name is set, or in the second form is non-null, then
substitute its value; otherwise substitute word. In
the second form name may be omitted, in which case word
is always substituted.
${name+word}
${name:+word}
If name is set, or in the second form is non-null, then
substitute word; otherwise substitute nothing.
${name=word}
${name:=word}
${name::=word}
In the first form, if name is unset then set it to
word; in the second form, if name is unset or null then
set it to word; and in the third form, unconditionally
set name to word. In all forms, the value of the
parameter is then substituted.
${name?word}
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${name:?word}
In the first form, if name is set, or in the second
form if name is both set and non-null, then substitute
its value; otherwise, print word and exit from the
shell. Interactive shells instead return to the
prompt. If word is omitted, then a standard message is
printed.
In any of the above expressions that test a variable and
substitute an alternate word, note that you can use standard
shell quoting in the word value to selectively override the
splitting done by the SH_WORD_SPLIT option and the = flag,
but not splitting by the s:string: flag.
In the following expressions, when name is an array and the
substitution is not quoted, or if the `(@)' flag or the
name[@] syntax is used, matching and replacement is per-
formed on each array element separately.
${name#pattern}
${name##pattern}
If the pattern matches the beginning of the value of
name, then substitute the value of name with the
matched portion deleted; otherwise, just substitute the
value of name. In the first form, the smallest match-
ing pattern is preferred; in the second form, the
largest matching pattern is preferred.
${name%pattern}
${name%%pattern}
If the pattern matches the end of the value of name,
then substitute the value of name with the matched por-
tion deleted; otherwise, just substitute the value of
name. In the first form, the smallest matching pattern
is preferred; in the second form, the largest matching
pattern is preferred.
${name:#pattern}
If the pattern matches the value of name, then substi-
tute the empty string; otherwise, just substitute the
value of name. If name is an array the matching array
elements are removed (use the `(M)' flag to remove the
non-matched elements).
${name:|arrayname}
If arrayname is the name (N.B., not contents) of an
array variable, then any elements contained in array-
name are removed from the substitution of name. If the
substitution is scalar, either because name is a scalar
variable or the expression is quoted, the elements of
arrayname are instead tested against the entire expres-
sion.
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${name:*arrayname}
Similar to the preceding subsitution, but in the oppo-
site sense, so that entries present in both the origi-
nal substitution and as elements of arrayname are
retained and others removed.
${name:offset}
${name:offset:length}
This syntax gives effects similar to parameter sub-
scripting in the form $name[start,end], but is compati-
ble with other shells; note that both offset and length
are interpreted differently from the components of a
subscript.
If offset is non-negative, then if the variable name is
a scalar substitute the contents starting offset char-
acters from the first character of the string, and if
name is an array substitute elements starting offset
elements from the first element. If length is given,
substitute that many characters or elements, otherwise
the entire rest of the scalar or array.
A positive offset is always treated as the offset of a
character or element in name from the first character
or element of the array (this is different from native
zsh subscript notation). Hence 0 refers to the first
character or element regardless of the setting of the
option KSH_ARRAYS.
A negative offset counts backwards from the end of the
scalar or array, so that -1 corresponds to the last
character or element, and so on.
When positive, length counts from the offset position
toward the end of the scalar or array. When negative,
length counts back from the end. If this results in a
position smaller than offset, a diagnostic is printed
and nothing is substituted.
The option MULTIBYTE is obeyed, i.e. the offset and
length count multibyte characters where appropriate.
offset and length undergo the same set of shell substi-
tutions as for scalar assignment; in addition, they are
then subject to arithmetic evaluation. Hence, for
example
print ${foo:3}
print ${foo: 1 + 2}
print ${foo:$(( 1 + 2))}
print ${foo:$(echo 1 + 2)}
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all have the same effect, extracting the string start-
ing at the fourth character of $foo if the substution
would otherwise return a scalar, or the array starting
at the fourth element if $foo would return an array.
Note that with the option KSH_ARRAYS $foo always
returns a scalar (regardless of the use of the offset
syntax) and a form such as $foo[*]:3 is required to
extract elements of an array named foo.
If offset is negative, the - may not appear immediately
after the : as this indicates the ${name:-word} form of
substitution. Instead, a space may be inserted before
the -. Furthermore, neither offset nor length may
begin with an alphabetic character or & as these are
used to indicate history-style modifiers. To substi-
tute a value from a variable, the recommended approach
is to precede it with a $ as this signifies the inten-
tion (parameter substitution can easily be rendered
unreadable); however, as arithmetic substitution is
performed, the expression ${var: offs} does work,
retrieving the offset from $offs.
For further compatibility with other shells there is a
special case for array offset 0. This usually accesses
to the first element of the array. However, if the
substitution refers the positional parameter array,
e.g. $@ or $*, then offset 0 instead refers to $0, off-
set 1 refers to $1, and so on. In other words, the
positional parameter array is effectively extended by
prepending $0. Hence ${*:0:1} substitutes $0 and
${*:1:1} substitutes $1.
${name/pattern/repl}
${name//pattern/repl}
Replace the longest possible match of pattern in the
expansion of parameter name by string repl. The first
form replaces just the first occurrence, the second
form all occurrences. Both pattern and repl are sub-
ject to double-quoted substitution, so that expressions
like ${name/$opat/$npat} will work, but note the usual
rule that pattern characters in $opat are not treated
specially unless either the option GLOB_SUBST is set,
or $opat is instead substituted as ${~opat}.
The pattern may begin with a `#', in which case the
pattern must match at the start of the string, or `%',
in which case it must match at the end of the string,
or `#%' in which case the pattern must match the entire
string. The repl may be an empty string, in which case
the final `/' may also be omitted. To quote the final
`/' in other cases it should be preceded by a single
backslash; this is not necessary if the `/' occurs
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inside a substituted parameter. Note also that the
`#', `%' and `#% are not active if they occur inside a
substituted parameter, even at the start.
The first `/' may be preceded by a `:', in which case
the match will only succeed if it matches the entire
word. Note also the effect of the I and S parameter
expansion flags below; however, the flags M, R, B, E
and N are not useful.
For example,
foo="twinkle twinkle little star" sub="t*e" rep="spy"
print ${foo//${~sub}/$rep}
print ${(S)foo//${~sub}/$rep}
Here, the `~' ensures that the text of $sub is treated
as a pattern rather than a plain string. In the first
case, the longest match for t*e is substituted and the
result is `spy star', while in the second case, the
shortest matches are taken and the result is `spy spy
lispy star'.
${#spec}
If spec is one of the above substitutions, substitute
the length in characters of the result instead of the
result itself. If spec is an array expression, substi-
tute the number of elements of the result. This has
the side-effect that joining is skipped even in quoted
forms, which may affect other sub-expressions in spec.
Note that `^', `=', and `~', below, must appear to the
left of `#' when these forms are combined.
${^spec}
Turn on the RC_EXPAND_PARAM option for the evaluation
of spec; if the `^' is doubled, turn it off. When this
option is set, array expansions of the form
foo${xx}bar, where the parameter xx is set to (a b c),
are substituted with `fooabar foobbar foocbar' instead
of the default `fooa b cbar'. Note that an empty array
will therefore cause all arguments to be removed.
Internally, each such expansion is converted into the
equivalent list for brace expansion. E.g., ${^var}
becomes {$var[1],$var[2],...}, and is processed as
described in the section `Brace Expansion' below. If
word splitting is also in effect the $var[N] may them-
selves be split into different list elements.
${=spec}
Perform word splitting using the rules for
SH_WORD_SPLIT during the evaluation of spec, but
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regardless of whether the parameter appears in double
quotes; if the `=' is doubled, turn it off. This
forces parameter expansions to be split into separate
words before substitution, using IFS as a delimiter.
This is done by default in most other shells.
Note that splitting is applied to word in the assign-
ment forms of spec before the assignment to name is
performed. This affects the result of array assign-
ments with the A flag.
${~spec}
Turn on the GLOB_SUBST option for the evaluation of
spec; if the `~' is doubled, turn it off. When this
option is set, the string resulting from the expansion
will be interpreted as a pattern anywhere that is pos-
sible, such as in filename expansion and filename gen-
eration and pattern-matching contexts like the right
hand side of the `=' and `!=' operators in conditions.
In nested substitutions, note that the effect of the ~
applies to the result of the current level of substitu-
tion. A surrounding pattern operation on the result
may cancel it. Hence, for example, if the parameter
foo is set to *, ${~foo//\*/*.c} is substituted by the
pattern *.c, which may be expanded by filename genera-
tion, but ${${~foo}//\*/*.c} substitutes to the string
*.c, which will not be further expanded.
If a ${...} type parameter expression or a $(...) type com-
mand substitution is used in place of name above, it is
expanded first and the result is used as if it were the
value of name. Thus it is possible to perform nested opera-
tions: ${${foo#head}%tail} substitutes the value of $foo
with both `head' and `tail' deleted. The form with $(...)
is often useful in combination with the flags described
next; see the examples below. Each name or nested ${...} in
a parameter expansion may also be followed by a subscript
expression as described in Array Parameters in zshparam(1).
Note that double quotes may appear around nested expres-
sions, in which case only the part inside is treated as
quoted; for example, ${(f)"$(foo)"} quotes the result of
$(foo), but the flag `(f)' (see below) is applied using the
rules for unquoted expansions. Note further that quotes are
themselves nested in this context; for example, in
"${(@f)"$(foo)"}", there are two sets of quotes, one sur-
rounding the whole expression, the other (redundant) sur-
rounding the $(foo) as before.
Parameter Expansion Flags
If the opening brace is directly followed by an opening
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parenthesis, the string up to the matching closing parenthe-
sis will be taken as a list of flags. In cases where
repeating a flag is meaningful, the repetitions need not be
consecutive; for example, `(q%q%q)' means the same thing as
the more readable `(%%qqq)'. The following flags are sup-
ported:
# Evaluate the resulting words as numeric expressions and
output the characters corresponding to the resulting
integer. Note that this form is entirely distinct from
use of the # without parentheses.
If the MULTIBYTE option is set and the number is
greater than 127 (i.e. not an ASCII character) it is
treated as a Unicode character.
% Expand all % escapes in the resulting words in the same
way as in prompts (see EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in
zshmisc(1)). If this flag is given twice, full prompt
expansion is done on the resulting words, depending on
the setting of the PROMPT_PERCENT, PROMPT_SUBST and
PROMPT_BANG options.
@ In double quotes, array elements are put into separate
words. E.g., `"${(@)foo}"' is equivalent to
`"${foo[@]}"' and `"${(@)foo[1,2]}"' is the same as
`"$foo[1]" "$foo[2]"'. This is distinct from field
splitting by the f, s or z flags, which still applies
within each array element.
A Create an array parameter with `${...=...}',
`${...:=...}' or `${...::=...}'. If this flag is
repeated (as in `AA'), create an associative array
parameter. Assignment is made before sorting or pad-
ding; if field splitting is active, the word part is
split before assignment. The name part may be a sub-
scripted range for ordinary arrays; the word part must
be converted to an array, for example by using
`${(AA)=name=...}' to activate field splitting, when
creating an associative array.
a Sort in array index order; when combined with `O' sort
in reverse array index order. Note that `a' is there-
fore equivalent to the default but `Oa' is useful for
obtaining an array's elements in reverse order.
c With ${#name}, count the total number of characters in
an array, as if the elements were concatenated with
spaces between them. This is not a true join of the
array, so other expressions used with this flag may
have an effect on the elements of the array before it
is counted.
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C Capitalize the resulting words. `Words' in this case
refers to sequences of alphanumeric characters sepa-
rated by non-alphanumerics, not to words that result
from field splitting.
D Assume the string or array elements contain directories
and attempt to substitute the leading part of these by
names. The remainder of the path (the whole of it if
the leading part was not subsituted) is then quoted so
that the whole string can be used as a shell argument.
This is the reverse of `~' substitution: see the sec-
tion FILENAME EXPANSION below.
e Perform parameter expansion, command substitution and
arithmetic expansion on the result. Such expansions can
be nested but too deep recursion may have unpredictable
effects.
f Split the result of the expansion at newlines. This is
a shorthand for `ps:\n:'.
F Join the words of arrays together using newline as a
separator. This is a shorthand for `pj:\n:'.
g:opts:
Process escape sequences like the echo builtin when no
options are given (g::). With the o option, octal
escapes don't take a leading zero. With the c option,
sequences like `^X' are also processed. With the e
option, processes `\M-t' and similar sequences like the
print builtin. With both of the o and e options,
behaves like the print builtin except that in none of
these modes is `\c' interpreted.
i Sort case-insensitively. May be combined with `n' or
`O'.
k If name refers to an associative array, substitute the
keys (element names) rather than the values of the ele-
ments. Used with subscripts (including ordinary
arrays), force indices or keys to be substituted even
if the subscript form refers to values. However, this
flag may not be combined with subscript ranges.
L Convert all letters in the result to lower case.
n Sort decimal integers numerically; if the first differ-
ing characters of two test strings are not digits,
sorting is lexical. Integers with more initial zeroes
are sorted before those with fewer or none. Hence the
array `foo1 foo02 foo2 foo3 foo20 foo23' is sorted into
the order shown. May be combined with `i' or `O'.
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o Sort the resulting words in ascending order; if this
appears on its own the sorting is lexical and case-sen-
sitive (unless the locale renders it case-insensitive).
Sorting in ascending order is the default for other
forms of sorting, so this is ignored if combined with
`a', `i' or `n'.
O Sort the resulting words in descending order; `O' with-
out `a', `i' or `n' sorts in reverse lexical order.
May be combined with `a', `i' or `n' to reverse the
order of sorting.
P This forces the value of the parameter name to be
interpreted as a further parameter name, whose value
will be used where appropriate. Note that flags set
with one of the typeset family of commands (in particu-
lar case transformations) are not applied to the value
of name used in this fashion.
If used with a nested parameter or command substitu-
tion, the result of that will be taken as a parameter
name in the same way. For example, if you have
`foo=bar' and `bar=baz', the strings ${(P)foo},
${(P)${foo}}, and ${(P)$(echo bar)} will be expanded to
`baz'.
q Quote characters that are special to the shell in the
resulting words with backslashes; unprintable or
invalid characters are quoted using the $'\NNN' form,
with separate quotes for each octet.
If this flag is given twice, the resulting words are
quoted in single quotes and if it is given three times,
the words are quoted in double quotes; in these forms
no special handling of unprintable or invalid charac-
ters is attempted. If the flag is given four times,
the words are quoted in single quotes preceded by a $.
Note that in all three of these forms quoting is done
unconditionally, even if this does not change the way
the resulting string would be interpreted by the shell.
If a q- is given (only a single q may appear), a mini-
mal form of single quoting is used that only quotes the
string if needed to protect special characters. Typi-
cally this form gives the most readable output.
Q Remove one level of quotes from the resulting words.
t Use a string describing the type of the parameter where
the value of the parameter would usually appear. This
string consists of keywords separated by hyphens (`-').
The first keyword in the string describes the main
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type, it can be one of `scalar', `array', `integer',
`float' or `association'. The other keywords describe
the type in more detail:
local
for local parameters
left for left justified parameters
right_blanks
for right justified parameters with leading blanks
right_zeros
for right justified parameters with leading zeros
lower
for parameters whose value is converted to all
lower case when it is expanded
upper
for parameters whose value is converted to all
upper case when it is expanded
readonly
for readonly parameters
tag for tagged parameters
export
for exported parameters
unique
for arrays which keep only the first occurrence of
duplicated values
hide for parameters with the `hide' flag
special
for special parameters defined by the shell
u Expand only the first occurrence of each unique word.
U Convert all letters in the result to upper case.
v Used with k, substitute (as two consecutive words) both
the key and the value of each associative array ele-
ment. Used with subscripts, force values to be substi-
tuted even if the subscript form refers to indices or
keys.
V Make any special characters in the resulting words vis-
ible.
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w With ${#name}, count words in arrays or strings; the s
flag may be used to set a word delimiter.
W Similar to w with the difference that empty words
between repeated delimiters are also counted.
X With this flag, parsing errors occurring with the Q, e
and # flags or the pattern matching forms such as
`${name#pattern}' are reported. Without the flag,
errors are silently ignored.
z Split the result of the expansion into words using
shell parsing to find the words, i.e. taking into
account any quoting in the value. Comments are not
treated specially but as ordinary strings, similar to
interactive shells with the INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS option
unset (however, see the Z flag below for related
options)
Note that this is done very late, even later than the
`(s)' flag. So to access single words in the result use
nested expansions as in `${${(z)foo}[2]}'. Likewise, to
remove the quotes in the resulting words use
`${(Q)${(z)foo}}'.
0 Split the result of the expansion on null bytes. This
is a shorthand for `ps:\0:'.
The following flags (except p) are followed by one or more
arguments as shown. Any character, or the matching pairs
`(...)', `{...}', `[...]', or `<...>', may be used in place
of a colon as delimiters, but note that when a flag takes
more than one argument, a matched pair of delimiters must
surround each argument.
p Recognize the same escape sequences as the print
builtin in string arguments to any of the flags
described below that follow this argument.
~ Force string arguments to any of the flags below that
follow within the parentheses to be treated as pat-
terns. Compare with a ~ outside parentheses, which
forces the entire substituted string to be treated as a
pattern. Hence, for example,
[[ "?" = ${(~j.|.)array} ]]
with the EXTENDED_GLOB option set succeeds if and only if
$array contains the string `?' as an element. The argument
may be repeated to toggle the behaviour; its effect only
lasts to the end of the parenthesised group.
j:string:
Join the words of arrays together using string as a
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separator. Note that this occurs before field split-
ting by the s:string: flag or the SH_WORD_SPLIT option.
l:expr::string1::string2:
Pad the resulting words on the left. Each word will be
truncated if required and placed in a field expr char-
acters wide.
The arguments :string1: and :string2: are optional;
neither, the first, or both may be given. Note that
the same pairs of delimiters must be used for each of
the three arguments. The space to the left will be
filled with string1 (concatenated as often as needed)
or spaces if string1 is not given. If both string1 and
string2 are given, string2 is inserted once directly to
the left of each word, truncated if necessary, before
string1 is used to produce any remaining padding.
If the MULTIBYTE option is in effect, the flag m may
also be given, in which case widths will be used for
the calculation of padding; otherwise individual multi-
byte characters are treated as occupying one unit of
width.
If the MULTIBYTE option is not in effect, each byte in
the string is treated as occupying one unit of width.
Control characters are always assumed to be one unit
wide; this allows the mechanism to be used for generat-
ing repetitions of control characters.
m Only useful together with one of the flags l or r or
with the # length operator when the MULTIBYTE option is
in effect. Use the character width reported by the
system in calculating how much of the string it occu-
pies or the overall length of the string. Most print-
able characters have a width of one unit, however cer-
tain Asian character sets and certain special effects
use wider characters; combining characters have zero
width. Non-printable characters are arbitrarily
counted as zero width; how they would actually be dis-
played will vary.
If the m is repeated, the character either counts zero
(if it has zero width), else one. For printable char-
acter strings this has the effect of counting the num-
ber of glyphs (visibly separate characters), except for
the case where combining characters themselves have
non-zero width (true in certain alphabets).
r:expr::string1::string2:
As l, but pad the words on the right and insert string2
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immediately to the right of the string to be padded.
Left and right padding may be used together. In this
case the strategy is to apply left padding to the first
half width of each of the resulting words, and right
padding to the second half. If the string to be padded
has odd width the extra padding is applied on the left.
s:string:
Force field splitting at the separator string. Note
that a string of two or more characters means that all
of them must match in sequence; this differs from the
treatment of two or more characters in the IFS parame-
ter. See also the = flag and the SH_WORD_SPLIT option.
An empty string may also be given in which case every
character will be a separate element.
For historical reasons, the usual behaviour that empty
array elements are retained inside double quotes is
disabled for arrays generated by splitting; hence the
following:
line="one::three"
print -l "${(s.:.)line}"
produces two lines of output for one and three and
elides the empty field. To override this behaviour,
supply the "(@)" flag as well, i.e. "${(@s.:.)line}".
Z:opts:
As z but takes a combination of option letters between
a following pair of delimiter characters. With no
options the effect is identical to z. (Z+c+) causes
comments to be parsed as a string and retained; any
field in the resulting array beginning with an unquoted
comment character is a comment. (Z+C+) causes comments
to be parsed and removed. The rule for comments is
standard: anything between a word starting with the
third character of $HISTCHARS, default #, up to the
next newline is a comment. (Z+n+) causes unquoted new-
lines to be treated as ordinary whitespace, else they
are treated as if they are shell code delimiters and
converted to semicolons. Options are combined within
the same set of delimiters, e.g. (Z+Cn+).
_:flags:
The underscore (_) flag is reserved for future use. As
of this revision of zsh, there are no valid flags; any-
thing following an underscore, other than an empty pair
of delimiters, is treated as an error, and the flag
itself has no effect.
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The following flags are meaningful with the ${...#...} or
${...%...} forms. The S and I flags may also be used with
the ${.../...} forms.
S Search substrings as well as beginnings or ends; with #
start from the beginning and with % start from the end
of the string. With substitution via ${.../...} or
${...//...}, specifies non-greedy matching, i.e. that
the shortest instead of the longest match should be
replaced.
I:expr:
Search the exprth match (where expr evaluates to a num-
ber). This only applies when searching for substrings,
either with the S flag, or with ${.../...} (only the
exprth match is substituted) or ${...//...} (all
matches from the exprth on are substituted). The
default is to take the first match.
The exprth match is counted such that there is either
one or zero matches from each starting position in the
string, although for global substitution matches over-
lapping previous replacements are ignored. With the
${...%...} and ${...%%...} forms, the starting position
for the match moves backwards from the end as the index
increases, while with the other forms it moves forward
from the start.
Hence with the string
which switch is the right switch for Ipswich?
substitutions of the form ${(SI:N:)string#w*ch} as N
increases from 1 will match and remove `which',
`witch', `witch' and `wich'; the form using `##' will
match and remove `which switch is the right switch for
Ipswich', `witch is the right switch for Ipswich',
`witch for Ipswich' and `wich'. The form using `%' will
remove the same matches as for `#', but in reverse
order, and the form using `%%' will remove the same
matches as for `##' in reverse order.
B Include the index of the beginning of the match in the
result.
E Include the index of the end of the match in the
result.
M Include the matched portion in the result.
N Include the length of the match in the result.
R Include the unmatched portion in the result (the Rest).
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Rules
Here is a summary of the rules for substitution; this
assumes that braces are present around the substitution,
i.e. ${...}. Some particular examples are given below.
Note that the Zsh Development Group accepts no responsibil-
ity for any brain damage which may occur during the reading
of the following rules.
1. Nested substitution
If multiple nested ${...} forms are present, substitu-
tion is performed from the inside outwards. At each
level, the substitution takes account of whether the
current value is a scalar or an array, whether the
whole substitution is in double quotes, and what flags
are supplied to the current level of substitution, just
as if the nested substitution were the outermost. The
flags are not propagated up to enclosing substitutions;
the nested substitution will return either a scalar or
an array as determined by the flags, possibly adjusted
for quoting. All the following steps take place where
applicable at all levels of substitution. Note that,
unless the `(P)' flag is present, the flags and any
subscripts apply directly to the value of the nested
substitution; for example, the expansion ${${foo}}
behaves exactly the same as ${foo}.
At each nested level of substitution, the substituted
words undergo all forms of single-word substitution
(i.e. not filename generation), including command sub-
stitution, arithmetic expansion and filename expansion
(i.e. leading ~ and =). Thus, for example,
${${:-=cat}:h} expands to the directory where the cat
program resides. (Explanation: the internal substitu-
tion has no parameter but a default value =cat, which
is expanded by filename expansion to a full path; the
outer substitution then applies the modifier :h and
takes the directory part of the path.)
2. Internal parameter flags
Any parameter flags set by one of the typeset family of
commands, in particular the L, R, Z, u and l flags for
padding and capitalization, are applied directly to the
parameter value. Note these flags are options to the
command, e.g. `typeset -Z'; they are not the same as
the flags used within parameter substitutions.
3. Parameter subscripting
If the value is a raw parameter reference with a sub-
script, such as ${var[3]}, the effect of subscripting
is applied directly to the parameter. Subscripts are
evaluated left to right; subsequent subscripts apply to
the scalar or array value yielded by the previous
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subscript. Thus if var is an array, ${var[1][2]} is
the second character of the first word, but
${var[2,4][2]} is the entire third word (the second
word of the range of words two through four of the
original array). Any number of subscripts may appear.
Flags such as (k) and (v) which alter the result of
subscripting are applied.
4. Parameter name replacement
The effect of any (P) flag, which treats the value so
far as a parameter name and replaces it with the corre-
sponding value, is applied.
5. Double-quoted joining
If the value after this process is an array, and the
substitution appears in double quotes, and neither an
(@) flag nor a # length operator is present at the cur-
rent level, then words of the value are joined with the
first character of the parameter $IFS, by default a
space, between each word (single word arrays are not
modified). If the (j) flag is present, that is used
for joining instead of $IFS.
6. Nested subscripting
Any remaining subscripts (i.e. of a nested substitu-
tion) are evaluated at this point, based on whether the
value is an array or a scalar. As with 3., multiple
subscripts can appear. Note that ${foo[2,4][2]} is
thus equivalent to ${${foo[2,4]}[2]} and also to
"${${(@)foo[2,4]}[2]}" (the nested substitution returns
an array in both cases), but not to "${${foo[2,4]}[2]}"
(the nested substitution returns a scalar because of
the quotes).
7. Modifiers
Any modifiers, as specified by a trailing `#', `%', `/'
(possibly doubled) or by a set of modifiers of the form
:... (see the section `Modifiers' in the section `His-
tory Expansion'), are applied to the words of the value
at this level.
8. Character evaluation
Any (#) flag is applied, evaluating the result so far
numerically as a character.
9. Length
Any initial # modifier, i.e. in the form ${#var}, is
used to evaluate the length of the expression so far.
10. Forced joining
If the `(j)' flag is present, or no `(j)' flag is
present but the string is to be split as given by rule
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11., and joining did not take place at step 5., any
words in the value are joined together using the given
string or the first character of $IFS if none. Note
that the `(F)' flag implicitly supplies a string for
joining in this manner.
11. Simple word splitting
If one of the `(s)' or `(f)' flags are present, or the
`=' specifier was present (e.g. ${=var}), the word is
split on occurrences of the specified string, or (for =
with neither of the two flags present) any of the char-
acters in $IFS.
If no `(s)', `(f)' or `=' was given, but the word is
not quoted and the option SH_WORD_SPLIT is set, the
word is split on occurrences of any of the characters
in $IFS. Note this step, too, takes place at all lev-
els of a nested substitution.
12. Case modification
Any case modification from one of the flags (L), (U) or
(C) is applied.
13. Escape sequence replacement
First any replacements from the (g) flag are performed,
then any prompt-style formatting from the (%) family of
flags is applied.
14. Quote application
Any quoting or unquoting using (q) and (Q) and related
flags is applied.
15. Directory naming
Any directory name substitution using (D) flag is
applied.
16. Visibility enhancement
Any modifications to make characters visible using the
(V) flag are applied.
17. Lexical word splitting
If the '(z)' flag or one of the forms of the '(Z)' flag
is present, the word is split as if it were a shell
command line, so that quotation marks and other
metacharacters are used to decide what constitutes a
word. Note this form of splitting is entirely distinct
from that described by rule 11.: it does not use $IFS,
and does not cause forced joining.
18. Uniqueness
If the result is an array and the `(u)' flag was
present, duplicate elements are removed from the array.
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19. Ordering
If the result is still an array and one of the `(o)' or
`(O)' flags was present, the array is reordered.
20. Re-evaluation
Any `(e)' flag is applied to the value, forcing it to
be re-examined for new parameter substitutions, but
also for command and arithmetic substitutions.
21. Padding
Any padding of the value by the `(l.fill.)' or
`(r.fill.)' flags is applied.
22. Semantic joining
In contexts where expansion semantics requires a single
word to result, all words are rejoined with the first
character of IFS between. So in `${(P)${(f)lines}}'
the value of ${lines} is split at newlines, but then
must be joined again before the P flag can be applied.
If a single word is not required, this rule is skipped.
23. Empty argument removal
If the substitution does not appear in double quotes,
any resulting zero-length argument, whether from a
scalar or an element of an array, is elided from the
list of arguments inserted into the command line.
Strictly speaking, the removal happens later as the
same happens with other forms of substitution; the
point to note here is simply that it occurs after any
of the above parameter operations.
Examples
The flag f is useful to split a double-quoted substitution
line by line. For example, ${(f)"$(<file)"} substitutes the
contents of file divided so that each line is an element of
the resulting array. Compare this with the effect of
$(<file) alone, which divides the file up by words, or the
same inside double quotes, which makes the entire content of
the file a single string.
The following illustrates the rules for nested parameter
expansions. Suppose that $foo contains the array (bar baz):
"${(@)${foo}[1]}"
This produces the result b. First, the inner substitu-
tion "${foo}", which has no array (@) flag, produces a
single word result "bar baz". The outer substitution
"${(@)...[1]}" detects that this is a scalar, so that
(despite the `(@)' flag) the subscript picks the first
character.
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"${${(@)foo}[1]}"
This produces the result `bar'. In this case, the
inner substitution "${(@)foo}" produces the array `(bar
baz)'. The outer substitution "${...[1]}" detects that
this is an array and picks the first word. This is
similar to the simple case "${foo[1]}".
As an example of the rules for word splitting and joining,
suppose $foo contains the array `(ax1 bx1)'. Then
${(s/x/)foo}
produces the words `a', `1 b' and `1'.
${(j/x/s/x/)foo}
produces `a', `1', `b' and `1'.
${(s/x/)foo%%1*}
produces `a' and ` b' (note the extra space). As sub-
stitution occurs before either joining or splitting,
the operation first generates the modified array (ax
bx), which is joined to give "ax bx", and then split to
give `a', ` b' and `'. The final empty string will
then be elided, as it is not in double quotes.
COMMAND SUBSTITUTION
A command enclosed in parentheses preceded by a dollar sign,
like `$(...)', or quoted with grave accents, like ``...`',
is replaced with its standard output, with any trailing new-
lines deleted. If the substitution is not enclosed in dou-
ble quotes, the output is broken into words using the IFS
parameter. The substitution `$(cat foo)' may be replaced by
the equivalent but faster `$(<foo)'. In either case, if the
option GLOB_SUBST is set, the output is eligible for file-
name generation.
ARITHMETIC EXPANSION
A string of the form `$[exp]' or `$((exp))' is substituted
with the value of the arithmetic expression exp. exp is
subjected to parameter expansion, command substitution and
arithmetic expansion before it is evaluated. See the sec-
tion `Arithmetic Evaluation'.
BRACE EXPANSION
A string of the form `foo{xx,yy,zz}bar' is expanded to the
individual words `fooxxbar', `fooyybar' and `foozzbar'.
Left-to-right order is preserved. This construct may be
nested. Commas may be quoted in order to include them lit-
erally in a word.
An expression of the form `{n1..n2}', where n1 and n2 are
integers, is expanded to every number between n1 and n2
inclusive. If either number begins with a zero, all the
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resulting numbers will be padded with leading zeroes to that
minimum width, but for negative numbers the - character is
also included in the width. If the numbers are in decreas-
ing order the resulting sequence will also be in decreasing
order.
An expression of the form `{n1..n2..n3}', where n1, n2, and
n3 are integers, is expanded as above, but only every n3th
number starting from n1 is output. If n3 is negative the
numbers are output in reverse order, this is slightly dif-
ferent from simply swapping n1 and n2 in the case that the
step n3 doesn't evenly divide the range. Zero padding can
be specified in any of the three numbers, specifying it in
the third can be useful to pad for example `{-99..100..01}'
which is not possible to specify by putting a 0 on either of
the first two numbers (i.e. pad to two characters).
If a brace expression matches none of the above forms, it is
left unchanged, unless the option BRACE_CCL (an abbreviation
for `brace character class') is set. In that case, it is
expanded to a list of the individual characters between the
braces sorted into the order of the characters in the ASCII
character set (multibyte characters are not currently han-
dled). The syntax is similar to a [...] expression in file-
name generation: `-' is treated specially to denote a range
of characters, but `^' or `!' as the first character is
treated normally. For example, `{abcdef0-9}' expands to 16
words 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 a b c d e f.
Note that brace expansion is not part of filename generation
(globbing); an expression such as */{foo,bar} is split into
two separate words */foo and */bar before filename genera-
tion takes place. In particular, note that this is liable
to produce a `no match' error if either of the two expres-
sions does not match; this is to be contrasted with
*/(foo|bar), which is treated as a single pattern but other-
wise has similar effects.
To combine brace expansion with array expansion, see the
${^spec} form described in the section Parameter Expansion
above.
FILENAME EXPANSION
Each word is checked to see if it begins with an unquoted
`~'. If it does, then the word up to a `/', or the end of
the word if there is no `/', is checked to see if it can be
substituted in one of the ways described here. If so, then
the `~' and the checked portion are replaced with the appro-
priate substitute value.
A `~' by itself is replaced by the value of $HOME. A `~'
followed by a `+' or a `-' is replaced by current or
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previous working directory, respectively.
A `~' followed by a number is replaced by the directory at
that position in the directory stack. `~0' is equivalent to
`~+', and `~1' is the top of the stack. `~+' followed by a
number is replaced by the directory at that position in the
directory stack. `~+0' is equivalent to `~+', and `~+1' is
the top of the stack. `~-' followed by a number is replaced
by the directory that many positions from the bottom of the
stack. `~-0' is the bottom of the stack. The PUSHD_MINUS
option exchanges the effects of `~+' and `~-' where they are
followed by a number.
Dynamic named directories
If the function zsh_directory_name exists, or the shell
variable zsh_directory_name_functions exists and contains an
array of function names, then the functions are used to
implement dynamic directory naming. The functions are tried
in order until one returns status zero, so it is important
that functions test whether they can handle the case in
question and return an appropriate status.
A `~' followed by a string namstr in unquoted square brack-
ets is treated specially as a dynamic directory name. Note
that the first unquoted closing square bracket always termi-
nates namstr. The shell function is passed two arguments:
the string n (for name) and namstr. It should either set
the array reply to a single element which is the directory
corresponding to the name and return status zero (executing
an assignment as the last statement is usually sufficient),
or it should return status non-zero. In the former case the
element of reply is used as the directory; in the latter
case the substitution is deemed to have failed. If all
functions fail and the option NOMATCH is set, an error
results.
The functions defined as above are also used to see if a
directory can be turned into a name, for example when print-
ing the directory stack or when expanding %~ in prompts. In
this case each function is passed two arguments: the string
d (for directory) and the candidate for dynamic naming. The
function should either return non-zero status, if the direc-
tory cannot be named by the function, or it should set the
array reply to consist of two elements: the first is the
dynamic name for the directory (as would appear within
`~[...]'), and the second is the prefix length of the direc-
tory to be replaced. For example, if the trial directory is
/home/myname/src/zsh and the dynamic name for
/home/myname/src (which has 16 characters) is s, then the
function sets
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reply=(s 16)
The directory name so returned is compared with possible
static names for parts of the directory path, as described
below; it is used if the prefix length matched (16 in the
example) is longer than that matched by any static name.
It is not a requirement that a function implements both n
and d calls; for example, it might be appropriate for cer-
tain dynamic forms of expansion not to be contracted to
names. In that case any call with the first argument d
should cause a non-zero status to be returned.
The completion system calls `zsh_directory_name c' followed
by equivalent calls to elements of the array zsh_direc-
tory_name_functions, if it exists, in order to complete
dynamic names for directories. The code for this should be
as for any other completion function as described in zsh-
compsys(1).
As a working example, here is a function that expands any
dynamic names beginning with the string p: to directories
below /home/pws/perforce. In this simple case a static name
for the directory would be just as effective.
zsh_directory_name() {
emulate -L zsh
setopt extendedglob
local -a match mbegin mend
if [[ $1 = d ]]; then
# turn the directory into a name
if [[ $2 = (#b)(/home/pws/perforce/)([^/]##)* ]]; then
typeset -ga reply
reply=(p:$match[2] $(( ${#match[1]} + ${#match[2]} )) )
else
return 1
fi
elif [[ $1 = n ]]; then
# turn the name into a directory
[[ $2 != (#b)p:(?*) ]] && return 1
typeset -ga reply
reply=(/home/pws/perforce/$match[1])
elif [[ $1 = c ]]; then
# complete names
local expl
local -a dirs
dirs=(/home/pws/perforce/*(/:t))
dirs=(p:${^dirs})
_wanted dynamic-dirs expl 'dynamic directory' compadd -S\] -a dirs
return
else
return 1
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fi
return 0
}
Static named directories
A `~' followed by anything not already covered consisting of
any number of alphanumeric characters or underscore (`_'),
hyphen (`-'), or dot (`.') is looked up as a named direc-
tory, and replaced by the value of that named directory if
found. Named directories are typically home directories for
users on the system. They may also be defined if the text
after the `~' is the name of a string shell parameter whose
value begins with a `/'. Note that trailing slashes will be
removed from the path to the directory (though the original
parameter is not modified).
It is also possible to define directory names using the -d
option to the hash builtin.
When the shell prints a path (e.g. when expanding %~ in
prompts or when printing the directory stack), the path is
checked to see if it has a named directory as its prefix.
If so, then the prefix portion is replaced with a `~' fol-
lowed by the name of the directory. The shorter of the two
ways of referring to the directory is used, i.e. either the
directory name or the full path; the name is used if they
are the same length. The parameters $PWD and $OLDPWD are
never abbreviated in this fashion.
`=' expansion
If a word begins with an unquoted `=' and the EQUALS option
is set, the remainder of the word is taken as the name of a
command. If a command exists by that name, the word is
replaced by the full pathname of the command.
Notes
Filename expansion is performed on the right hand side of a
parameter assignment, including those appearing after com-
mands of the typeset family. In this case, the right hand
side will be treated as a colon-separated list in the manner
of the PATH parameter, so that a `~' or an `=' following a
`:' is eligible for expansion. All such behaviour can be
disabled by quoting the `~', the `=', or the whole expres-
sion (but not simply the colon); the EQUALS option is also
respected.
If the option MAGIC_EQUAL_SUBST is set, any unquoted shell
argument in the form `identifier=expression' becomes eligi-
ble for file expansion as described in the previous para-
graph. Quoting the first `=' also inhibits this.
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FILENAME GENERATION
If a word contains an unquoted instance of one of the char-
acters `*', `(', `|', `<', `[', or `?', it is regarded as a
pattern for filename generation, unless the GLOB option is
unset. If the EXTENDED_GLOB option is set, the `^' and `#'
characters also denote a pattern; otherwise they are not
treated specially by the shell.
The word is replaced with a list of sorted filenames that
match the pattern. If no matching pattern is found, the
shell gives an error message, unless the NULL_GLOB option is
set, in which case the word is deleted; or unless the
NOMATCH option is unset, in which case the word is left
unchanged.
In filename generation, the character `/' must be matched
explicitly; also, a `.' must be matched explicitly at the
beginning of a pattern or after a `/', unless the GLOB_DOTS
option is set. No filename generation pattern matches the
files `.' or `..'. In other instances of pattern matching,
the `/' and `.' are not treated specially.
Glob Operators
* Matches any string, including the null string.
? Matches any character.
[...]
Matches any of the enclosed characters. Ranges of
characters can be specified by separating two charac-
ters by a `-'. A `-' or `]' may be matched by includ-
ing it as the first character in the list. There are
also several named classes of characters, in the form
`[:name:]' with the following meanings. The first set
use the macros provided by the operating system to test
for the given character combinations, including any
modifications due to local language settings, see
ctype(3):
[:alnum:]
The character is alphanumeric
[:alpha:]
The character is alphabetic
[:ascii:]
The character is 7-bit, i.e. is a single-byte
character without the top bit set.
[:blank:]
The character is either space or tab
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[:cntrl:]
The character is a control character
[:digit:]
The character is a decimal digit
[:graph:]
The character is a printable character other than
whitespace
[:lower:]
The character is a lowercase letter
[:print:]
The character is printable
[:punct:]
The character is printable but neither alphanu-
meric nor whitespace
[:space:]
The character is whitespace
[:upper:]
The character is an uppercase letter
[:xdigit:]
The character is a hexadecimal digit
Another set of named classes is handled internally by
the shell and is not sensitive to the locale:
[:IDENT:]
The character is allowed to form part of a shell
identifier, such as a parameter name
[:IFS:]
The character is used as an input field separator,
i.e. is contained in the IFS parameter
[:IFSSPACE:]
The character is an IFS white space character; see
the documentation for IFS in the zshparam(1) man-
ual page.
[:WORD:]
The character is treated as part of a word; this
test is sensitive to the value of the WORDCHARS
parameter
Note that the square brackets are additional to those
enclosing the whole set of characters, so to test for a
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single alphanumeric character you need `[[:alnum:]]'.
Named character sets can be used alongside other types,
e.g. `[[:alpha:]0-9]'.
[^...]
[!...]
Like [...], except that it matches any character which
is not in the given set.
<[x]-[y]>
Matches any number in the range x to y, inclusive.
Either of the numbers may be omitted to make the range
open-ended; hence `<->' matches any number. To match
individual digits, the [...] form is more efficient.
Be careful when using other wildcards adjacent to pat-
terns of this form; for example, <0-9>* will actually
match any number whatsoever at the start of the string,
since the `<0-9>' will match the first digit, and the
`*' will match any others. This is a trap for the
unwary, but is in fact an inevitable consequence of the
rule that the longest possible match always succeeds.
Expressions such as `<0-9>[^[:digit:]]*' can be used
instead.
(...)
Matches the enclosed pattern. This is used for group-
ing. If the KSH_GLOB option is set, then a `@', `*',
`+', `?' or `!' immediately preceding the `(' is
treated specially, as detailed below. The option
SH_GLOB prevents bare parentheses from being used in
this way, though the KSH_GLOB option is still avail-
able.
Note that grouping cannot extend over multiple directo-
ries: it is an error to have a `/' within a group (this
only applies for patterns used in filename generation).
There is one exception: a group of the form (pat/)#
appearing as a complete path segment can match a
sequence of directories. For example, foo/(a*/)#bar
matches foo/bar, foo/any/bar, foo/any/anyother/bar, and
so on.
x|y Matches either x or y. This operator has lower prece-
dence than any other. The `|' character must be within
parentheses, to avoid interpretation as a pipeline.
^x (Requires EXTENDED_GLOB to be set.) Matches anything
except the pattern x. This has a higher precedence
than `/', so `^foo/bar' will search directories in `.'
except `./foo' for a file named `bar'.
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x~y (Requires EXTENDED_GLOB to be set.) Match anything
that matches the pattern x but does not match y. This
has lower precedence than any operator except `|', so
`*/*~foo/bar' will search for all files in all directo-
ries in `.' and then exclude `foo/bar' if there was
such a match. Multiple patterns can be excluded by
`foo~bar~baz'. In the exclusion pattern (y), `/' and
`.' are not treated specially the way they usually are
in globbing.
x# (Requires EXTENDED_GLOB to be set.) Matches zero or
more occurrences of the pattern x. This operator has
high precedence; `12#' is equivalent to `1(2#)', rather
than `(12)#'. It is an error for an unquoted `#' to
follow something which cannot be repeated; this
includes an empty string, a pattern already followed by
`##', or parentheses when part of a KSH_GLOB pattern
(for example, `!(foo)#' is invalid and must be replaced
by `*(!(foo))').
x## (Requires EXTENDED_GLOB to be set.) Matches one or
more occurrences of the pattern x. This operator has
high precedence; `12##' is equivalent to `1(2##)',
rather than `(12)##'. No more than two active `#'
characters may appear together. (Note the potential
clash with glob qualifiers in the form `1(2##)' which
should therefore be avoided.)
ksh-like Glob Operators
If the KSH_GLOB option is set, the effects of parentheses
can be modified by a preceding `@', `*', `+', `?' or `!'.
This character need not be unquoted to have special effects,
but the `(' must be.
@(...)
Match the pattern in the parentheses. (Like `(...)'.)
*(...)
Match any number of occurrences. (Like `(...)#',
except that recursive directory searching is not sup-
ported.)
+(...)
Match at least one occurrence. (Like `(...)##', except
that recursive directory searching is not supported..)
?(...)
Match zero or one occurrence. (Like `(|...)'.)
!(...)
Match anything but the expression in parentheses.
(Like `(^(...))'.)
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Precedence
The precedence of the operators given above is (highest)
`^', `/', `~', `|' (lowest); the remaining operators are
simply treated from left to right as part of a string, with
`#' and `##' applying to the shortest possible preceding
unit (i.e. a character, `?', `[...]', `<...>', or a paren-
thesised expression). As mentioned above, a `/' used as a
directory separator may not appear inside parentheses, while
a `|' must do so; in patterns used in other contexts than
filename generation (for example, in case statements and
tests within `[[...]]'), a `/' is not special; and `/' is
also not special after a `~' appearing outside parentheses
in a filename pattern.
Globbing Flags
There are various flags which affect any text to their right
up to the end of the enclosing group or to the end of the
pattern; they require the EXTENDED_GLOB option. All take the
form (#X) where X may have one of the following forms:
i Case insensitive: upper or lower case characters in
the pattern match upper or lower case characters.
l Lower case characters in the pattern match upper or
lower case characters; upper case characters in the
pattern still only match upper case characters.
I Case sensitive: locally negates the effect of i or l
from that point on.
b Activate backreferences for parenthesised groups in the
pattern; this does not work in filename generation.
When a pattern with a set of active parentheses is
matched, the strings matched by the groups are stored
in the array $match, the indices of the beginning of
the matched parentheses in the array $mbegin, and the
indices of the end in the array $mend, with the first
element of each array corresponding to the first paren-
thesised group, and so on. These arrays are not other-
wise special to the shell. The indices use the same
convention as does parameter substitution, so that ele-
ments of $mend and $mbegin may be used in subscripts;
the KSH_ARRAYS option is respected. Sets of globbing
flags are not considered parenthesised groups; only the
first nine active parentheses can be referenced.
For example,
foo="a string with a message"
if [[ $foo = (a|an)' '(#b)(*)' '* ]]; then
print ${foo[$mbegin[1],$mend[1]]}
fi
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prints `string with a'. Note that the first parenthe-
sis is before the (#b) and does not create a backrefer-
ence.
Backreferences work with all forms of pattern matching
other than filename generation, but note that when per-
forming matches on an entire array, such as
${array#pattern}, or a global substitution, such as
${param//pat/repl}, only the data for the last match
remains available. In the case of global replacements
this may still be useful. See the example for the m
flag below.
The numbering of backreferences strictly follows the
order of the opening parentheses from left to right in
the pattern string, although sets of parentheses may be
nested. There are special rules for parentheses fol-
lowed by `#' or `##'. Only the last match of the
parenthesis is remembered: for example, in `[[ abab =
(#b)([ab])# ]]', only the final `b' is stored in
match[1]. Thus extra parentheses may be necessary to
match the complete segment: for example, use
`X((ab|cd)#)Y' to match a whole string of either `ab'
or `cd' between `X' and `Y', using the value of
$match[1] rather than $match[2].
If the match fails none of the parameters is altered,
so in some cases it may be necessary to initialise them
beforehand. If some of the backreferences fail to
match -- which happens if they are in an alternate
branch which fails to match, or if they are followed by
# and matched zero times -- then the matched string is
set to the empty string, and the start and end indices
are set to -1.
Pattern matching with backreferences is slightly slower
than without.
B Deactivate backreferences, negating the effect of the b
flag from that point on.
cN,M The flag (#cN,M) can be used anywhere that the # or ##
operators can be used except in the expressions `(*/)#'
and `(*/)##' in filename generation, where `/' has spe-
cial meaning; it cannot be combined with other globbing
flags and a bad pattern error occurs if it is mis-
placed. It is equivalent to the form {N,M} in regular
expressions. The previous character or group is
required to match between N and M times, inclusive.
The form (#cN) requires exactly N matches; (#c,M) is
equivalent to specifying N as 0; (#cN,) specifies that
there is no maximum limit on the number of matches.
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m Set references to the match data for the entire string
matched; this is similar to backreferencing and does
not work in filename generation. The flag must be in
effect at the end of the pattern, i.e. not local to a
group. The parameters $MATCH, $MBEGIN and $MEND will
be set to the string matched and to the indices of the
beginning and end of the string, respectively. This is
most useful in parameter substitutions, as otherwise
the string matched is obvious.
For example,
arr=(veldt jynx grimps waqf zho buck)
print ${arr//(#m)[aeiou]/${(U)MATCH}}
forces all the matches (i.e. all vowels) into upper-
case, printing `vEldt jynx grImps wAqf zhO bUck'.
Unlike backreferences, there is no speed penalty for
using match references, other than the extra substitu-
tions required for the replacement strings in cases
such as the example shown.
M Deactivate the m flag, hence no references to match
data will be created.
anum Approximate matching: num errors are allowed in the
string matched by the pattern. The rules for this are
described in the next subsection.
s, e Unlike the other flags, these have only a local effect,
and each must appear on its own: `(#s)' and `(#e)' are
the only valid forms. The `(#s)' flag succeeds only at
the start of the test string, and the `(#e)' flag suc-
ceeds only at the end of the test string; they corre-
spond to `^' and `$' in standard regular expressions.
They are useful for matching path segments in patterns
other than those in filename generation (where path
segments are in any case treated separately). For
example, `*((#s)|/)test((#e)|/)*' matches a path seg-
ment `test' in any of the following strings: test,
test/at/start, at/end/test, in/test/middle.
Another use is in parameter substitution; for example
`${array/(#s)A*Z(#e)}' will remove only elements of an
array which match the complete pattern `A*Z'. There
are other ways of performing many operations of this
type, however the combination of the substitution oper-
ations `/' and `//' with the `(#s)' and `(#e)' flags
provides a single simple and memorable method.
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Note that assertions of the form `(^(#s))' also work,
i.e. match anywhere except at the start of the string,
although this actually means `anything except a
zero-length portion at the start of the string'; you
need to use `(""~(#s))' to match a zero-length portion
of the string not at the start.
q A `q' and everything up to the closing parenthesis of
the globbing flags are ignored by the pattern matching
code. This is intended to support the use of glob
qualifiers, see below. The result is that the pattern
`(#b)(*).c(#q.)' can be used both for globbing and for
matching against a string. In the former case, the
`(#q.)' will be treated as a glob qualifier and the
`(#b)' will not be useful, while in the latter case the
`(#b)' is useful for backreferences and the `(#q.)'
will be ignored. Note that colon modifiers in the glob
qualifiers are also not applied in ordinary pattern
matching.
u Respect the current locale in determining the presence
of multibyte characters in a pattern, provided the
shell was compiled with MULTIBYTE_SUPPORT. This over-
rides the MULTIBYTE option; the default behaviour is
taken from the option. Compare U. (Mnemonic: typi-
cally multibyte characters are from Unicode in the
UTF-8 encoding, although any extension of ASCII sup-
ported by the system library may be used.)
U All characters are considered to be a single byte long.
The opposite of u. This overrides the MULTIBYTE
option.
For example, the test string fooxx can be matched by the
pattern (#i)FOOXX, but not by (#l)FOOXX, (#i)FOO(#I)XX or
((#i)FOOX)X. The string (#ia2)readme specifies case-insen-
sitive matching of readme with up to two errors.
When using the ksh syntax for grouping both KSH_GLOB and
EXTENDED_GLOB must be set and the left parenthesis should be
preceded by @. Note also that the flags do not affect let-
ters inside [...] groups, in other words (#i)[a-z] still
matches only lowercase letters. Finally, note that when
examining whole paths case-insensitively every directory
must be searched for all files which match, so that a pat-
tern of the form (#i)/foo/bar/... is potentially slow.
Approximate Matching
When matching approximately, the shell keeps a count of the
errors found, which cannot exceed the number specified in
the (#anum) flags. Four types of error are recognised:
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1. Different characters, as in fooxbar and fooybar.
2. Transposition of characters, as in banana and abnana.
3. A character missing in the target string, as with the
pattern road and target string rod.
4. An extra character appearing in the target string, as
with stove and strove.
Thus, the pattern (#a3)abcd matches dcba, with the errors
occurring by using the first rule twice and the second once,
grouping the string as [d][cb][a] and [a][bc][d].
Non-literal parts of the pattern must match exactly, includ-
ing characters in character ranges: hence (#a1)??? matches
strings of length four, by applying rule 4 to an empty part
of the pattern, but not strings of length two, since all the
? must match. Other characters which must match exactly are
initial dots in filenames (unless the GLOB_DOTS option is
set), and all slashes in filenames, so that a/bc is two
errors from ab/c (the slash cannot be transposed with
another character). Similarly, errors are counted sepa-
rately for non-contiguous strings in the pattern, so that
(ab|cd)ef is two errors from aebf.
When using exclusion via the ~ operator, approximate match-
ing is treated entirely separately for the excluded part and
must be activated separately. Thus, (#a1)README~READ_ME
matches READ.ME but not READ_ME, as the trailing READ_ME is
matched without approximation. However,
(#a1)README~(#a1)READ_ME does not match any pattern of the
form READ?ME as all such forms are now excluded.
Apart from exclusions, there is only one overall error
count; however, the maximum errors allowed may be altered
locally, and this can be delimited by grouping. For exam-
ple, (#a1)cat((#a0)dog)fox allows one error in total, which
may not occur in the dog section, and the pattern
(#a1)cat(#a0)dog(#a1)fox is equivalent. Note that the point
at which an error is first found is the crucial one for
establishing whether to use approximation; for example,
(#a1)abc(#a0)xyz will not match abcdxyz, because the error
occurs at the `x', where approximation is turned off.
Entire path segments may be matched approximately, so that
`(#a1)/foo/d/is/available/at/the/bar' allows one error in
any path segment. This is much less efficient than without
the (#a1), however, since every directory in the path must
be scanned for a possible approximate match. It is best to
place the (#a1) after any path segments which are known to
be correct.
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Recursive Globbing
A pathname component of the form `(foo/)#' matches a path
consisting of zero or more directories matching the pattern
foo.
As a shorthand, `**/' is equivalent to `(*/)#'; note that
this therefore matches files in the current directory as
well as subdirectories. Thus:
ls (*/)#bar
or
ls **/bar
does a recursive directory search for files named `bar'
(potentially including the file `bar' in the current direc-
tory). This form does not follow symbolic links; the alter-
native form `***/' does, but is otherwise identical. Nei-
ther of these can be combined with other forms of globbing
within the same path segment; in that case, the `*' opera-
tors revert to their usual effect.
Glob Qualifiers
Patterns used for filename generation may end in a list of
qualifiers enclosed in parentheses. The qualifiers specify
which filenames that otherwise match the given pattern will
be inserted in the argument list.
If the option BARE_GLOB_QUAL is set, then a trailing set of
parentheses containing no `|' or `(' characters (or `~' if
it is special) is taken as a set of glob qualifiers. A glob
subexpression that would normally be taken as glob quali-
fiers, for example `(^x)', can be forced to be treated as
part of the glob pattern by doubling the parentheses, in
this case producing `((^x))'.
If the option EXTENDED_GLOB is set, a different syntax for
glob qualifiers is available, namely `(#qx)' where x is any
of the same glob qualifiers used in the other format. The
qualifiers must still appear at the end of the pattern.
However, with this syntax multiple glob qualifiers may be
chained together. They are treated as a logical AND of the
individual sets of flags. Also, as the syntax is unambigu-
ous, the expression will be treated as glob qualifiers just
as long any parentheses contained within it are balanced;
appearance of `|', `(' or `~' does not negate the effect.
Note that qualifiers will be recognised in this form even if
a bare glob qualifier exists at the end of the pattern, for
example `*(#q*)(.)' will recognise executable regular files
if both options are set; however, mixed syntax should proba-
bly be avoided for the sake of clarity.
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A qualifier may be any one of the following:
/ directories
F `full' (i.e. non-empty) directories. Note that the
opposite sense (^F) expands to empty directories and
all non-directories. Use (/^F) for empty directories.
. plain files
@ symbolic links
= sockets
p named pipes (FIFOs)
* executable plain files (0100)
% device files (character or block special)
%b block special files
%c character special files
r owner-readable files (0400)
w owner-writable files (0200)
x owner-executable files (0100)
A group-readable files (0040)
I group-writable files (0020)
E group-executable files (0010)
R world-readable files (0004)
W world-writable files (0002)
X world-executable files (0001)
s setuid files (04000)
S setgid files (02000)
t files with the sticky bit (01000)
fspec
files with access rights matching spec. This spec may
be a octal number optionally preceded by a `=', a `+',
or a `-'. If none of these characters is given, the
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behavior is the same as for `='. The octal number
describes the mode bits to be expected, if combined
with a `=', the value given must match the file-modes
exactly, with a `+', at least the bits in the given
number must be set in the file-modes, and with a `-',
the bits in the number must not be set. Giving a `?'
instead of a octal digit anywhere in the number ensures
that the corresponding bits in the file-modes are not
checked, this is only useful in combination with `='.
If the qualifier `f' is followed by any other character
anything up to the next matching character (`[', `{',
and `<' match `]', `}', and `>' respectively, any other
character matches itself) is taken as a list of
comma-separated sub-specs. Each sub-spec may be either
an octal number as described above or a list of any of
the characters `u', `g', `o', and `a', followed by a
`=', a `+', or a `-', followed by a list of any of the
characters `r', `w', `x', `s', and `t', or an octal
digit. The first list of characters specify which
access rights are to be checked. If a `u' is given,
those for the owner of the file are used, if a `g' is
given, those of the group are checked, a `o' means to
test those of other users, and the `a' says to test all
three groups. The `=', `+', and `-' again says how the
modes are to be checked and have the same meaning as
described for the first form above. The second list of
characters finally says which access rights are to be
expected: `r' for read access, `w' for write access,
`x' for the right to execute the file (or to search a
directory), `s' for the setuid and setgid bits, and `t'
for the sticky bit.
Thus, `*(f70?)' gives the files for which the owner has
read, write, and execute permission, and for which
other group members have no rights, independent of the
permissions for other users. The pattern `*(f-100)'
gives all files for which the owner does not have exe-
cute permission, and `*(f:gu+w,o-rx:)' gives the files
for which the owner and the other members of the group
have at least write permission, and for which other
users don't have read or execute permission.
estring
+cmd The string will be executed as shell code. The file-
name will be included in the list if and only if the
code returns a zero status (usually the status of the
last command).
In the first form, the first character after the `e'
will be used as a separator and anything up to the next
matching separator will be taken as the string; `[',
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`{', and `<' match `]', `}', and `>', respectively,
while any other character matches itself. Note that
expansions must be quoted in the string to prevent them
from being expanded before globbing is done. string is
then executed as shell code. The string globqual is
appended to the array zsh_eval_context the duration of
execution.
During the execution of string the filename currently
being tested is available in the parameter REPLY; the
parameter may be altered to a string to be inserted
into the list instead of the original filename. In
addition, the parameter reply may be set to an array or
a string, which overrides the value of REPLY. If set
to an array, the latter is inserted into the command
line word by word.
For example, suppose a directory contains a single file
`lonely'. Then the expression
`*(e:'reply=(${REPLY}{1,2})':)' will cause the words
`lonely1' and `lonely2' to be inserted into the command
line. Note the quoting of string.
The form +cmd has the same effect, but no delimiters
appear around cmd. Instead, cmd is taken as the long-
est sequence of characters following the + that are
alphanumeric or underscore. Typically cmd will be the
name of a shell function that contains the appropriate
test. For example,
nt() { [[ $REPLY -nt $NTREF ]] }
NTREF=reffile
ls -l *(+nt)
lists all files in the directory that have been modi-
fied more recently than reffile.
ddev files on the device dev
l[-|+]ct
files having a link count less than ct (-), greater
than ct (+), or equal to ct
U files owned by the effective user ID
G files owned by the effective group ID
uid files owned by user ID id if that is a number. Other-
wise, id specifies a user name: the character after the
`u' will be taken as a separator and the string between
it and the next matching separator will be taken as a
user name. The starting separators `[', `{', and `<'
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match the final separators `]', `}', and `>', respec-
tively; any other character matches itself. The
selected files are those owned by this user. For exam-
ple, `u:foo:' or `u[foo]' selects files owned by user
`foo'.
gid like uid but with group IDs or names
a[Mwhms][-|+]n
files accessed exactly n days ago. Files accessed
within the last n days are selected using a negative
value for n (-n). Files accessed more than n days ago
are selected by a positive n value (+n). Optional unit
specifiers `M', `w', `h', `m' or `s' (e.g. `ah5') cause
the check to be performed with months (of 30 days),
weeks, hours, minutes or seconds instead of days,
respectively. An explicit `d' for days is also
allowed.
Any fractional part of the difference between the
access time and the current part in the appropriate
units is ignored in the comparison. For instance,
`echo *(ah-5)' would echo files accessed within the
last five hours, while `echo *(ah+5)' would echo files
accessed at least six hours ago, as times strictly
between five and six hours are treated as five hours.
m[Mwhms][-|+]n
like the file access qualifier, except that it uses the
file modification time.
c[Mwhms][-|+]n
like the file access qualifier, except that it uses the
file inode change time.
L[+|-]n
files less than n bytes (-), more than n bytes (+), or
exactly n bytes in length.
If this flag is directly followed by a `k' (`K'), `m'
(`M'), or `p' (`P') (e.g. `Lk-50') the check is per-
formed with kilobytes, megabytes, or blocks (of 512
bytes) instead. In this case a file is regarded as
"exactly" the size if the file size rounded up to the
next unit is equal to the test size. Hence `*(Lm1)'
matches files from 1 byte up to 1 Megabyte inclusive.
Note also that the set of files "less than" the test
size only includes files that would not match the
equality test; hence `*(Lm-1)' only matches files of
zero size.
^ negates all qualifiers following it
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- toggles between making the qualifiers work on symbolic
links (the default) and the files they point to
M sets the MARK_DIRS option for the current pattern
T appends a trailing qualifier mark to the filenames,
analogous to the LIST_TYPES option, for the current
pattern (overrides M)
N sets the NULL_GLOB option for the current pattern
D sets the GLOB_DOTS option for the current pattern
n sets the NUMERIC_GLOB_SORT option for the current pat-
tern
oc specifies how the names of the files should be sorted.
If c is n they are sorted by name (the default); if it
is L they are sorted depending on the size (length) of
the files; if l they are sorted by the number of links;
if a, m, or c they are sorted by the time of the last
access, modification, or inode change respectively; if
d, files in subdirectories appear before those in the
current directory at each level of the search -- this
is best combined with other criteria, for example
`odon' to sort on names for files within the same
directory; if N, no sorting is performed. Note that a,
m, and c compare the age against the current time,
hence the first name in the list is the youngest file.
Also note that the modifiers ^ and - are used, so
`*(^-oL)' gives a list of all files sorted by file size
in descending order, following any symbolic links.
Unless oN is used, multiple order specifiers may occur
to resolve ties.
oe and o+ are special cases; they are each followed by
shell code, delimited as for the e glob qualifier and
the + glob qualifier respectively (see above). The
code is executed for each matched file with the parame-
ter REPLY set to the name of the file on entry and
globsort appended to zsh_eval_context. The code should
modify the parameter REPLY in some fashion. On return,
the value of the parameter is used instead of the file
name as the string on which to sort. Unlike other sort
operators, oe and o+ may be repeated, but note that the
maximum number of sort operators of any kind that may
appear in any glob expression is 12.
Oc like `o', but sorts in descending order; i.e. `*(^oc)'
is the same as `*(Oc)' and `*(^Oc)' is the same as
`*(oc)'; `Od' puts files in the current directory
before those in subdirectories at each level of the
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search.
[beg[,end]]
specifies which of the matched filenames should be
included in the returned list. The syntax is the same
as for array subscripts. beg and the optional end may
be mathematical expressions. As in parameter subscript-
ing they may be negative to make them count from the
last match backward. E.g.: `*(-OL[1,3])' gives a list
of the names of the three largest files.
Pstring
The string will be prepended to each glob match as a
separate word. string is delimited in the same way as
arguments to the e glob qualifier described above. The
qualifier can be repeated; the words are prepended sep-
arately so that the resulting command line contains the
words in the same order they were given in the list of
glob qualifiers.
A typical use for this is to prepend an option before
all occurrences of a file name; for example, the pat-
tern `*(P:-f:)' produces the command line arguments `-f
file1 -f file2 ...'
More than one of these lists can be combined, separated by
commas. The whole list matches if at least one of the sub-
lists matches (they are `or'ed, the qualifiers in the sub-
lists are `and'ed). Some qualifiers, however, affect all
matches generated, independent of the sublist in which they
are given. These are the qualifiers `M', `T', `N', `D',
`n', `o', `O' and the subscripts given in brackets
(`[...]').
If a `:' appears in a qualifier list, the remainder of the
expression in parenthesis is interpreted as a modifier (see
the section `Modifiers' in the section `History Expansion').
Each modifier must be introduced by a separate `:'. Note
also that the result after modification does not have to be
an existing file. The name of any existing file can be fol-
lowed by a modifier of the form `(:..)' even if no actual
filename generation is performed, although note that the
presence of the parentheses causes the entire expression to
be subjected to any global pattern matching options such as
NULL_GLOB. Thus:
ls *(-/)
lists all directories and symbolic links that point to
directories, and
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ls *(%W)
lists all world-writable device files in the current direc-
tory, and
ls *(W,X)
lists all files in the current directory that are
world-writable or world-executable, and
echo /tmp/foo*(u0^@:t)
outputs the basename of all root-owned files beginning with
the string `foo' in /tmp, ignoring symlinks, and
ls *.*~(lex|parse).[ch](^D^l1)
lists all files having a link count of one whose names con-
tain a dot (but not those starting with a dot, since
GLOB_DOTS is explicitly switched off) except for lex.c,
lex.h, parse.c and parse.h.
print b*.pro(#q:s/pro/shmo/)(#q.:s/builtin/shmiltin/)
demonstrates how colon modifiers and other qualifiers may be
chained together. The ordinary qualifier `.' is applied
first, then the colon modifiers in order from left to right.
So if EXTENDED_GLOB is set and the base pattern matches the
regular file builtin.pro, the shell will print
`shmiltin.shmo'.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 49
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open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
NAME
zshparam - zsh parameters
DESCRIPTION
A parameter has a name, a value, and a number of attributes.
A name may be any sequence of alphanumeric characters and
underscores, or the single characters `*', `@', `#', `?',
`-', `$', or `!'. The value may be a scalar (a string), an
integer, an array (indexed numerically), or an associative
array (an unordered set of name-value pairs, indexed by
name). To declare the type of a parameter, or to assign a
scalar or integer value to a parameter, use the typeset
builtin.
The value of a scalar or integer parameter may also be
assigned by writing:
name=value
If the integer attribute, -i, is set for name, the value is
subject to arithmetic evaluation. Furthermore, by replacing
`=' with `+=', a parameter can be added or appended to. See
the section `Array Parameters' for additional forms of
assignment.
To refer to the value of a parameter, write `$name' or
`${name}'. See Parameter Expansion in zshexpn(1) for com-
plete details.
In the parameter lists that follow, the mark `<S>' indicates
that the parameter is special. Special parameters cannot
have their type changed or their readonly attribute turned
off, and if a special parameter is unset, then later recre-
ated, the special properties will be retained. `<Z>' indi-
cates that the parameter does not exist when the shell ini-
tializes in sh or ksh emulation mode.
ARRAY PARAMETERS
To assign an array value, write one of:
set -A name value ...
name=(value ...)
If no parameter name exists, an ordinary array parameter is
created. If the parameter name exists and is a scalar, it
is replaced by a new array. Ordinary array parameters may
also be explicitly declared with:
typeset -a name
Associative arrays must be declared before assignment, by
using:
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typeset -A name
When name refers to an associative array, the list in an
assignment is interpreted as alternating keys and values:
set -A name key value ...
name=(key value ...)
Every key must have a value in this case. Note that this
assigns to the entire array, deleting any elements that do
not appear in the list.
To create an empty array (including associative arrays), use
one of:
set -A name
name=()
Array Subscripts
Individual elements of an array may be selected using a sub-
script. A subscript of the form `[exp]' selects the single
element exp, where exp is an arithmetic expression which
will be subject to arithmetic expansion as if it were sur-
rounded by `$((...))'. The elements are numbered beginning
with 1, unless the KSH_ARRAYS option is set in which case
they are numbered from zero.
Subscripts may be used inside braces used to delimit a
parameter name, thus `${foo[2]}' is equivalent to `$foo[2]'.
If the KSH_ARRAYS option is set, the braced form is the only
one that works, as bracketed expressions otherwise are not
treated as subscripts.
If the KSH_ARRAYS option is not set, then by default
accesses to an array element with a subscript that evaluates
to zero return an empty string, while an attempt to write
such an element is treated as an error. For backward com-
patibility the KSH_ZERO_SUBSCRIPT option can be set to cause
subscript values 0 and 1 to be equivalent; see the descrip-
tion of the option in zshoptions(1).
The same subscripting syntax is used for associative arrays,
except that no arithmetic expansion is applied to exp. How-
ever, the parsing rules for arithmetic expressions still
apply, which affects the way that certain special characters
must be protected from interpretation. See Subscript Pars-
ing below for details.
A subscript of the form `[*]' or `[@]' evaluates to all ele-
ments of an array; there is no difference between the two
except when they appear within double quotes. `"$foo[*]"'
evaluates to `"$foo[1] $foo[2] ..."', whereas `"$foo[@]"'
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evaluates to `"$foo[1]" "$foo[2]" ...'. For associative
arrays, `[*]' or `[@]' evaluate to all the values, in no
particular order. Note that this does not substitute the
keys; see the documentation for the `k' flag under Parameter
Expansion Flags in zshexpn(1) for complete details. When an
array parameter is referenced as `$name' (with no subscript)
it evaluates to `$name[*]', unless the KSH_ARRAYS option is
set in which case it evaluates to `${name[0]}' (for an asso-
ciative array, this means the value of the key `0', which
may not exist even if there are values for other keys).
A subscript of the form `[exp1,exp2]' selects all elements
in the range exp1 to exp2, inclusive. (Associative arrays
are unordered, and so do not support ranges.) If one of the
subscripts evaluates to a negative number, say -n, then the
nth element from the end of the array is used. Thus
`$foo[-3]' is the third element from the end of the array
foo, and `$foo[1,-1]' is the same as `$foo[*]'.
Subscripting may also be performed on non-array values, in
which case the subscripts specify a substring to be
extracted. For example, if FOO is set to `foobar', then
`echo $FOO[2,5]' prints `ooba'.
Array Element Assignment
A subscript may be used on the left side of an assignment
like so:
name[exp]=value
In this form of assignment the element or range specified by
exp is replaced by the expression on the right side. An
array (but not an associative array) may be created by
assignment to a range or element. Arrays do not nest, so
assigning a parenthesized list of values to an element or
range changes the number of elements in the array, shifting
the other elements to accommodate the new values. (This is
not supported for associative arrays.)
This syntax also works as an argument to the typeset com-
mand:
typeset "name[exp]"=value
The value may not be a parenthesized list in this case; only
single-element assignments may be made with typeset. Note
that quotes are necessary in this case to prevent the brack-
ets from being interpreted as filename generation operators.
The noglob precommand modifier could be used instead.
To delete an element of an ordinary array, assign `()' to
that element. To delete an element of an associative array,
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use the unset command:
unset "name[exp]"
Subscript Flags
If the opening bracket, or the comma in a range, in any sub-
script expression is directly followed by an opening paren-
thesis, the string up to the matching closing one is consid-
ered to be a list of flags, as in `name[(flags)exp]'.
The flags s, n and b take an argument; the delimiter is
shown below as `:', but any character, or the matching pairs
`(...)', `{...}', `[...]', or `<...>', may be used, but note
that `<...>' can only be used if the subscript is inside a
double quoted expression or a parameter substitution
enclosed in braces as otherwise the expression is inter-
preted as a redirection.
The flags currently understood are:
w If the parameter subscripted is a scalar then this flag
makes subscripting work on words instead of characters.
The default word separator is whitespace. This flag
may not be used with the i or I flag.
s:string:
This gives the string that separates words (for use
with the w flag). The delimiter character : is arbi-
trary; see above.
p Recognize the same escape sequences as the print
builtin in the string argument of a subsequent `s'
flag.
f If the parameter subscripted is a scalar then this flag
makes subscripting work on lines instead of characters,
i.e. with elements separated by newlines. This is a
shorthand for `pws:\n:'.
r Reverse subscripting: if this flag is given, the exp is
taken as a pattern and the result is the first matching
array element, substring or word (if the parameter is
an array, if it is a scalar, or if it is a scalar and
the `w' flag is given, respectively). The subscript
used is the number of the matching element, so that
pairs of subscripts such as `$foo[(r)??,3]' and
`$foo[(r)??,(r)f*]' are possible if the parameter is
not an associative array. If the parameter is an asso-
ciative array, only the value part of each pair is com-
pared to the pattern, and the result is that value.
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If a search through an ordinary array failed, the
search sets the subscript to one past the end of the
array, and hence ${array[(r)pattern]} will substitute
the empty string. Thus the success of a search can be
tested by using the (i) flag, for example (assuming the
option KSH_ARRAYS is not in effect):
[[ ${array[(i)pattern]} -le ${#array} ]]
If KSH_ARRAYS is in effect, the -le should be replaced
by -lt.
R Like `r', but gives the last match. For associative
arrays, gives all possible matches. May be used for
assigning to ordinary array elements, but not for
assigning to associative arrays. On failure, for nor-
mal arrays this has the effect of returning the element
corresponding to subscript 0; this is empty unless one
of the options KSH_ARRAYS or KSH_ZERO_SUBSCRIPT is in
effect.
Note that in subscripts with both `r' and `R' pattern
characters are active even if they were substituted for
a parameter (regardless of the setting of GLOB_SUBST
which controls this feature in normal pattern match-
ing). The flag `e' can be added to inhibit pattern
matching. As this flag does not inhibit other forms of
substitution, care is still required; using a parameter
to hold the key has the desired effect:
key2='original key'
print ${array[(Re)$key2]}
i Like `r', but gives the index of the match instead;
this may not be combined with a second argument. On
the left side of an assignment, behaves like `r'. For
associative arrays, the key part of each pair is com-
pared to the pattern, and the first matching key found
is the result. On failure substitutes the length of
the array plus one, as discussed under the description
of `r', or the empty string for an associative array.
I Like `i', but gives the index of the last match, or all
possible matching keys in an associative array. On
failure substitutes 0, or the empty string for an asso-
ciative array. This flag is best when testing for val-
ues or keys that do not exist.
k If used in a subscript on an associative array, this
flag causes the keys to be interpreted as patterns, and
returns the value for the first key found where exp is
matched by the key. Note this could be any such key as
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no ordering of associative arrays is defined. This
flag does not work on the left side of an assignment to
an associative array element. If used on another type
of parameter, this behaves like `r'.
K On an associative array this is like `k' but returns
all values where exp is matched by the keys. On other
types of parameters this has the same effect as `R'.
n:expr:
If combined with `r', `R', `i' or `I', makes them give
the nth or nth last match (if expr evaluates to n).
This flag is ignored when the array is associative.
The delimiter character : is arbitrary; see above.
b:expr:
If combined with `r', `R', `i' or `I', makes them begin
at the nth or nth last element, word, or character (if
expr evaluates to n). This flag is ignored when the
array is associative. The delimiter character : is
arbitrary; see above.
e This flag causes any pattern matching that would be
performed on the subscript to use plain string matching
instead. Hence `${array[(re)*]}' matches only the
array element whose value is *. Note that other forms
of substitution such as parameter substitution are not
inhibited.
This flag can also be used to force * or @ to be inter-
preted as a single key rather than as a reference to
all values. It may be used for either purpose on the
left side of an assignment.
See Parameter Expansion Flags (zshexpn(1)) for additional
ways to manipulate the results of array subscripting.
Subscript Parsing
This discussion applies mainly to associative array key
strings and to patterns used for reverse subscripting (the
`r', `R', `i', etc. flags), but it may also affect parameter
substitutions that appear as part of an arithmetic expres-
sion in an ordinary subscript.
It is possible to avoid the use of subscripts in assignments
to associative array elements by using the syntax:
aa+=('key with "*strange*" characters' 'value string')
This adds a new key/value pair if the key is not already
present, and replaces the value for the existing key if it
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is.
The basic rule to remember when writing a subscript expres-
sion is that all text between the opening `[' and the clos-
ing `]' is interpreted as if it were in double quotes (see
zshmisc(1)). However, unlike double quotes which normally
cannot nest, subscript expressions may appear inside dou-
ble-quoted strings or inside other subscript expressions (or
both!), so the rules have two important differences.
The first difference is that brackets (`[' and `]') must
appear as balanced pairs in a subscript expression unless
they are preceded by a backslash (`\'). Therefore, within a
subscript expression (and unlike true double-quoting) the
sequence `\[' becomes `[', and similarly `\]' becomes `]'.
This applies even in cases where a backslash is not normally
required; for example, the pattern `[^[]' (to match any
character other than an open bracket) should be written
`[^\[]' in a reverse-subscript pattern. However, note that
`\[^\[\]' and even `\[^[]' mean the same thing, because
backslashes are always stripped when they appear before
brackets!
The same rule applies to parentheses (`(' and `)') and
braces (`{' and `}'): they must appear either in balanced
pairs or preceded by a backslash, and backslashes that pro-
tect parentheses or braces are removed during parsing. This
is because parameter expansions may be surrounded by bal-
anced braces, and subscript flags are introduced by balanced
parentheses.
The second difference is that a double-quote (`"') may
appear as part of a subscript expression without being pre-
ceded by a backslash, and therefore that the two characters
`\"' remain as two characters in the subscript (in true dou-
ble-quoting, `\"' becomes `"'). However, because of the
standard shell quoting rules, any double-quotes that appear
must occur in balanced pairs unless preceded by a backslash.
This makes it more difficult to write a subscript expression
that contains an odd number of double-quote characters, but
the reason for this difference is so that when a subscript
expression appears inside true double-quotes, one can still
write `\"' (rather than `\\\"') for `"'.
To use an odd number of double quotes as a key in an assign-
ment, use the typeset builtin and an enclosing pair of dou-
ble quotes; to refer to the value of that key, again use
double quotes:
typeset -A aa
typeset "aa[one\"two\"three\"quotes]"=QQQ
print "$aa[one\"two\"three\"quotes]"
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It is important to note that the quoting rules do not change
when a parameter expansion with a subscript is nested inside
another subscript expression. That is, it is not necessary
to use additional backslashes within the inner subscript
expression; they are removed only once, from the innermost
subscript outwards. Parameters are also expanded from the
innermost subscript first, as each expansion is encountered
left to right in the outer expression.
A further complication arises from a way in which subscript
parsing is not different from double quote parsing. As in
true double-quoting, the sequences `\*', and `\@' remain as
two characters when they appear in a subscript expression.
To use a literal `*' or `@' as an associative array key, the
`e' flag must be used:
typeset -A aa
aa[(e)*]=star
print $aa[(e)*]
A last detail must be considered when reverse subscripting
is performed. Parameters appearing in the subscript expres-
sion are first expanded and then the complete expression is
interpreted as a pattern. This has two effects: first,
parameters behave as if GLOB_SUBST were on (and it cannot be
turned off); second, backslashes are interpreted twice, once
when parsing the array subscript and again when parsing the
pattern. In a reverse subscript, it's necessary to use four
backslashes to cause a single backslash to match literally
in the pattern. For complex patterns, it is often easiest
to assign the desired pattern to a parameter and then refer
to that parameter in the subscript, because then the back-
slashes, brackets, parentheses, etc., are seen only when the
complete expression is converted to a pattern. To match the
value of a parameter literally in a reverse subscript,
rather than as a pattern, use `${(q)name}' (see zshexpn(1))
to quote the expanded value.
Note that the `k' and `K' flags are reverse subscripting for
an ordinary array, but are not reverse subscripting for an
associative array! (For an associative array, the keys in
the array itself are interpreted as patterns by those flags;
the subscript is a plain string in that case.)
One final note, not directly related to subscripting: the
numeric names of positional parameters (described below) are
parsed specially, so for example `$2foo' is equivalent to
`${2}foo'. Therefore, to use subscript syntax to extract a
substring from a positional parameter, the expansion must be
surrounded by braces; for example, `${2[3,5]}' evaluates to
the third through fifth characters of the second positional
parameter, but `$2[3,5]' is the entire second parameter
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concatenated with the filename generation pattern `[3,5]'.
POSITIONAL PARAMETERS
The positional parameters provide access to the command-line
arguments of a shell function, shell script, or the shell
itself; see the section `Invocation', and also the section
`Functions'. The parameter n, where n is a number, is the
nth positional parameter. The parameter `$0' is a special
case, see the section `Parameters Set By The Shell'.
The parameters *, @ and argv are arrays containing all the
positional parameters; thus `$argv[n]', etc., is equivalent
to simply `$n'. Note that the options KSH_ARRAYS or
KSH_ZERO_SUBSCRIPT apply to these arrays as well, so with
either of those options set, `${argv[0]}' is equivalent to
`$1' and so on.
Positional parameters may be changed after the shell or
function starts by using the set builtin, by assigning to
the argv array, or by direct assignment of the form
`n=value' where n is the number of the positional parameter
to be changed. This also creates (with empty values) any of
the positions from 1 to n that do not already have values.
Note that, because the positional parameters form an array,
an array assignment of the form `n=(value ...)' is allowed,
and has the effect of shifting all the values at positions
greater than n by as many positions as necessary to accommo-
date the new values.
LOCAL PARAMETERS
Shell function executions delimit scopes for shell parame-
ters. (Parameters are dynamically scoped.) The typeset
builtin, and its alternative forms declare, integer, local
and readonly (but not export), can be used to declare a
parameter as being local to the innermost scope.
When a parameter is read or assigned to, the innermost
existing parameter of that name is used. (That is, the
local parameter hides any less-local parameter.) However,
assigning to a non-existent parameter, or declaring a new
parameter with export, causes it to be created in the outer-
most scope.
Local parameters disappear when their scope ends. unset can
be used to delete a parameter while it is still in scope;
any outer parameter of the same name remains hidden.
Special parameters may also be made local; they retain their
special attributes unless either the existing or the
newly-created parameter has the -h (hide) attribute. This
may have unexpected effects: there is no default value, so
if there is no assignment at the point the variable is made
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local, it will be set to an empty value (or zero in the case
of integers). The following:
typeset PATH=/new/directory:$PATH
is valid for temporarily allowing the shell or programmes
called from it to find the programs in /new/directory inside
a function.
Note that the restriction in older versions of zsh that
local parameters were never exported has been removed.
PARAMETERS SET BY THE SHELL
The following parameters are automatically set by the shell:
! <S>
The process ID of the last command started in the back-
ground with &, or put into the background with the bg
builtin.
# <S>
The number of positional parameters in decimal. Note
that some confusion may occur with the syntax $#param
which substitutes the length of param. Use ${#} to
resolve ambiguities. In particular, the sequence
`$#-...' in an arithmetic expression is interpreted as
the length of the parameter -, q.v.
ARGC <S> <Z>
Same as #.
$ <S>
The process ID of this shell. Note that this indicates
the original shell started by invoking zsh; all pro-
cesses forked from the shells without executing a new
program, such as subshells started by (...), substitute
the same value.
- <S>
Flags supplied to the shell on invocation or by the set
or setopt commands.
* <S>
An array containing the positional parameters.
argv <S> <Z>
Same as *. Assigning to argv changes the local posi-
tional parameters, but argv is not itself a local
parameter. Deleting argv with unset in any function
deletes it everywhere, although only the innermost
positional parameter array is deleted (so * and @ in
other scopes are not affected).
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@ <S>
Same as argv[@], even when argv is not set.
? <S>
The exit status returned by the last command.
0 <S>
The name used to invoke the current shell. If the
FUNCTION_ARGZERO option is set, this is set temporarily
within a shell function to the name of the function,
and within a sourced script to the name of the script.
status <S> <Z>
Same as ?.
pipestatus <S> <Z>
An array containing the exit statuses returned by all
commands in the last pipeline.
_ <S>
The last argument of the previous command. Also, this
parameter is set in the environment of every command
executed to the full pathname of the command.
CPUTYPE
The machine type (microprocessor class or machine
model), as determined at run time.
EGID <S>
The effective group ID of the shell process. If you
have sufficient privileges, you may change the effec-
tive group ID of the shell process by assigning to this
parameter. Also (assuming sufficient privileges), you
may start a single command with a different effective
group ID by `(EGID=gid; command)'
EUID <S>
The effective user ID of the shell process. If you
have sufficient privileges, you may change the effec-
tive user ID of the shell process by assigning to this
parameter. Also (assuming sufficient privileges), you
may start a single command with a different effective
user ID by `(EUID=uid; command)'
ERRNO <S>
The value of errno (see errno(3)) as set by the most
recently failed system call. This value is system
dependent and is intended for debugging purposes. It
is also useful with the zsh/system module which allows
the number to be turned into a name or message.
GID <S>
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The real group ID of the shell process. If you have
sufficient privileges, you may change the group ID of
the shell process by assigning to this parameter. Also
(assuming sufficient privileges), you may start a sin-
gle command under a different group ID by `(GID=gid;
command)'
HISTCMD
The current history line number in an interactive
shell, in other words the line number for the command
that caused $HISTCMD to be read.
HOST The current hostname.
LINENO <S>
The line number of the current line within the current
script, sourced file, or shell function being executed,
whichever was started most recently. Note that in the
case of shell functions the line number refers to the
function as it appeared in the original definition, not
necessarily as displayed by the functions builtin.
LOGNAME
If the corresponding variable is not set in the envi-
ronment of the shell, it is initialized to the login
name corresponding to the current login session. This
parameter is exported by default but this can be dis-
abled using the typeset builtin.
MACHTYPE
The machine type (microprocessor class or machine
model), as determined at compile time.
OLDPWD
The previous working directory. This is set when the
shell initializes and whenever the directory changes.
OPTARG <S>
The value of the last option argument processed by the
getopts command.
OPTIND <S>
The index of the last option argument processed by the
getopts command.
OSTYPE
The operating system, as determined at compile time.
PPID <S>
The process ID of the parent of the shell. As for $$,
the value indicates the parent of the original shell
and does not change in subshells.
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PWD The present working directory. This is set when the
shell initializes and whenever the directory changes.
RANDOM <S>
A pseudo-random integer from 0 to 32767, newly gener-
ated each time this parameter is referenced. The ran-
dom number generator can be seeded by assigning a
numeric value to RANDOM.
The values of RANDOM form an intentionally-repeatable
pseudo-random sequence; subshells that reference RANDOM
will result in identical pseudo-random values unless
the value of RANDOM is referenced or seeded in the par-
ent shell in between subshell invocations.
SECONDS <S>
The number of seconds since shell invocation. If this
parameter is assigned a value, then the value returned
upon reference will be the value that was assigned plus
the number of seconds since the assignment.
Unlike other special parameters, the type of the SEC-
ONDS parameter can be changed using the typeset com-
mand. Only integer and one of the floating point types
are allowed. For example, `typeset -F SECONDS' causes
the value to be reported as a floating point number.
The value is available to microsecond accuracy,
although the shell may show more or fewer digits
depending on the use of typeset. See the documentation
for the builtin typeset in zshbuiltins(1) for more
details.
SHLVL <S>
Incremented by one each time a new shell is started.
signals
An array containing the names of the signals.
TRY_BLOCK_ERROR <S>
In an always block, indicates whether the preceding
list of code caused an error. The value is 1 to indi-
cate an error, 0 otherwise. It may be reset, clearing
the error condition. See Complex Commands in zsh-
misc(1)
TTY The name of the tty associated with the shell, if any.
TTYIDLE <S>
The idle time of the tty associated with the shell in
seconds or -1 if there is no such tty.
UID <S>
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The real user ID of the shell process. If you have
sufficient privileges, you may change the user ID of
the shell by assigning to this parameter. Also (assum-
ing sufficient privileges), you may start a single com-
mand under a different user ID by `(UID=uid; command)'
USERNAME <S>
The username corresponding to the real user ID of the
shell process. If you have sufficient privileges, you
may change the username (and also the user ID and group
ID) of the shell by assigning to this parameter. Also
(assuming sufficient privileges), you may start a sin-
gle command under a different username (and user ID and
group ID) by `(USERNAME=username; command)'
VENDOR
The vendor, as determined at compile time.
zsh_eval_context <S> <Z> (ZSH_EVAL_CONTEXT <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) indicating the context
of shell code that is being run. Each time a piece of
shell code that is stored within the shell is executed
a string is temporarily appended to the array to indi-
cate the type of operation that is being performed.
Read in order the array gives an indication of the
stack of operations being performed with the most imme-
diate context last.
Note that the variable does not give information on
syntactic context such as pipelines or subshells. Use
$ZSH_SUBSHELL to detect subshells.
The context is one of the following:
cmdarg
Code specified by the -c option to the command
line that invoked the shell.
cmdsubst
Command substitution using the `...` or $(...)
construct.
equalsubst
File substitution using the =(...) construct.
eval Code executed by the eval builtin.
evalautofunc
Code executed with the KSH_AUTOLOAD mechanism in
order to define an autoloaded function.
fc Code from the shell history executed by the -e
option to the fc builtin.
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file Lines of code being read directly from a file, for
example by the source builtin.
filecode
Lines of code being read from a .zwc file instead
of directly from the source file.
globqual
Code executed by the e or + glob qualifier.
globsort
Code executed to order files by the o glob quali-
fier.
insubst
File substitution using the <(...) construct.
loadautofunc
Code read directly from a file to define an
autoloaded function.
outsubst
File substitution using the >(...) construct.
sched
Code executed by the sched builtin.
shfunc
A shell function.
stty Code passed to stty by the STTY environment vari-
able. Normally this is passed directly to the
system's stty command, so this value is unlikely
to be seen in practice.
style
Code executed as part of a style retrieved by the
zstyle builtin from the zsh/zutil module.
toplevel
The highest execution level of a script or inter-
active shell.
trap Code executed as a trap defined by the trap
builtin. Traps defined as functions have the con-
text shfunc. As traps are asynchronous they may
have a different hierarchy from other code.
zpty Code executed by the zpty builtin from the
zsh/zpty module.
zregexparse-guard
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Code executed as a guard by the zregexparse com-
mand from the zsh/zutil module.
zregexparse-action
Code executed as an action by the zregexparse com-
mand from the zsh/zutil module.
ZSH_NAME
Expands to the basename of the command used to invoke
this instance of zsh.
ZSH_PATCHLEVEL
The revision string for the version number of the
ChangeLog file in the zsh distribution. This is most
useful in order to keep track of versions of the shell
during development between releases; hence most users
should not use it and should instead rely on $ZSH_VER-
SION.
zsh_scheduled_events
See the section `The zsh/sched Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
ZSH_SUBSHELL
Readonly integer. Initially zero, incremented each
time the shell forks to create a subshell for executing
code. Hence `(print $ZSH_SUBSHELL)' and `print $(print
$ZSH_SUBSHELL)' output 1, while `( (print $ZSH_SUB-
SHELL) )' outputs 2.
ZSH_VERSION
The version number of the release of zsh.
PARAMETERS USED BY THE SHELL
The following parameters are used by the shell.
In cases where there are two parameters with an upper- and
lowercase form of the same name, such as path and PATH, the
lowercase form is an array and the uppercase form is a
scalar with the elements of the array joined together by
colons. These are similar to tied parameters created via
`typeset -T'. The normal use for the colon-separated form
is for exporting to the environment, while the array form is
easier to manipulate within the shell. Note that unsetting
either of the pair will unset the other; they retain their
special properties when recreated, and recreating one of the
pair will recreate the other.
ARGV0
If exported, its value is used as the argv[0] of exter-
nal commands. Usually used in constructs like
`ARGV0=emacs nethack'.
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BAUD The rate in bits per second at which data reaches the
terminal. The line editor will use this value in order
to compensate for a slow terminal by delaying updates
to the display until necessary. If the parameter is
unset or the value is zero the compensation mechanism
is turned off. The parameter is not set by default.
This parameter may be profitably set in some circum-
stances, e.g. for slow modems dialing into a communi-
cations server, or on a slow wide area network. It
should be set to the baud rate of the slowest part of
the link for best performance.
cdpath <S> <Z> (CDPATH <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) of directories specify-
ing the search path for the cd command.
COLUMNS <S>
The number of columns for this terminal session. Used
for printing select lists and for the line editor.
CORRECT_IGNORE
If set, is treated as a pattern during spelling correc-
tion. Any potential correction that matches the pat-
tern is ignored. For example, if the value is `_*'
then completion functions (which, by convention, have
names beginning with `_') will never be offered as
spelling corrections. The pattern does not apply to
the correction of file names, as applied by the COR-
RECT_ALL option (so with the example just given files
beginning with `_' in the current directory would still
be completed).
DIRSTACKSIZE
The maximum size of the directory stack, by default
there is no limit. If the stack gets larger than this,
it will be truncated automatically. This is useful
with the AUTO_PUSHD option.
ENV If the ENV environment variable is set when zsh is
invoked as sh or ksh, $ENV is sourced after the profile
scripts. The value of ENV is subjected to parameter
expansion, command substitution, and arithmetic expan-
sion before being interpreted as a pathname. Note that
ENV is not used unless zsh is emulating sh or ksh.
FCEDIT
The default editor for the fc builtin. If FCEDIT is
not set, the parameter EDITOR is used; if that is not
set either, a builtin default, usually vi, is used.
fignore <S> <Z> (FIGNORE <S>)
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An array (colon separated list) containing the suffixes
of files to be ignored during filename completion.
However, if completion only generates files with suf-
fixes in this list, then these files are completed any-
way.
fpath <S> <Z> (FPATH <S>)
An array (colon separated list) of directories specify-
ing the search path for function definitions. This
path is searched when a function with the -u attribute
is referenced. If an executable file is found, then it
is read and executed in the current environment.
histchars <S>
Three characters used by the shell's history and lexi-
cal analysis mechanism. The first character signals
the start of a history expansion (default `!'). The
second character signals the start of a quick history
substitution (default `^'). The third character is the
comment character (default `#').
The characters must be in the ASCII character set; any
attempt to set histchars to characters with a
locale-dependent meaning will be rejected with an error
message.
HISTCHARS <S> <Z>
Same as histchars. (Deprecated.)
HISTFILE
The file to save the history in when an interactive
shell exits. If unset, the history is not saved.
HISTORY_IGNORE
If set, is treated as a pattern at the time history
files are written. Any potential history entry that
matches the pattern is skipped. For example, if the
value is `fc *' then commands that invoke the interac-
tive history editor are never written to the history
file (compare the HIST_NO_STORE option or the zshad-
dhistory hook, either of which would prevent such com-
mands from being added to the interactive history at
all).
HISTSIZE <S>
The maximum number of events stored in the internal
history list. If you use the HIST_EXPIRE_DUPS_FIRST
option, setting this value larger than the SAVEHIST
size will give you the difference as a cushion for sav-
ing duplicated history events.
HOME <S>
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The default argument for the cd command. This is not
set automatically by the shell in sh, ksh or csh emula-
tion, but it is typically present in the environment
anyway, and if it becomes set it has its usual special
behaviour.
IFS <S>
Internal field separators (by default space, tab, new-
line and NUL), that are used to separate words which
result from command or parameter expansion and words
read by the read builtin. Any characters from the set
space, tab and newline that appear in the IFS are
called IFS white space. One or more IFS white space
characters or one non-IFS white space character
together with any adjacent IFS white space character
delimit a field. If an IFS white space character
appears twice consecutively in the IFS, this character
is treated as if it were not an IFS white space charac-
ter.
If the parameter is unset, the default is used. Note
this has a different effect from setting the parameter
to an empty string.
KEYBOARD_HACK
This variable defines a character to be removed from
the end of the command line before interpreting it
(interactive shells only). It is intended to fix the
problem with keys placed annoyingly close to return and
replaces the SUNKEYBOARDHACK option which did this for
backquotes only. Should the chosen character be one of
singlequote, doublequote or backquote, there must also
be an odd number of them on the command line for the
last one to be removed.
For backward compabitility, if the SUNKEYBOARDHACK
option is explicitly set, the value of KEYBOARD_HACK
reverts to backquote. If the option is explicitly
unset, this variable is set to empty.
KEYTIMEOUT
The time the shell waits, in hundredths of seconds, for
another key to be pressed when reading bound
multi-character sequences.
LANG <S>
This variable determines the locale category for any
category not specifically selected via a variable
starting with `LC_'.
LC_ALL <S>
This variable overrides the value of the `LANG'
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variable and the value of any of the other variables
starting with `LC_'.
LC_COLLATE <S>
This variable determines the locale category for char-
acter collation information within ranges in glob
brackets and for sorting.
LC_CTYPE <S>
This variable determines the locale category for char-
acter handling functions. If the MULTIBYTE option is
in effect this variable or LANG should contain a value
that reflects the character set in use, even if it is a
single-byte character set, unless only the 7-bit subset
(ASCII) is used. For example, if the character set is
ISO-8859-1, a suitable value might be en_US.iso88591
(certain Linux distributions) or en_US.ISO8859-1
(MacOS).
LC_MESSAGES <S>
This variable determines the language in which messages
should be written. Note that zsh does not use message
catalogs.
LC_NUMERIC <S>
This variable affects the decimal point character and
thousands separator character for the formatted
input/output functions and string conversion functions.
Note that zsh ignores this setting when parsing float-
ing point mathematical expressions.
LC_TIME <S>
This variable determines the locale category for date
and time formatting in prompt escape sequences.
LINES <S>
The number of lines for this terminal session. Used
for printing select lists and for the line editor.
LISTMAX
In the line editor, the number of matches to list with-
out asking first. If the value is negative, the list
will be shown if it spans at most as many lines as
given by the absolute value. If set to zero, the shell
asks only if the top of the listing would scroll off
the screen.
LOGCHECK
The interval in seconds between checks for login/logout
activity using the watch parameter.
MAIL If this parameter is set and mailpath is not set, the
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shell looks for mail in the specified file.
MAILCHECK
The interval in seconds between checks for new mail.
mailpath <S> <Z> (MAILPATH <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) of filenames to check
for new mail. Each filename can be followed by a `?'
and a message that will be printed. The message will
undergo parameter expansion, command substitution and
arithmetic expansion with the variable $_ defined as
the name of the file that has changed. The default
message is `You have new mail'. If an element is a
directory instead of a file the shell will recursively
check every file in every subdirectory of the element.
manpath <S> <Z> (MANPATH <S> <Z>)
An array (colon-separated list) whose value is not used
by the shell. The manpath array can be useful, how-
ever, since setting it also sets MANPATH, and vice
versa.
match
mbegin
mend Arrays set by the shell when the b globbing flag is
used in pattern matches. See the subsection Globbing
flags in the documentation for Filename Generation in
zshexpn(1).
MATCH
MBEGIN
MEND Set by the shell when the m globbing flag is used in
pattern matches. See the subsection Globbing flags in
the documentation for Filename Generation in zsh-
expn(1).
module_path <S> <Z> (MODULE_PATH <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) of directories that
zmodload searches for dynamically loadable modules.
This is initialized to a standard pathname, usually
`/usr/local/lib/zsh/$ZSH_VERSION'. (The
`/usr/local/lib' part varies from installation to
installation.) For security reasons, any value set in
the environment when the shell is started will be
ignored.
These parameters only exist if the installation sup-
ports dynamic module loading.
NULLCMD <S>
The command name to assume if a redirection is speci-
fied with no command. Defaults to cat. For sh/ksh
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
behavior, change this to :. For csh-like behavior,
unset this parameter; the shell will print an error
message if null commands are entered.
path <S> <Z> (PATH <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) of directories to
search for commands. When this parameter is set, each
directory is scanned and all files found are put in a
hash table.
POSTEDIT <S>
This string is output whenever the line editor exits.
It usually contains termcap strings to reset the termi-
nal.
PROMPT <S> <Z>
PROMPT2 <S> <Z>
PROMPT3 <S> <Z>
PROMPT4 <S> <Z>
Same as PS1, PS2, PS3 and PS4, respectively.
prompt <S> <Z>
Same as PS1.
PROMPT_EOL_MARK
When the PROMPT_CR and PROMPT_SP options are set, the
PROMPT_EOL_MARK parameter can be used to customize how
the end of partial lines are shown. This parameter
undergoes prompt expansion, with the PROMPT_PERCENT
option set. If not set, the default behavior is equiv-
alent to the value `%B%S%#%s%b'.
PS1 <S>
The primary prompt string, printed before a command is
read. It undergoes a special form of expansion before
being displayed; see EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in
zshmisc(1). The default is `%m%# '.
PS2 <S>
The secondary prompt, printed when the shell needs more
information to complete a command. It is expanded in
the same way as PS1. The default is `%_> ', which dis-
plays any shell constructs or quotation marks which are
currently being processed.
PS3 <S>
Selection prompt used within a select loop. It is
expanded in the same way as PS1. The default is `?# '.
PS4 <S>
The execution trace prompt. Default is `+%N:%i> ',
which displays the name of the current shell structure
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
and the line number within it. In sh or ksh emulation,
the default is `+ '.
psvar <S> <Z> (PSVAR <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) whose elements can be
used in PROMPT strings. Setting psvar also sets PSVAR,
and vice versa.
READNULLCMD <S>
The command name to assume if a single input redirect-
ion is specified with no command. Defaults to more.
REPORTTIME
If nonnegative, commands whose combined user and system
execution times (measured in seconds) are greater than
this value have timing statistics printed for them.
Output is suppressed for commands executed within the
line editor, including completion; commands explicitly
marked with the time keyword still cause the summary to
be printed in this case.
REPLY
This parameter is reserved by convention to pass string
values between shell scripts and shell builtins in sit-
uations where a function call or redirection are impos-
sible or undesirable. The read builtin and the select
complex command may set REPLY, and filename generation
both sets and examines its value when evaluating cer-
tain expressions. Some modules also employ REPLY for
similar purposes.
reply
As REPLY, but for array values rather than strings.
RPROMPT <S>
RPS1 <S>
This prompt is displayed on the right-hand side of the
screen when the primary prompt is being displayed on
the left. This does not work if the SINGLE_LINE_ZLE
option is set. It is expanded in the same way as PS1.
RPROMPT2 <S>
RPS2 <S>
This prompt is displayed on the right-hand side of the
screen when the secondary prompt is being displayed on
the left. This does not work if the SINGLE_LINE_ZLE
option is set. It is expanded in the same way as PS2.
SAVEHIST
The maximum number of history events to save in the
history file.
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SPROMPT <S>
The prompt used for spelling correction. The sequence
`%R' expands to the string which presumably needs
spelling correction, and `%r' expands to the proposed
correction. All other prompt escapes are also allowed.
STTY If this parameter is set in a command's environment,
the shell runs the stty command with the value of this
parameter as arguments in order to set up the terminal
before executing the command. The modes apply only to
the command, and are reset when it finishes or is sus-
pended. If the command is suspended and continued later
with the fg or wait builtins it will see the modes
specified by STTY, as if it were not suspended. This
(intentionally) does not apply if the command is con-
tinued via `kill -CONT'. STTY is ignored if the com-
mand is run in the background, or if it is in the envi-
ronment of the shell but not explicitly assigned to in
the input line. This avoids running stty at every
external command by accidentally exporting it. Also
note that STTY should not be used for window size spec-
ifications; these will not be local to the command.
TERM <S>
The type of terminal in use. This is used when looking
up termcap sequences. An assignment to TERM causes zsh
to re-initialize the terminal, even if the value does
not change (e.g., `TERM=$TERM'). It is necessary to
make such an assignment upon any change to the terminal
definition database or terminal type in order for the
new settings to take effect.
TERMINFO <S>
A reference to a compiled description of the terminal,
used by the `terminfo' library when the system has it;
see terminfo(5). If set, this causes the shell to
reinitialise the terminal, making the workaround
`TERM=$TERM' unnecessary.
TIMEFMT
The format of process time reports with the time key-
word. The default is `%J %U user %S system %P cpu %*E
total'. Recognizes the following escape sequences,
although not all may be available on all systems, and
some that are available may not be useful:
%% A `%'.
%U CPU seconds spent in user mode.
%S CPU seconds spent in kernel mode.
%E Elapsed time in seconds.
%P The CPU percentage, computed as (100*%U+%S)/%E.
%W Number of times the process was swapped.
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
%X The average amount in (shared) text space used in
kilobytes.
%D The average amount in (unshared) data/stack space
used in kilobytes.
%K The total space used (%X+%D) in kilobytes.
%M The maximum memory the process had in use at any
time in megabytes.
%F The number of major page faults (page needed to be
brought from disk).
%R The number of minor page faults.
%I The number of input operations.
%O The number of output operations.
%r The number of socket messages received.
%s The number of socket messages sent.
%k The number of signals received.
%w Number of voluntary context switches (waits).
%c Number of involuntary context switches.
%J The name of this job.
A star may be inserted between the percent sign and
flags printing time. This cause the time to be printed
in `hh:mm:ss.ttt' format (hours and minutes are only
printed if they are not zero).
TMOUT
If this parameter is nonzero, the shell will receive an
ALRM signal if a command is not entered within the
specified number of seconds after issuing a prompt. If
there is a trap on SIGALRM, it will be executed and a
new alarm is scheduled using the value of the TMOUT
parameter after executing the trap. If no trap is set,
and the idle time of the terminal is not less than the
value of the TMOUT parameter, zsh terminates. Other-
wise a new alarm is scheduled to TMOUT seconds after
the last keypress.
TMPPREFIX
A pathname prefix which the shell will use for all tem-
porary files. Note that this should include an initial
part for the file name as well as any directory names.
The default is `/tmp/zsh'.
watch <S> <Z> (WATCH <S>)
An array (colon-separated list) of login/logout events
to report. If it contains the single word `all', then
all login/logout events are reported. If it contains
the single word `notme', then all events are reported
as with `all' except $USERNAME. An entry in this list
may consist of a username, an `@' followed by a remote
hostname, and a `%' followed by a line (tty). Any or
all of these components may be present in an entry; if
a login/logout event matches all of them, it is
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
reported.
WATCHFMT
The format of login/logout reports if the watch parame-
ter is set. Default is `%n has %a %l from %m'. Recog-
nizes the following escape sequences:
%n The name of the user that logged in/out.
%a The observed action, i.e. "logged on" or "logged
off".
%l The line (tty) the user is logged in on.
%M The full hostname of the remote host.
%m The hostname up to the first `.'. If only the IP
address is available or the utmp field contains
the name of an X-windows display, the whole name
is printed.
NOTE: The `%m' and `%M' escapes will work only if
there is a host name field in the utmp on your
machine. Otherwise they are treated as ordinary
strings.
%S (%s)
Start (stop) standout mode.
%U (%u)
Start (stop) underline mode.
%B (%b)
Start (stop) boldface mode.
%t
%@ The time, in 12-hour, am/pm format.
%T The time, in 24-hour format.
%w The date in `day-dd' format.
%W The date in `mm/dd/yy' format.
%D The date in `yy-mm-dd' format.
%(x:true-text:false-text)
Specifies a ternary expression. The character
following the x is arbitrary; the same character
is used to separate the text for the "true" result
from that for the "false" result. Both the sepa-
rator and the right parenthesis may be escaped
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with a backslash. Ternary expressions may be
nested.
The test character x may be any one of `l', `n',
`m' or `M', which indicate a `true' result if the
corresponding escape sequence would return a
non-empty value; or it may be `a', which indicates
a `true' result if the watched user has logged in,
or `false' if he has logged out. Other characters
evaluate to neither true nor false; the entire
expression is omitted in this case.
If the result is `true', then the true-text is
formatted according to the rules above and
printed, and the false-text is skipped. If
`false', the true-text is skipped and the
false-text is formatted and printed. Either or
both of the branches may be empty, but both sepa-
rators must be present in any case.
WORDCHARS <S>
A list of non-alphanumeric characters considered part of a
word by the line editor.
ZBEEP
If set, this gives a string of characters, which can use all
the same codes as the bindkey command as described in the
zsh/zle module entry in zshmodules(1), that will be output
to the terminal instead of beeping. This may have a visible
instead of an audible effect; for example, the string
`\e[?5h\e[?5l' on a vt100 or xterm will have the effect of
flashing reverse video on and off (if you usually use
reverse video, you should use the string `\e[?5l\e[?5h'
instead). This takes precedence over the NOBEEP option.
ZDOTDIR
The directory to search for shell startup files (.zshrc,
etc), if not $HOME.
ZLE_LINE_ABORTED
This parameter is set by the line editor when an error
occurs. It contains the line that was being edited at the
point of the error. `print -zr -- $ZLE_LINE_ABORTED' can be
used to recover the line. Only the most recent line of this
kind is remembered.
ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS
ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS
These parameters are used by the line editor. In certain
circumstances suffixes (typically space or slash) added by
the completion system will be removed automatically, either
because the next editing command was not an insertable
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User Commands ZSHPARAM(1)
character, or because the character was marked as requiring
the suffix to be removed.
These variables can contain the sets of characters that will
cause the suffix to be removed. If ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS
is set, those characters will cause the suffix to be
removed; if ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS is set, those characters
will cause the suffix to be removed and replaced by a space.
If ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS is not set, the default behaviour
is equivalent to:
ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS=$' \t\n;&|'
If ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS is set but is empty, no charac-
ters have this behaviour. ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS takes
precedence, so that the following:
ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS=$'&|'
causes the characters `&' and `|' to remove the suffix but
to replace it with a space.
To illustrate the difference, suppose that the option
AUTO_REMOVE_SLASH is in effect and the directory DIR has
just been completed, with an appended /, following which the
user types `&'. The default result is `DIR&'. With
ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS set but without including `&' the
result is `DIR/&'. With ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS set to
include `&' the result is `DIR &'.
Note that certain completions may provide their own suffix
removal or replacement behaviour which overrides the values
described here. See the completion system documentation in
zshcompsys(1).
ZLE_RPROMPT_INDENT <S>
If set, used to give the indentation between the right hand
side of the right prompt in the line editor as given by RPS1
or RPROMPT and the right hand side of the screen. If not
set, the value 1 is used.
Typically this will be used to set the value to 0 so that
the prompt appears flush with the right hand side of the
screen. This is not the default as many terminals do not
handle this correctly, in particular when the prompt appears
at the extreme bottom right of the screen. Recent virtual
terminals are more likely to handle this case correctly.
Some experimentation is necessary.
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ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 29
User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
NAME
zshoptions - zsh options
SPECIFYING OPTIONS
Options are primarily referred to by name. These names are
case insensitive and underscores are ignored. For example,
`allexport' is equivalent to `A__lleXP_ort'.
The sense of an option name may be inverted by preceding it
with `no', so `setopt No_Beep' is equivalent to `unsetopt
beep'. This inversion can only be done once, so `nonobeep'
is not a synonym for `beep'. Similarly, `tify' is not a
synonym for `nonotify' (the inversion of `notify').
Some options also have one or more single letter names.
There are two sets of single letter options: one used by
default, and another used to emulate sh/ksh (used when the
SH_OPTION_LETTERS option is set). The single letter options
can be used on the shell command line, or with the set,
setopt and unsetopt builtins, as normal Unix options pre-
ceded by `-'.
The sense of the single letter options may be inverted by
using `+' instead of `-'. Some of the single letter option
names refer to an option being off, in which case the inver-
sion of that name refers to the option being on. For exam-
ple, `+n' is the short name of `exec', and `-n' is the short
name of its inversion, `noexec'.
In strings of single letter options supplied to the shell at
startup, trailing whitespace will be ignored; for example
the string `-f ' will be treated just as `-f', but the
string `-f i' is an error. This is because many systems
which implement the `#!' mechanism for calling scripts do
not strip trailing whitespace.
DESCRIPTION OF OPTIONS
In the following list, options set by default in all emula-
tions are marked <D>; those set by default only in csh, ksh,
sh, or zsh emulations are marked <C>, <K>, <S>, <Z> as
appropriate. When listing options (by `setopt', `unsetopt',
`set -o' or `set +o'), those turned on by default appear in
the list prefixed with `no'. Hence (unless KSH_OPTION_PRINT
is set), `setopt' shows all options whose settings are
changed from the default.
Changing Directories
AUTO_CD (-J)
If a command is issued that can't be executed as a nor-
mal command, and the command is the name of a direc-
tory, perform the cd command to that directory.
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AUTO_PUSHD (-N)
Make cd push the old directory onto the directory
stack.
CDABLE_VARS (-T)
If the argument to a cd command (or an implied cd with
the AUTO_CD option set) is not a directory, and does
not begin with a slash, try to expand the expression as
if it were preceded by a `~' (see the section `Filename
Expansion').
CHASE_DOTS
When changing to a directory containing a path segment
`..' which would otherwise be treated as canceling the
previous segment in the path (in other words, `foo/..'
would be removed from the path, or if `..' is the first
part of the path, the last part of the current working
directory would be removed), instead resolve the path
to the physical directory. This option is overridden
by CHASE_LINKS.
For example, suppose /foo/bar is a link to the direc-
tory /alt/rod. Without this option set, `cd
/foo/bar/..' changes to /foo; with it set, it changes
to /alt. The same applies if the current directory is
/foo/bar and `cd ..' is used. Note that all other sym-
bolic links in the path will also be resolved.
CHASE_LINKS (-w)
Resolve symbolic links to their true values when chang-
ing directory. This also has the effect of CHASE_DOTS,
i.e. a `..' path segment will be treated as referring
to the physical parent, even if the preceding path seg-
ment is a symbolic link.
POSIX_CD
Modifies the behaviour of cd, chdir and pushd commands
to make them more compatible with the POSIX standard.
The behaviour with the option unset is described in the
documentation for the cd builtin in zshbuiltins(1). If
the option is set, the shell does not test for directo-
ries beneath the local directory (`.') until after all
directories in cdpath have been tested.
Also, if the option is set, the conditions under which
the shell prints the new directory after changing to it
are modified. It is no longer restricted to interac-
tive shells (although printing of the directory stack
with pushd is still limited to interactive shells); and
any use of a component of CDPATH, including a `.' but
excluding an empty component that is otherwise treated
as `.', causes the directory to be printed.
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PUSHD_IGNORE_DUPS
Don't push multiple copies of the same directory onto
the directory stack.
PUSHD_MINUS
Exchanges the meanings of `+' and `-' when used with a
number to specify a directory in the stack.
PUSHD_SILENT (-E)
Do not print the directory stack after pushd or popd.
PUSHD_TO_HOME (-D)
Have pushd with no arguments act like `pushd $HOME'.
Completion
ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT <D>
If unset, key functions that list completions try to
return to the last prompt if given a numeric argument.
If set these functions try to return to the last prompt
if given no numeric argument.
ALWAYS_TO_END
If a completion is performed with the cursor within a
word, and a full completion is inserted, the cursor is
moved to the end of the word. That is, the cursor is
moved to the end of the word if either a single match
is inserted or menu completion is performed.
AUTO_LIST (-9) <D>
Automatically list choices on an ambiguous completion.
AUTO_MENU <D>
Automatically use menu completion after the second con-
secutive request for completion, for example by press-
ing the tab key repeatedly. This option is overridden
by MENU_COMPLETE.
AUTO_NAME_DIRS
Any parameter that is set to the absolute name of a
directory immediately becomes a name for that direc-
tory, that will be used by the `%~' and related prompt
sequences, and will be available when completion is
performed on a word starting with `~'. (Otherwise, the
parameter must be used in the form `~param' first.)
AUTO_PARAM_KEYS <D>
If a parameter name was completed and a following char-
acter (normally a space) automatically inserted, and
the next character typed is one of those that have to
come directly after the name (like `}', `:', etc.), the
automatically added character is deleted, so that the
character typed comes immediately after the parameter
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name. Completion in a brace expansion is affected sim-
ilarly: the added character is a `,', which will be
removed if `}' is typed next.
AUTO_PARAM_SLASH <D>
If a parameter is completed whose content is the name
of a directory, then add a trailing slash instead of a
space.
AUTO_REMOVE_SLASH <D>
When the last character resulting from a completion is
a slash and the next character typed is a word delim-
iter, a slash, or a character that ends a command (such
as a semicolon or an ampersand), remove the slash.
BASH_AUTO_LIST
On an ambiguous completion, automatically list choices
when the completion function is called twice in succes-
sion. This takes precedence over AUTO_LIST. The set-
ting of LIST_AMBIGUOUS is respected. If AUTO_MENU is
set, the menu behaviour will then start with the third
press. Note that this will not work with MENU_COM-
PLETE, since repeated completion calls immediately
cycle through the list in that case.
COMPLETE_ALIASES
Prevents aliases on the command line from being inter-
nally substituted before completion is attempted. The
effect is to make the alias a distinct command for com-
pletion purposes.
COMPLETE_IN_WORD
If unset, the cursor is set to the end of the word if
completion is started. Otherwise it stays there and
completion is done from both ends.
GLOB_COMPLETE
When the current word has a glob pattern, do not insert
all the words resulting from the expansion but generate
matches as for completion and cycle through them like
MENU_COMPLETE. The matches are generated as if a `*'
was added to the end of the word, or inserted at the
cursor when COMPLETE_IN_WORD is set. This actually
uses pattern matching, not globbing, so it works not
only for files but for any completion, such as options,
user names, etc.
Note that when the pattern matcher is used, matching
control (for example, case-insensitive or anchored
matching) cannot be used. This limitation only applies
when the current word contains a pattern; simply turn-
ing on the GLOB_COMPLETE option does not have this
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 4
User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
effect.
HASH_LIST_ALL <D>
Whenever a command completion or spelling correction is
attempted, make sure the entire command path is hashed
first. This makes the first completion slower but
avoids false reports of spelling errors.
LIST_AMBIGUOUS <D>
This option works when AUTO_LIST or BASH_AUTO_LIST is
also set. If there is an unambiguous prefix to insert
on the command line, that is done without a completion
list being displayed; in other words, auto-listing be-
haviour only takes place when nothing would be
inserted. In the case of BASH_AUTO_LIST, this means
that the list will be delayed to the third call of the
function.
LIST_BEEP <D>
Beep on an ambiguous completion. More accurately, this
forces the completion widgets to return status 1 on an
ambiguous completion, which causes the shell to beep if
the option BEEP is also set; this may be modified if
completion is called from a user-defined widget.
LIST_PACKED
Try to make the completion list smaller (occupying less
lines) by printing the matches in columns with differ-
ent widths.
LIST_ROWS_FIRST
Lay out the matches in completion lists sorted horizon-
tally, that is, the second match is to the right of the
first one, not under it as usual.
LIST_TYPES (-X) <D>
When listing files that are possible completions, show
the type of each file with a trailing identifying mark.
MENU_COMPLETE (-Y)
On an ambiguous completion, instead of listing possi-
bilities or beeping, insert the first match immedi-
ately. Then when completion is requested again, remove
the first match and insert the second match, etc. When
there are no more matches, go back to the first one
again. reverse-menu-complete may be used to loop
through the list in the other direction. This option
overrides AUTO_MENU.
REC_EXACT (-S)
In completion, recognize exact matches even if they are
ambiguous.
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
Expansion and Globbing
BAD_PATTERN (+2) <C> <Z>
If a pattern for filename generation is badly formed,
print an error message. (If this option is unset, the
pattern will be left unchanged.)
BARE_GLOB_QUAL <Z>
In a glob pattern, treat a trailing set of parentheses
as a qualifier list, if it contains no `|', `(' or (if
special) `~' characters. See the section `Filename
Generation'.
BRACE_CCL
Expand expressions in braces which would not otherwise
undergo brace expansion to a lexically ordered list of
all the characters. See the section `Brace Expansion'.
CASE_GLOB <D>
Make globbing (filename generation) sensitive to case.
Note that other uses of patterns are always sensitive
to case. If the option is unset, the presence of any
character which is special to filename generation will
cause case-insensitive matching. For example, cvs(/)
can match the directory CVS owing to the presence of
the globbing flag (unless the option BARE_GLOB_QUAL is
unset).
CASE_MATCH <D>
Make regular expressions using the zsh/regex module
(including matches with =~) sensitive to case.
CSH_NULL_GLOB <C>
If a pattern for filename generation has no matches,
delete the pattern from the argument list; do not
report an error unless all the patterns in a command
have no matches. Overrides NOMATCH.
EQUALS <Z>
Perform = filename expansion. (See the section `File-
name Expansion'.)
EXTENDED_GLOB
Treat the `#', `~' and `^' characters as part of pat-
terns for filename generation, etc. (An initial
unquoted `~' always produces named directory expan-
sion.)
FORCE_FLOAT
Constants in arithmetic evaluation will be treated as
floating point even without the use of a decimal point.
Integers in any base will be converted.
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
GLOB (+F, ksh: +f) <D>
Perform filename generation (globbing). (See the sec-
tion `Filename Generation'.)
GLOB_ASSIGN <C>
If this option is set, filename generation (globbing)
is performed on the right hand side of scalar parameter
assignments of the form `name=pattern (e.g. `foo=*').
If the result has more than one word the parameter will
become an array with those words as arguments. This
option is provided for backwards compatibility only:
globbing is always performed on the right hand side of
array assignments of the form `name=(value)' (e.g.
`foo=(*)') and this form is recommended for clarity;
with this option set, it is not possible to predict
whether the result will be an array or a scalar.
GLOB_DOTS (-4)
Do not require a leading `.' in a filename to be
matched explicitly.
GLOB_SUBST <C> <K> <S>
Treat any characters resulting from parameter expansion
as being eligible for file expansion and filename gen-
eration, and any characters resulting from command sub-
stitution as being eligible for filename generation.
Braces (and commas in between) do not become eligible
for expansion.
HIST_SUBST_PATTERN
Substitutions using the :s and :& history modifiers are
performed with pattern matching instead of string
matching. This occurs wherever history modifiers are
valid, including glob qualifiers and parameters. See
the section Modifiers in zshexpn(1).
IGNORE_BRACES (-I) <S>
Do not perform brace expansion. For historical reasons
this also includes the effect of the
IGNORE_CLOSE_BRACES option.
IGNORE_CLOSE_BRACES
When neither this option nor IGNORE_BRACES is set, a
sole close brace character `}' is syntactically signif-
icant at any point on a command line. This has the
effect that no semicolon or newline is necessary before
the brace terminating a function or current shell con-
struct. When either option is set, a closing brace is
syntactically significant only in command position.
Unlike IGNORE_BRACES, this option does not disable
brace expansion.
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
For example, with both options unset a function may be
defined in the following fashion:
args() { echo $# }
while if either option is set, this does not work and
something equivalent to the following is required:
args() { echo $#; }
KSH_GLOB <K>
In pattern matching, the interpretation of parentheses
is affected by a preceding `@', `*', `+', `?' or `!'.
See the section `Filename Generation'.
MAGIC_EQUAL_SUBST
All unquoted arguments of the form `anything=expres-
sion' appearing after the command name have filename
expansion (that is, where expression has a leading `~'
or `=') performed on expression as if it were a parame-
ter assignment. The argument is not otherwise treated
specially; it is passed to the command as a single
argument, and not used as an actual parameter assign-
ment. For example, in echo foo=~/bar:~/rod, both
occurrences of ~ would be replaced. Note that this
happens anyway with typeset and similar statements.
This option respects the setting of the KSH_TYPESET
option. In other words, if both options are in effect,
arguments looking like assignments will not undergo
word splitting.
MARK_DIRS (-8, ksh: -X)
Append a trailing `/' to all directory names resulting
from filename generation (globbing).
MULTIBYTE <C> <K> <Z>
Respect multibyte characters when found in strings.
When this option is set, strings are examined using the
system library to determine how many bytes form a char-
acter, depending on the current locale. This affects
the way characters are counted in pattern matching,
parameter values and various delimiters.
The option is on by default if the shell was compiled
with MULTIBYTE_SUPPORT except in sh emulation; other-
wise it is off by default and has no effect if turned
on. The mode is off in sh emulation for compatibility
but for interactive use may need to be turned on if the
terminal interprets multibyte characters.
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
If the option is off a single byte is always treated as
a single character. This setting is designed purely
for examining strings known to contain raw bytes or
other values that may not be characters in the current
locale. It is not necessary to unset the option merely
because the character set for the current locale does
not contain multibyte characters.
The option does not affect the shell's editor, which
always uses the locale to determine multibyte charac-
ters. This is because the character set displayed by
the terminal emulator is independent of shell settings.
NOMATCH (+3) <C> <Z>
If a pattern for filename generation has no matches,
print an error, instead of leaving it unchanged in the
argument list. This also applies to file expansion of
an initial `~' or `='.
NULL_GLOB (-G)
If a pattern for filename generation has no matches,
delete the pattern from the argument list instead of
reporting an error. Overrides NOMATCH.
NUMERIC_GLOB_SORT
If numeric filenames are matched by a filename genera-
tion pattern, sort the filenames numerically rather
than lexicographically.
RC_EXPAND_PARAM (-P)
Array expansions of the form `foo${xx}bar', where the
parameter xx is set to (a b c), are substituted with
`fooabar foobbar foocbar' instead of the default `fooa
b cbar'. Note that an empty array will therefore cause
all arguments to be removed.
REMATCH_PCRE <Z>
If set, regular expression matching with the =~ opera-
tor will use Perl-Compatible Regular Expressions from
the PCRE library, if available. If not set, regular
expressions will use the extended regexp syntax pro-
vided by the system libraries.
SH_GLOB <K> <S>
Disables the special meaning of `(', `|', `)' and '<'
for globbing the result of parameter and command sub-
stitutions, and in some other places where the shell
accepts patterns. If SH_GLOB is set but KSH_GLOB is
not, the shell allows the interpretation of subshell
expressions enclosed in parentheses in some cases where
there is no space before the opening parenthesis, e.g.
!(true) is interpreted as if there were a space after
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
the !. This option is set by default if zsh is invoked
as sh or ksh.
UNSET (+u, ksh: +u) <K> <S> <Z>
Treat unset parameters as if they were empty when sub-
stituting. Otherwise they are treated as an error.
WARN_CREATE_GLOBAL
Print a warning message when a global parameter is cre-
ated in a function by an assignment. This often indi-
cates that a parameter has not been declared local when
it should have been. Parameters explicitly declared
global from within a function using typeset -g do not
cause a warning. Note that there is no warning when a
local parameter is assigned to in a nested function,
which may also indicate an error.
History
APPEND_HISTORY <D>
If this is set, zsh sessions will append their history
list to the history file, rather than replace it. Thus,
multiple parallel zsh sessions will all have the new
entries from their history lists added to the history
file, in the order that they exit. The file will still
be periodically re-written to trim it when the number
of lines grows 20% beyond the value specified by $SAVE-
HIST (see also the HIST_SAVE_BY_COPY option).
BANG_HIST (+K) <C> <Z>
Perform textual history expansion, csh-style, treating
the character `!' specially.
EXTENDED_HISTORY <C>
Save each command's beginning timestamp (in seconds
since the epoch) and the duration (in seconds) to the
history file. The format of this prefixed data is:
`: <beginning time>:<elapsed seconds>;<command>'.
HIST_ALLOW_CLOBBER
Add `|' to output redirections in the history. This
allows history references to clobber files even when
CLOBBER is unset.
HIST_BEEP <D>
Beep when an attempt is made to access a history entry
which isn't there.
HIST_EXPIRE_DUPS_FIRST
If the internal history needs to be trimmed to add the
current command line, setting this option will cause
the oldest history event that has a duplicate to be
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
lost before losing a unique event from the list. You
should be sure to set the value of HISTSIZE to a larger
number than SAVEHIST in order to give you some room for
the duplicated events, otherwise this option will
behave just like HIST_IGNORE_ALL_DUPS once the history
fills up with unique events.
HIST_FCNTL_LOCK
When writing out the history file, by default zsh uses
ad-hoc file locking to avoid known problems with lock-
ing on some operating systems. With this option lock-
ing is done by means of the system's fcntl call, where
this method is available. On recent operating systems
this may provide better performance, in particular
avoiding history corruption when files are stored on
NFS.
HIST_FIND_NO_DUPS
When searching for history entries in the line editor,
do not display duplicates of a line previously found,
even if the duplicates are not contiguous.
HIST_IGNORE_ALL_DUPS
If a new command line being added to the history list
duplicates an older one, the older command is removed
from the list (even if it is not the previous event).
HIST_IGNORE_DUPS (-h)
Do not enter command lines into the history list if
they are duplicates of the previous event.
HIST_IGNORE_SPACE (-g)
Remove command lines from the history list when the
first character on the line is a space, or when one of
the expanded aliases contains a leading space. Only
normal aliases (not global or suffix aliases) have this
behaviour. Note that the command lingers in the inter-
nal history until the next command is entered before it
vanishes, allowing you to briefly reuse or edit the
line. If you want to make it vanish right away without
entering another command, type a space and press
return.
HIST_LEX_WORDS
By default, shell history that is read in from files is
split into words on all white space. This means that
arguments with quoted whitespace are not correctly han-
dled, with the consequence that references to words in
history lines that have been read from a file may be
inaccurate. When this option is set, words read in
from a history file are divided up in a similar fashion
to normal shell command line handling. Although this
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
produces more accurately delimited words, if the size
of the history file is large this can be slow. Trial
and error is necessary to decide.
HIST_NO_FUNCTIONS
Remove function definitions from the history list.
Note that the function lingers in the internal history
until the next command is entered before it vanishes,
allowing you to briefly reuse or edit the definition.
HIST_NO_STORE
Remove the history (fc -l) command from the history
list when invoked. Note that the command lingers in
the internal history until the next command is entered
before it vanishes, allowing you to briefly reuse or
edit the line.
HIST_REDUCE_BLANKS
Remove superfluous blanks from each command line being
added to the history list.
HIST_SAVE_BY_COPY <D>
When the history file is re-written, we normally write
out a copy of the file named $HISTFILE.new and then
rename it over the old one. However, if this option is
unset, we instead truncate the old history file and
write out the new version in-place. If one of the his-
tory-appending options is enabled, this option only has
an effect when the enlarged history file needs to be
re-written to trim it down to size. Disable this only
if you have special needs, as doing so makes it possi-
ble to lose history entries if zsh gets interrupted
during the save.
When writing out a copy of the history file, zsh pre-
serves the old file's permissions and group informa-
tion, but will refuse to write out a new file if it
would change the history file's owner.
HIST_SAVE_NO_DUPS
When writing out the history file, older commands that
duplicate newer ones are omitted.
HIST_VERIFY
Whenever the user enters a line with history expansion,
don't execute the line directly; instead, perform his-
tory expansion and reload the line into the editing
buffer.
INC_APPEND_HISTORY
This options works like APPEND_HISTORY except that new
history lines are added to the $HISTFILE incrementally
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(as soon as they are entered), rather than waiting
until the shell exits. The file will still be periodi-
cally re-written to trim it when the number of lines
grows 20% beyond the value specified by $SAVEHIST (see
also the HIST_SAVE_BY_COPY option).
SHARE_HISTORY <K>
This option both imports new commands from the history
file, and also causes your typed commands to be
appended to the history file (the latter is like speci-
fying INC_APPEND_HISTORY). The history lines are also
output with timestamps ala EXTENDED_HISTORY (which
makes it easier to find the spot where we left off
reading the file after it gets re-written).
By default, history movement commands visit the
imported lines as well as the local lines, but you can
toggle this on and off with the set-local-history zle
binding. It is also possible to create a zle widget
that will make some commands ignore imported commands,
and some include them.
If you find that you want more control over when com-
mands get imported, you may wish to turn SHARE_HISTORY
off, INC_APPEND_HISTORY on, and then manually import
commands whenever you need them using `fc -RI'.
Initialisation
ALL_EXPORT (-a, ksh: -a)
All parameters subsequently defined are automatically
exported.
GLOBAL_EXPORT (<Z>)
If this option is set, passing the -x flag to the
builtins declare, float, integer, readonly and typeset
(but not local) will also set the -g flag; hence
parameters exported to the environment will not be made
local to the enclosing function, unless they were
already or the flag +g is given explicitly. If the
option is unset, exported parameters will be made local
in just the same way as any other parameter.
This option is set by default for backward compatibil-
ity; it is not recommended that its behaviour be relied
upon. Note that the builtin export always sets both
the -x and -g flags, and hence its effect extends
beyond the scope of the enclosing function; this is the
most portable way to achieve this behaviour.
GLOBAL_RCS (-d) <D>
If this option is unset, the startup files
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/etc/zprofile, /etc/zshrc, /etc/zlogin and /etc/zlogout
will not be run. It can be disabled and re-enabled at
any time, including inside local startup files (.zshrc,
etc.).
RCS (+f) <D>
After /etc/zshenv is sourced on startup, source the
.zshenv, /etc/zprofile, .zprofile, /etc/zshrc, .zshrc,
/etc/zlogin, .zlogin, and .zlogout files, as described
in the section `Files'. If this option is unset, the
/etc/zshenv file is still sourced, but any of the oth-
ers will not be; it can be set at any time to prevent
the remaining startup files after the currently execut-
ing one from being sourced.
Input/Output
ALIASES <D>
Expand aliases.
CLOBBER (+C, ksh: +C) <D>
Allows `>' redirection to truncate existing files, and
`>>' to create files. Otherwise `>!' or `>|' must be
used to truncate a file, and `>>!' or `>>|' to create a
file.
CORRECT (-0)
Try to correct the spelling of commands. Note that,
when the HASH_LIST_ALL option is not set or when some
directories in the path are not readable, this may
falsely report spelling errors the first time some com-
mands are used.
The shell variable CORRECT_IGNORE may be set to a pat-
tern to match words that will never be offered as cor-
rections.
CORRECT_ALL (-O)
Try to correct the spelling of all arguments in a line.
DVORAK
Use the Dvorak keyboard instead of the standard qwerty
keyboard as a basis for examining spelling mistakes for
the CORRECT and CORRECT_ALL options and the spell-word
editor command.
FLOW_CONTROL <D>
If this option is unset, output flow control via
start/stop characters (usually assigned to ^S/^Q) is
disabled in the shell's editor.
IGNORE_EOF (-7)
Do not exit on end-of-file. Require the use of exit or
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logout instead. However, ten consecutive EOFs will
cause the shell to exit anyway, to avoid the shell
hanging if its tty goes away.
Also, if this option is set and the Zsh Line Editor is
used, widgets implemented by shell functions can be
bound to EOF (normally Control-D) without printing the
normal warning message. This works only for normal
widgets, not for completion widgets.
INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS (-k) <K> <S>
Allow comments even in interactive shells.
HASH_CMDS <D>
Note the location of each command the first time it is
executed. Subsequent invocations of the same command
will use the saved location, avoiding a path search.
If this option is unset, no path hashing is done at
all. However, when CORRECT is set, commands whose
names do not appear in the functions or aliases hash
tables are hashed in order to avoid reporting them as
spelling errors.
HASH_DIRS <D>
Whenever a command name is hashed, hash the directory
containing it, as well as all directories that occur
earlier in the path. Has no effect if neither
HASH_CMDS nor CORRECT is set.
HASH_EXECUTABLES_ONLY
When hashing commands because of HASH_COMMANDS, check
that the file to be hashed is actually an executable.
This option is unset by default as if the path contains
a large number of commands, or consists of many remote
files, the additional tests can take a long time.
Trial and error is needed to show if this option is
beneficial.
MAIL_WARNING (-U)
Print a warning message if a mail file has been
accessed since the shell last checked.
PATH_DIRS (-Q)
Perform a path search even on command names with
slashes in them. Thus if `/usr/local/bin' is in the
user's path, and he or she types `X11/xinit', the com-
mand `/usr/local/bin/X11/xinit' will be executed
(assuming it exists). Commands explicitly beginning
with `/', `./' or `../' are not subject to the path
search. This also applies to the `.' builtin.
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Note that subdirectories of the current directory are
always searched for executables specified in this form.
This takes place before any search indicated by this
option, and regardless of whether `.' or the current
directory appear in the command search path.
PATH_SCRIPT <K> <S>
If this option is not set, a script passed as the first
non-option argument to the shell must contain the name
of the file to open. If this option is set, and the
script does not specify a directory path, the script is
looked for first in the current directory, then in the
command path. See the section INVOCATION in zsh(1).
PRINT_EIGHT_BIT
Print eight bit characters literally in completion
lists, etc. This option is not necessary if your sys-
tem correctly returns the printability of eight bit
characters (see ctype(3)).
PRINT_EXIT_VALUE (-1)
Print the exit value of programs with non-zero exit
status. This is only available at the command line in
interactive shells.
RC_QUOTES
Allow the character sequence `''' to signify a single
quote within singly quoted strings. Note this does not
apply in quoted strings using the format $'...', where
a backslashed single quote can be used.
RM_STAR_SILENT (-H) <K> <S>
Do not query the user before executing `rm *' or `rm
path/*'.
RM_STAR_WAIT
If querying the user before executing `rm *' or `rm
path/*', first wait ten seconds and ignore anything
typed in that time. This avoids the problem of reflex-
ively answering `yes' to the query when one didn't
really mean it. The wait and query can always be
avoided by expanding the `*' in ZLE (with tab).
SHORT_LOOPS <C> <Z>
Allow the short forms of for, repeat, select, if, and
function constructs.
SUN_KEYBOARD_HACK (-L)
If a line ends with a backquote, and there are an odd
number of backquotes on the line, ignore the trailing
backquote. This is useful on some keyboards where the
return key is too small, and the backquote key lies
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annoyingly close to it. As an alternative the variable
KEYBOARD_HACK lets you choose the character to be
removed.
Job Control
AUTO_CONTINUE
With this option set, stopped jobs that are removed
from the job table with the disown builtin command are
automatically sent a CONT signal to make them running.
AUTO_RESUME (-W)
Treat single word simple commands without redirection
as candidates for resumption of an existing job.
BG_NICE (-6) <C> <Z>
Run all background jobs at a lower priority. This
option is set by default.
CHECK_JOBS <Z>
Report the status of background and suspended jobs
before exiting a shell with job control; a second
attempt to exit the shell will succeed. NO_CHECK_JOBS
is best used only in combination with NO_HUP, else such
jobs will be killed automatically.
The check is omitted if the commands run from the pre-
vious command line included a `jobs' command, since it
is assumed the user is aware that there are background
or suspended jobs. A `jobs' command run from one of
the hook functions defined in the section SPECIAL FUNC-
TIONS in zshmisc(1) is not counted for this purpose.
HUP <Z>
Send the HUP signal to running jobs when the shell
exits.
LONG_LIST_JOBS (-R)
List jobs in the long format by default.
MONITOR (-m, ksh: -m)
Allow job control. Set by default in interactive
shells.
NOTIFY (-5, ksh: -b) <Z>
Report the status of background jobs immediately,
rather than waiting until just before printing a
prompt.
POSIX_JOBS <K> <S>
This option makes job control more compliant with the
POSIX standard.
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When the option is not set, the MONITOR option is unset
on entry to subshells, so that job control is no longer
active. When the option is set, the MONITOR option and
job control remain active in the subshell, but note
that the subshell has no access to jobs in the parent
shell.
When the option is not set, jobs put in the background
or foreground with bg or fg are displayed with the same
information that would be reported by jobs. When the
option is set, only the text is printed. The output
from jobs itself is not affected by the option.
When the option is not set, job information from the
parent shell is saved for output within a subshell (for
example, within a pipeline). When the option is set,
the output of jobs is empty until a job is started
within the subshell.
When the option is set, it becomes possible to use the
wait builtin to wait for the last job started in the
background (as given by $!) even if that job has
already exited. This works even if the option is
turned on temporarily around the use of the wait
builtin.
Prompting
PROMPT_BANG <K>
If set, `!' is treated specially in prompt expansion.
See EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1).
PROMPT_CR (+V) <D>
Print a carriage return just before printing a prompt
in the line editor. This is on by default as
multi-line editing is only possible if the editor knows
where the start of the line appears.
PROMPT_SP <D>
Attempt to preserve a partial line (i.e. a line that
did not end with a newline) that would otherwise be
covered up by the command prompt due to the PROMPT_CR
option. This works by outputting some cursor-control
characters, including a series of spaces, that should
make the terminal wrap to the next line when a partial
line is present (note that this is only successful if
your terminal has automatic margins, which is typical).
When a partial line is preserved, by default you will
see an inverse+bold character at the end of the partial
line: a "%" for a normal user or a "#" for root. If
set, the shell parameter PROMPT_EOL_MARK can be used to
customize how the end of partial lines are shown.
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NOTE: if the PROMPT_CR option is not set, enabling this
option will have no effect. This option is on by
default.
PROMPT_PERCENT <C> <Z>
If set, `%' is treated specially in prompt expansion.
See EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1).
PROMPT_SUBST <K> <S>
If set, parameter expansion, command substitution and
arithmetic expansion are performed in prompts. Substi-
tutions within prompts do not affect the command sta-
tus.
TRANSIENT_RPROMPT
Remove any right prompt from display when accepting a
command line. This may be useful with terminals with
other cut/paste methods.
Scripts and Functions
C_BASES
Output hexadecimal numbers in the standard C format,
for example `0xFF' instead of the usual `16#FF'. If
the option OCTAL_ZEROES is also set (it is not by
default), octal numbers will be treated similarly and
hence appear as `077' instead of `8#77'. This option
has no effect on the choice of the output base, nor on
the output of bases other than hexadecimal and octal.
Note that these formats will be understood on input
irrespective of the setting of C_BASES.
C_PRECEDENCES
This alters the precedence of arithmetic operators to
be more like C and other programming languages; the
section ARITHMETIC EVALUATION in zshmisc(1) has an
explicit list.
DEBUG_BEFORE_CMD
Run the DEBUG trap before each command; otherwise it is
run after each command. Setting this option mimics the
behaviour of ksh 93; with the option unset the behav-
iour is that of ksh 88.
ERR_EXIT (-e, ksh: -e)
If a command has a non-zero exit status, execute the
ZERR trap, if set, and exit. This is disabled while
running initialization scripts.
The behaviour is also disabled inside DEBUG traps. In
this case the option is handled specially: it is unset
on entry to the trap. If the option DEBUG_BEFORE_CMD
is set, as it is by default, and the option ERR_EXIT is
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
found to have been set on exit, then the command for
which the DEBUG trap is being executed is skipped. The
option is restored after the trap exits.
Exiting due to ERR_EXIT has certain interactions with
asynchronous jobs noted in the section JOBS in in zsh-
misc(1).
ERR_RETURN
If a command has a non-zero exit status, return immedi-
ately from the enclosing function. The logic is iden-
tical to that for ERR_EXIT, except that an implicit
return statement is executed instead of an exit. This
will trigger an exit at the outermost level of a
non-interactive script.
EVAL_LINENO <Z>
If set, line numbers of expressions evaluated using the
builtin eval are tracked separately of the enclosing
environment. This applies both to the parameter LINENO
and the line number output by the prompt escape %i. If
the option is set, the prompt escape %N will output the
string `(eval)' instead of the script or function name
as an indication. (The two prompt escapes are typi-
cally used in the parameter PS4 to be output when the
option XTRACE is set.) If EVAL_LINENO is unset, the
line number of the surrounding script or function is
retained during the evaluation.
EXEC (+n, ksh: +n) <D>
Do execute commands. Without this option, commands are
read and checked for syntax errors, but not executed.
This option cannot be turned off in an interactive
shell, except when `-n' is supplied to the shell at
startup.
FUNCTION_ARGZERO <C> <Z>
When executing a shell function or sourcing a script,
set $0 temporarily to the name of the function/script.
LOCAL_OPTIONS <K>
If this option is set at the point of return from a
shell function, most options (including this one) which
were in force upon entry to the function are restored;
options that are not restored are PRIVILEGED and
RESTRICTED. Otherwise, only this option and the XTRACE
and PRINT_EXIT_VALUE options are restored. Hence if
this is explicitly unset by a shell function the other
options in force at the point of return will remain so.
A shell function can also guarantee itself a known
shell configuration with a formulation like `emulate -L
zsh'; the -L activates LOCAL_OPTIONS.
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LOCAL_PATTERNS
If this option is set at the point of return from a
shell function, the state of pattern disables, as set
with the builtin command `disable -p', is restored to
what it was when the function was entered. The behav-
iour of this option is similar to the effect of
LOCAL_OPTIONS on options; hence `emulate -L sh' (or
indeed any other emulation with the -L option) acti-
vates LOCAL_PATTERNS.
LOCAL_TRAPS <K>
If this option is set when a signal trap is set inside
a function, then the previous status of the trap for
that signal will be restored when the function exits.
Note that this option must be set prior to altering the
trap behaviour in a function; unlike LOCAL_OPTIONS, the
value on exit from the function is irrelevant. How-
ever, it does not need to be set before any global trap
for that to be correctly restored by a function. For
example,
unsetopt localtraps
trap - INT
fn() { setopt localtraps; trap '' INT; sleep 3; }
will restore normal handling of SIGINT after the func-
tion exits.
MULTI_FUNC_DEF <Z>
Allow definitions of multiple functions at once in the
form `fn1 fn2...()'; if the option is not set, this
causes a parse error. Definition of multiple functions
with the function keyword is always allowed. Multiple
function definitions are not often used and can cause
obscure errors.
MULTIOS <Z>
Perform implicit tees or cats when multiple redirec-
tions are attempted (see the section `Redirection').
OCTAL_ZEROES <S>
Interpret any integer constant beginning with a 0 as
octal, per IEEE Std 1003.2-1992 (ISO 9945-2:1993).
This is not enabled by default as it causes problems
with parsing of, for example, date and time strings
with leading zeroes.
Sequences of digits indicating a numeric base such as
the `08' component in `08#77' are always interpreted as
decimal, regardless of leading zeroes.
PIPE_FAIL
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By default, when a pipeline exits the exit status
recorded by the shell and returned by the shell vari-
able $? reflects that of the rightmost element of a
pipeline. If this option is set, the exit status
instead reflects the status of the rightmost element of
the pipeline that was non-zero, or zero if all elements
exited with zero status.
SOURCE_TRACE
If set, zsh will print an informational message
announcing the name of each file it loads. The format
of the output is similar to that for the XTRACE option,
with the message <sourcetrace>. A file may be loaded
by the shell itself when it starts up and shuts down
(Startup/Shutdown Files) or by the use of the `source'
and `dot' builtin commands.
TYPESET_SILENT
If this is unset, executing any of the `typeset' family
of commands with no options and a list of parameters
that have no values to be assigned but already exist
will display the value of the parameter. If the option
is set, they will only be shown when parameters are
selected with the `-m' option. The option `-p' is
available whether or not the option is set.
VERBOSE (-v, ksh: -v)
Print shell input lines as they are read.
XTRACE (-x, ksh: -x)
Print commands and their arguments as they are exe-
cuted. The output is proceded by the value of $PS4,
formatted as described in the section EXPANSION OF
PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1).
Shell Emulation
BASH_REMATCH
When set, matches performed with the =~ operator will
set the BASH_REMATCH array variable, instead of the
default MATCH and match variables. The first element
of the BASH_REMATCH array will contain the entire
matched text and subsequent elements will contain
extracted substrings. This option makes more sense
when KSH_ARRAYS is also set, so that the entire matched
portion is stored at index 0 and the first substring is
at index 1. Without this option, the MATCH variable
contains the entire matched text and the match array
variable contains substrings.
BSD_ECHO <S>
Make the echo builtin compatible with the BSD echo(1)
command. This disables backslashed escape sequences in
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
echo strings unless the -e option is specified.
CONTINUE_ON_ERROR
If a fatal error is encountered (see the section ERRORS
in zshmisc(1)), and the code is running in a script,
the shell will resume execution at the next statement
in the script at the top level, in other words outside
all functions or shell constructs such as loops and
conditions. This mimics the behaviour of interactive
shells, where the shell returns to the line editor to
read a new command; it was the normal behaviour in ver-
sions of zsh before 5.0.1.
CSH_JUNKIE_HISTORY <C>
A history reference without an event specifier will
always refer to the previous command. Without this
option, such a history reference refers to the same
event as the previous history reference, defaulting to
the previous command.
CSH_JUNKIE_LOOPS <C>
Allow loop bodies to take the form `list; end' instead
of `do list; done'.
CSH_JUNKIE_QUOTES <C>
Changes the rules for single- and double-quoted text to
match that of csh. These require that embedded new-
lines be preceded by a backslash; unescaped newlines
will cause an error message. In double-quoted strings,
it is made impossible to escape `$', ``' or `"' (and
`\' itself no longer needs escaping). Command substi-
tutions are only expanded once, and cannot be nested.
CSH_NULLCMD <C>
Do not use the values of NULLCMD and READNULLCMD when
running redirections with no command. This make such
redirections fail (see the section `Redirection').
KSH_ARRAYS <K> <S>
Emulate ksh array handling as closely as possible. If
this option is set, array elements are numbered from
zero, an array parameter without subscript refers to
the first element instead of the whole array, and
braces are required to delimit a subscript
(`${path[2]}' rather than just `$path[2]').
KSH_AUTOLOAD <K> <S>
Emulate ksh function autoloading. This means that when
a function is autoloaded, the corresponding file is
merely executed, and must define the function itself.
(By default, the function is defined to the contents of
the file. However, the most common ksh-style case - of
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
the file containing only a simple definition of the
function - is always handled in the ksh-compatible man-
ner.)
KSH_OPTION_PRINT <K>
Alters the way options settings are printed: instead of
separate lists of set and unset options, all options
are shown, marked `on' if they are in the non-default
state, `off' otherwise.
KSH_TYPESET <K>
Alters the way arguments to the typeset family of com-
mands, including declare, export, float, integer, local
and readonly, are processed. Without this option, zsh
will perform normal word splitting after command and
parameter expansion in arguments of an assignment; with
it, word splitting does not take place in those cases.
KSH_ZERO_SUBSCRIPT
Treat use of a subscript of value zero in array or
string expressions as a reference to the first element,
i.e. the element that usually has the subscript 1.
Ignored if KSH_ARRAYS is also set.
If neither this option nor KSH_ARRAYS is set, accesses
to an element of an array or string with subscript zero
return an empty element or string, while attempts to
set element zero of an array or string are treated as
an error. However, attempts to set an otherwise valid
subscript range that includes zero will succeed. For
example, if KSH_ZERO_SUBSCRIPT is not set,
array[0]=(element)
is an error, while
array[0,1]=(element)
is not and will replace the first element of the array.
This option is for compatibility with older versions of
the shell and is not recommended in new code.
POSIX_ALIASES <K> <S>
When this option is set, reserved words are not candi-
dates for alias expansion: it is still possible to
declare any of them as an alias, but the alias will
never be expanded. Reserved words are described in the
section RESERVED WORDS in zshmisc(1).
Alias expansion takes place while text is being read;
hence when this option is set it does not take effect
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
until the end of any function or other piece of shell
code parsed as one unit. Note this may cause differ-
ences from other shells even when the option is in
effect. For example, when running a command with `zsh
-c', or even `zsh -o posixaliases -c', the entire com-
mand argument is parsed as one unit, so aliases defined
within the argument are not available even in later
lines. If in doubt, avoid use of aliases in non-inter-
active code.
POSIX_BUILTINS <K> <S>
When this option is set the command builtin can be used
to execute shell builtin commands. Parameter assign-
ments specified before shell functions and special
builtins are kept after the command completes unless
the special builtin is prefixed with the command
builtin. Special builtins are ., :, break, continue,
declare, eval, exit, export, integer, local, readonly,
return, set, shift, source, times, trap and unset.
In addition, various error conditions associated with
the above builtins or exec cause a non-interactive
shell to exit and an interactive shell to return to its
top-level processing.
POSIX_IDENTIFIERS <K> <S>
When this option is set, only the ASCII characters a to
z, A to Z, 0 to 9 and _ may be used in identifiers
(names of shell parameters and modules).
When the option is unset and multibyte character sup-
port is enabled (i.e. it is compiled in and the option
MULTIBYTE is set), then additionally any alphanumeric
characters in the local character set may be used in
identifiers. Note that scripts and functions written
with this feature are not portable, and also that both
options must be set before the script or function is
parsed; setting them during execution is not sufficient
as the syntax variable=value has already been parsed as
a command rather than an assignment.
If multibyte character support is not compiled into the
shell this option is ignored; all octets with the top
bit set may be used in identifiers. This is non-stan-
dard but is the traditional zsh behaviour.
POSIX_STRINGS <K> <S>
This option affects processing of quoted strings. Cur-
rently it only affects the behaviour of null charac-
ters, i.e. character 0 in the portable character set
corresponding to US ASCII.
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
When this option is not set, null characters embedded
within strings of the form $'...' are treated as ordi-
nary characters. The entire string is maintained within
the shell and output to files where necessary, although
owing to restrictions of the library interface the
string is truncated at the null character in file
names, environment variables, or in arguments to exter-
nal programs.
When this option is set, the $'...' expression is trun-
cated at the null character. Note that remaining parts
of the same string beyond the termination of the quotes
are not trunctated.
For example, the command line argument a$'b\0c'd is
treated with the option off as the characters a, b,
null, c, d, and with the option on as the characters a,
b, d.
POSIX_TRAPS <K> <S>
When the is option is set, the usual zsh behaviour of
executing traps for EXIT on exit from shell functions
is suppressed. In that case, manipulating EXIT traps
always alters the global trap for exiting the shell;
the LOCAL_TRAPS option is ignored for the EXIT trap.
SH_FILE_EXPANSION <K> <S>
Perform filename expansion (e.g., ~ expansion) before
parameter expansion, command substitution, arithmetic
expansion and brace expansion. If this option is
unset, it is performed after brace expansion, so things
like `~$USERNAME' and `~{pfalstad,rc}' will work.
SH_NULLCMD <K> <S>
Do not use the values of NULLCMD and READNULLCMD when
doing redirections, use `:' instead (see the section
`Redirection').
SH_OPTION_LETTERS <K> <S>
If this option is set the shell tries to interpret sin-
gle letter options (which are used with set and setopt)
like ksh does. This also affects the value of the -
special parameter.
SH_WORD_SPLIT (-y) <K> <S>
Causes field splitting to be performed on unquoted
parameter expansions. Note that this option has noth-
ing to do with word splitting. (See the section
`Parameter Expansion'.)
TRAPS_ASYNC
While waiting for a program to exit, handle signals and
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 26
User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
run traps immediately. Otherwise the trap is run after
a child process has exited. Note this does not affect
the point at which traps are run for any case other
than when the shell is waiting for a child process.
Shell State
INTERACTIVE (-i, ksh: -i)
This is an interactive shell. This option is set upon
initialisation if the standard input is a tty and com-
mands are being read from standard input. (See the
discussion of SHIN_STDIN.) This heuristic may be over-
ridden by specifying a state for this option on the
command line. The value of this option can only be
changed via flags supplied at invocation of the shell.
It cannot be changed once zsh is running.
LOGIN (-l, ksh: -l)
This is a login shell. If this option is not explic-
itly set, the shell becomes a login shell if the first
character of the argv[0] passed to the shell is a `-'.
PRIVILEGED (-p, ksh: -p)
Turn on privileged mode. This is enabled automatically
on startup if the effective user (group) ID is not
equal to the real user (group) ID. Turning this option
off causes the effective user and group IDs to be set
to the real user and group IDs. This option disables
sourcing user startup files. If zsh is invoked as `sh'
or `ksh' with this option set, /etc/suid_profile is
sourced (after /etc/profile on interactive shells).
Sourcing ~/.profile is disabled and the contents of the
ENV variable is ignored. This option cannot be changed
using the -m option of setopt and unsetopt, and chang-
ing it inside a function always changes it globally
regardless of the LOCAL_OPTIONS option.
RESTRICTED (-r)
Enables restricted mode. This option cannot be changed
using unsetopt, and setting it inside a function always
changes it globally regardless of the LOCAL_OPTIONS
option. See the section `Restricted Shell'.
SHIN_STDIN (-s, ksh: -s)
Commands are being read from the standard input. Com-
mands are read from standard input if no command is
specified with -c and no file of commands is specified.
If SHIN_STDIN is set explicitly on the command line,
any argument that would otherwise have been taken as a
file to run will instead be treated as a normal posi-
tional parameter. Note that setting or unsetting this
option on the command line does not necessarily affect
the state the option will have while the shell is
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 27
User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
running - that is purely an indicator of whether on not
commands are actually being read from standard input.
The value of this option can only be changed via flags
supplied at invocation of the shell. It cannot be
changed once zsh is running.
SINGLE_COMMAND (-t, ksh: -t)
If the shell is reading from standard input, it exits
after a single command has been executed. This also
makes the shell non-interactive, unless the INTERACTIVE
option is explicitly set on the command line. The
value of this option can only be changed via flags sup-
plied at invocation of the shell. It cannot be changed
once zsh is running.
Zle
BEEP (+B) <D>
Beep on error in ZLE.
COMBINING_CHARS
Assume that the terminal displays combining characters
correctly. Specifically, if a base alphanumeric char-
acter is followed by one or more zero-width punctuation
characters, assume that the zero-width characters will
be displayed as modifications to the base character
within the same width. Not all terminals handle this.
If this option is not set, zero-width characters are
displayed separately with special mark-up.
If this option is set, the pattern test [[:WORD:]]
matches a zero-width punctuation character on the
assumption that it will be used as part of a word in
combination with a word character. Otherwise the base
shell does not handle combining characters specially.
EMACS
If ZLE is loaded, turning on this option has the equiv-
alent effect of `bindkey -e'. In addition, the VI
option is unset. Turning it off has no effect. The
option setting is not guaranteed to reflect the current
keymap. This option is provided for compatibility;
bindkey is the recommended interface.
OVERSTRIKE
Start up the line editor in overstrike mode.
SINGLE_LINE_ZLE (-M) <K>
Use single-line command line editing instead of
multi-line.
Note that although this is on by default in ksh emula-
tion it only provides superficial compatibility with
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User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
the ksh line editor and reduces the effectiveness of
the zsh line editor. As it has no effect on shell syn-
tax, many users may wish to disable this option when
using ksh emulation interactively.
VI If ZLE is loaded, turning on this option has the equiv-
alent effect of `bindkey -v'. In addition, the EMACS
option is unset. Turning it off has no effect. The
option setting is not guaranteed to reflect the current
keymap. This option is provided for compatibility;
bindkey is the recommended interface.
ZLE (-Z)
Use the zsh line editor. Set by default in interactive
shells connected to a terminal.
OPTION ALIASES
Some options have alternative names. These aliases are
never used for output, but can be used just like normal
option names when specifying options to the shell.
BRACE_EXPAND
NO_IGNORE_BRACES (ksh and bash compatibility)
DOT_GLOB
GLOB_DOTS (bash compatibility)
HASH_ALL
HASH_CMDS (bash compatibility)
HIST_APPEND
APPEND_HISTORY (bash compatibility)
HIST_EXPAND
BANG_HIST (bash compatibility)
LOG NO_HIST_NO_FUNCTIONS (ksh compatibility)
MAIL_WARN
MAIL_WARNING (bash compatibility)
ONE_CMD
SINGLE_COMMAND (bash compatibility)
PHYSICAL
CHASE_LINKS (ksh and bash compatibility)
PROMPT_VARS
PROMPT_SUBST (bash compatibility)
STDIN
SHIN_STDIN (ksh compatibility)
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TRACK_ALL
HASH_CMDS (ksh compatibility)
SINGLE LETTER OPTIONS
Default set
-0 CORRECT
-1 PRINT_EXIT_VALUE
-2 NO_BAD_PATTERN
-3 NO_NOMATCH
-4 GLOB_DOTS
-5 NOTIFY
-6 BG_NICE
-7 IGNORE_EOF
-8 MARK_DIRS
-9 AUTO_LIST
-B NO_BEEP
-C NO_CLOBBER
-D PUSHD_TO_HOME
-E PUSHD_SILENT
-F NO_GLOB
-G NULL_GLOB
-H RM_STAR_SILENT
-I IGNORE_BRACES
-J AUTO_CD
-K NO_BANG_HIST
-L SUN_KEYBOARD_HACK
-M SINGLE_LINE_ZLE
-N AUTO_PUSHD
-O CORRECT_ALL
-P RC_EXPAND_PARAM
-Q PATH_DIRS
-R LONG_LIST_JOBS
-S REC_EXACT
-T CDABLE_VARS
-U MAIL_WARNING
-V NO_PROMPT_CR
-W AUTO_RESUME
-X LIST_TYPES
-Y MENU_COMPLETE
-Z ZLE
-a ALL_EXPORT
-e ERR_EXIT
-f NO_RCS
-g HIST_IGNORE_SPACE
-h HIST_IGNORE_DUPS
-i INTERACTIVE
-k INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS
-l LOGIN
-m MONITOR
-n NO_EXEC
-p PRIVILEGED
-r RESTRICTED
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-s SHIN_STDIN
-t SINGLE_COMMAND
-u NO_UNSET
-v VERBOSE
-w CHASE_LINKS
-x XTRACE
-y SH_WORD_SPLIT
sh/ksh emulation set
-C NO_CLOBBER
-T TRAPS_ASYNC
-X MARK_DIRS
-a ALL_EXPORT
-b NOTIFY
-e ERR_EXIT
-f NO_GLOB
-i INTERACTIVE
-l LOGIN
-m MONITOR
-n NO_EXEC
-p PRIVILEGED
-r RESTRICTED
-s SHIN_STDIN
-t SINGLE_COMMAND
-u NO_UNSET
-v VERBOSE
-x XTRACE
Also note
-A Used by set for setting arrays
-b Used on the command line to specify end of option pro-
cessing
-c Used on the command line to specify a single command
-m Used by setopt for pattern-matching option setting
-o Used in all places to allow use of long option names
-s Used by set to sort positional parameters
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 31
User Commands ZSHOPTIONS(1)
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 32
User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
NAME
zshbuiltins - zsh built-in commands
SHELL BUILTIN COMMANDS
Some shell builtin commands take options as described in
individual entries; these are often referred to in the list
below as `flags' to avoid confusion with shell options,
which may also have an effect on the behaviour of builtin
commands. In this introductory section, `option' always has
the meaning of an option to a command that should be famil-
iar to most command line users.
Typically, options are single letters preceded by a hyphen
(-). Options that take an argument accept it either immedi-
ately following the option letter or after white space, for
example `print -C3 *' or `print -C 3 *' are equivalent.
Arguments to options are not the same as arguments to the
command; the documentation indicates which is which.
Options that do not take an argument may be combined in a
single word, for example `print -ca *' and `print -c -a *'
are equivalent.
Some shell builtin commands also take options that begin
with `+' instead of `-'. The list below makes clear which
commands these are.
Options (together with their individual arguments, if any)
must appear in a group before any non-option arguments; once
the first non-option argument has been found, option pro-
cessing is terminated.
All builtin commands other than precommand modifiers, even
those that have no options, can be given the argument `--'
to terminate option processing. This indicates that the
following words are non-option arguments, but is otherwise
ignored. This is useful in cases where arguments to the
command may begin with `-'. For historical reasons, most
builtin commands also recognize a single `-' in a separate
word for this purpose; note that this is less standard and
use of `-- is recommended.
- simple command
See the section `Precommand Modifiers'.
. file [ arg ... ]
Read commands from file and execute them in the current
shell environment.
If file does not contain a slash, or if PATH_DIRS is
set, the shell looks in the components of $path to find
the directory containing file. Files in the current
directory are not read unless `.' appears somewhere in
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$path. If a file named `file.zwc' is found, is newer
than file, and is the compiled form (created with the
zcompile builtin) of file, then commands are read from
that file instead of file.
If any arguments arg are given, they become the posi-
tional parameters; the old positional parameters are
restored when the file is done executing. If file was
not found the return status is 127; if file was found
but contained a syntax error the return status is 126;
else the return status is the exit status of the last
command executed.
: [ arg ... ]
This command does nothing, although normal argument
expansions is performed which may have effects on shell
parameters. A zero exit status is returned.
alias [ {+|-}gmrsL ] [ name[=value] ... ]
For each name with a corresponding value, define an
alias with that value. A trailing space in value
causes the next word to be checked for alias expansion.
If the -g flag is present, define a global alias;
global aliases are expanded even if they do not occur
in command position.
If the -s flag is present, define a suffix alias: if
the command word on a command line is in the form
`text.name', where text is any non-empty string, it is
replaced by the text `value text.name'. Note that name
is treated as a literal string, not a pattern. A
trailing space in value is not special in this case.
For example,
alias -s ps=gv
will cause the command `*.ps' to be expanded to `gv
*.ps'. As alias expansion is carried out earlier than
globbing, the `*.ps' will then be expanded. Suffix
aliases constitute a different name space from other
aliases (so in the above example it is still possible
to create an alias for the command ps) and the two sets
are never listed together.
For each name with no value, print the value of name,
if any. With no arguments, print all currently defined
aliases other than suffix aliases. If the -m flag is
given the arguments are taken as patterns (they should
be quoted to preserve them from being interpreted as
glob patterns), and the aliases matching these patterns
are printed. When printing aliases and one of the -g,
-r or -s flags is present, restrict the printing to
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
global, regular or suffix aliases, respectively; a reg-
ular alias is one which is neither a global nor a suf-
fix alias. Using `+' instead of `-', or ending the
option list with a single `+', prevents the values of
the aliases from being printed.
If the -L flag is present, then print each alias in a
manner suitable for putting in a startup script. The
exit status is nonzero if a name (with no value) is
given for which no alias has been defined.
For more on aliases, include common problems, see the
section ALIASING in zshmisc(1).
autoload [ {+|-}UXkmtz ] [ -w ] [ name ... ]
Equivalent to functions -u, with the exception of -X/+X
and -w.
The flag -X may be used only inside a shell function,
and may not be followed by a name. It causes the call-
ing function to be marked for autoloading and then
immediately loaded and executed, with the current array
of positional parameters as arguments. This replaces
the previous definition of the function. If no func-
tion definition is found, an error is printed and the
function remains undefined and marked for autoloading.
The flag +X attempts to load each name as an autoloaded
function, but does not execute it. The exit status is
zero (success) if the function was not previously
defined and a definition for it was found. This does
not replace any existing definition of the function.
The exit status is nonzero (failure) if the function
was already defined or when no definition was found.
In the latter case the function remains undefined and
marked for autoloading. If ksh-style autoloading is
enabled, the function created will contain the contents
of the file plus a call to the function itself appended
to it, thus giving normal ksh autoloading behaviour on
the first call to the function. If the -m flag is also
given each name is treated as a pattern and all func-
tions already marked for autoload that match the pat-
tern are loaded.
With the -w flag, the names are taken as names of files
compiled with the zcompile builtin, and all functions
defined in them are marked for autoloading.
The flags -z and -k mark the function to be autoloaded
using the zsh or ksh style, as if the option
KSH_AUTOLOAD were unset or were set, respectively. The
flags override the setting of the option at the time
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 3
User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
the function is loaded.
Note that the autoload command makes no attempt to
ensure the shell options set during the loading or exe-
cution of the file have any particular value. For
this, the emulate command can be used:
emulate zsh -c 'autoload -Uz func'
arranges that when func is loaded the shell is in
native zsh emulation, and this emulation is also
applied when func is run.
bg [ job ... ]
job ... &
Put each specified job in the background, or the cur-
rent job if none is specified.
bindkey
See the section `Zle Builtins' in zshzle(1).
break [ n ]
Exit from an enclosing for, while, until, select or
repeat loop. If n is specified, then break n levels
instead of just one.
builtin name [ args ... ]
Executes the builtin name, with the given args.
bye Same as exit.
cap See the section `The zsh/cap Module' in zshmodules(1).
cd [ -qsLP ] [ arg ]
cd [ -qsLP ] old new
cd [ -qsLP ] {+|-}n
Change the current directory. In the first form,
change the current directory to arg, or to the value of
$HOME if arg is not specified. If arg is `-', change
to the previous directory.
Otherwise, if arg begins with a slash, attempt to
change to the directory given by arg.
If arg does not begin with a slash, the behaviour
depends on whether the current directory `.' occurs in
the list of directories contained in the shell parame-
ter cdpath. If it does not, first attempt to change to
the directory arg under the current directory, and if
that fails but cdpath is set and contains at least one
element attempt to change to the directory arg under
each component of cdpath in turn until successful. If
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
`.' occurs in cdpath, then cdpath is searched strictly
in order so that `.' is only tried at the appropriate
point.
The order of testing cdpath is modified if the option
POSIX_CD is set, as described in the documentation for
the option.
If no directory is found, the option CDABLE_VARS is
set, and a parameter named arg exists whose value
begins with a slash, treat its value as the directory.
In that case, the parameter is added to the named
directory hash table.
The second form of cd substitutes the string new for
the string old in the name of the current directory,
and tries to change to this new directory.
The third form of cd extracts an entry from the direc-
tory stack, and changes to that directory. An argument
of the form `+n' identifies a stack entry by counting
from the left of the list shown by the dirs command,
starting with zero. An argument of the form `-n'
counts from the right. If the PUSHD_MINUS option is
set, the meanings of `+' and `-' in this context are
swapped.
If the -q (quiet) option is specified, the hook func-
tion chpwd and the functions in the array chpwd_func-
tions are not called. This is useful for calls to cd
that do not change the environment seen by an interac-
tive user.
If the -s option is specified, cd refuses to change the
current directory if the given pathname contains sym-
links. If the -P option is given or the CHASE_LINKS
option is set, symbolic links are resolved to their
true values. If the -L option is given symbolic links
are retained in the directory (and not resolved)
regardless of the state of the CHASE_LINKS option.
chdir
Same as cd.
clone
See the section `The zsh/clone Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
command [ -pvV ] simple command
The simple command argument is taken as an external
command instead of a function or builtin and is exe-
cuted. If the POSIX_BUILTINS option is set, builtins
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
will also be executed but certain special properties of
them are suppressed. The -p flag causes a default path
to be searched instead of that in $path. With the -v
flag, command is similar to whence and with -V, it is
equivalent to whence -v.
See also the section `Precommand Modifiers'.
comparguments
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compcall
See the section `The zsh/compctl Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compctl
See the section `The zsh/compctl Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compdescribe
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compfiles
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compgroups
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compquote
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
comptags
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
comptry
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
compvalues
See the section `The zsh/computil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
continue [ n ]
Resume the next iteration of the enclosing for, while,
until, select or repeat loop. If n is specified, break
out of n-1 loops and resume at the nth enclosing loop.
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
declare
Same as typeset.
dirs [ -c ] [ arg ... ]
dirs [ -lpv ]
With no arguments, print the contents of the directory
stack. Directories are added to this stack with the
pushd command, and removed with the cd or popd com-
mands. If arguments are specified, load them onto the
directory stack, replacing anything that was there, and
push the current directory onto the stack.
-c clear the directory stack.
-l print directory names in full instead of using of
using ~ expressions (see Dynamic and Static named
directories in zshexpn(1)).
-p print directory entries one per line.
-v number the directories in the stack when printing.
disable [ -afmprs ] name ...
Temporarily disable the named hash table elements or
patterns. The default is to disable builtin commands.
This allows you to use an external command with the
same name as a builtin command. The -a option causes
disable to act on regular or global aliases. The -s
option causes disable to act on suffix aliases. The -f
option causes disable to act on shell functions. The
-r options causes disable to act on reserved words.
Without arguments all disabled hash table elements from
the corresponding hash table are printed. With the -m
flag the arguments are taken as patterns (which should
be quoted to prevent them from undergoing filename
expansion), and all hash table elements from the corre-
sponding hash table matching these patterns are dis-
abled. Disabled objects can be enabled with the enable
command.
With the option -p, name ... refer to elements of the
shell's pattern syntax as described in the section
`Filename Generation'. Certain elements can be dis-
abled separately, as given below.
Note that patterns not allowed by the current settings
for the options EXTENDED_GLOB, KSH_GLOB and SH_GLOB are
never enabled, regardless of the setting here. For
example, if EXTENDED_GLOB is not active, the pattern ^
is ineffective even if `disable -p "^"' has not been
issued. The list below indicates any option settings
that restrict the use of the pattern. It should be
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
noted that setting SH_GLOB has a wider effect then
merely disabling patterns as certain expressions, in
particular those involving parentheses, are parsed dif-
ferently.
The following patterns may be disabled; all the strings
need quoting on the command line to prevent them from
being interpreted immediately as patterns and the pat-
terns are shown below in single quotes as a reminder.
'?' The pattern character ? wherever it occurs,
including when preceding a parenthesis with
KSH_GLOB.
'*' The pattern character * wherever it occurs,
including recursive globbing and when preceding a
parenthesis with KSH_GLOB.
'[' Character classes.
'<' (NO_SH_GLOB)
Numeric ranges.
'|' (NO_SH_GLOB)
Alternation in grouped patterns, case statements,
or KSH_GLOB parenthesised expressions.
'(' (NO_SH_GLOB)
Grouping using single parentheses. Disabling this
does not disable the use of parentheses for
KSH_GLOB where they are introduced by a special
character, nor for glob qualifiers (use `setopt
NO_BARE_GLOB_QUAL' to disable glob qualifiers that
use parentheses only).
'~' (EXTENDED_GLOB)
Exclusion in the form A~B.
'^' (EXTENDED_GLOB)
Exclusion in the form A^B.
'#' (EXTENDED_GLOB)
The pattern character # wherever it occurs, both
for repetition of a previous pattern and for indi-
cating globbing flags.
'?(' (KSH_GLOB)
The grouping form ?(...). Note this is also dis-
abled if '?' is disabled.
'*(' (KSH_GLOB)
The grouping form *(...). Note this is also dis-
abled if '*' is disabled.
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
'+(' (KSH_GLOB)
The grouping form +(...).
'!(' (KSH_GLOB)
The grouping form !(...).
'@(' (KSH_GLOB)
The grouping form @(...).
disown [ job ... ]
job ... &|
job ... &!
Remove the specified jobs from the job table; the shell
will no longer report their status, and will not com-
plain if you try to exit an interactive shell with them
running or stopped. If no job is specified, disown the
current job.
If the jobs are currently stopped and the AUTO_CONTINUE
option is not set, a warning is printed containing
information about how to make them running after they
have been disowned. If one of the latter two forms is
used, the jobs will automatically be made running,
independent of the setting of the AUTO_CONTINUE option.
echo [ -neE ] [ arg ... ]
Write each arg on the standard output, with a space
separating each one. If the -n flag is not present,
print a newline at the end. echo recognizes the fol-
lowing escape sequences:
\a bell character
\b backspace
\c suppress final newline
\e escape
\f form feed
\n linefeed (newline)
\r carriage return
\t horizontal tab
\v vertical tab
\\ backslash
\0NNN
character code in octal
\xNN character code in hexadecimal
\uNNNN
unicode character code in hexadecimal
\UNNNNNNNN
unicode character code in hexadecimal
The -E flag, or the BSD_ECHO option, can be used to
disable these escape sequences. In the latter case, -e
flag can be used to enable them.
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
echotc
See the section `The zsh/termcap Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
echoti
See the section `The zsh/terminfo Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
emulate [ -LR ] [ {zsh|sh|ksh|csh} [ flags ... ] ]
Without any argument print current emulation mode.
With single argument set up zsh options to emulate the
specified shell as much as possible. csh will never be
fully emulated. If the argument is not one of the
shells listed above, zsh will be used as a default;
more precisely, the tests performed on the argument are
the same as those used to determine the emulation at
startup based on the shell name, see the section COM-
PATIBILITY in zsh(1) . In addition to setting shell
options, the command also restores the pristine state
of pattern enables, as if all patterns had been enabled
using enable -p.
If the emulate command occurs inside a function that
has been marked for execution tracing with functions -t
then the xtrace option will be turned on regardless of
emulation mode or other options. Note that code exe-
cuted inside the function by the ., source, or eval
commands is not considered to be running directly from
the function, hence does not provoke this behaviour.
If the -R switch is given, all settable options are
reset to their default value corresponding to the spec-
ified emulation mode, except for certain options
describing the interactive environment; otherwise, only
those options likely to cause portability problems in
scripts and functions are altered. If the -L switch is
given, the options LOCAL_OPTIONS, LOCAL_PATTERNS and
LOCAL_TRAPS will be set as well, causing the effects of
the emulate command and any setopt, disable -p or
enable -p, and trap commands to be local to the immedi-
ately surrounding shell function, if any; normally
these options are turned off in all emulation modes
except ksh. The -L switch is mutually exclusive with
the use of -c in flags.
The flags may be any of the invocation-time flags
described in the section INVOCATION in zsh(1), except
that `-o EMACS' and `-o VI' may not be used. Flags
such as `+r'/`+o RESTRICTED' may be prohibited in some
circumstances.
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If -c arg appears in flags, arg is evaluated while the
requested emulation is temporarily in effect. In this
case the emulation mode and all options are restored to
their previous values before emulate returns. The -R
switch may precede the name of the shell to emulate;
note this has a meaning distinct from including -R in
flags.
Use of -c enables `sticky' emulation mode for functions
defined within the evaluated expression: the emulation
mode is associated thereafter with the function so that
whenever the function is executed the emulation
(respecting the -R switch, if present) and all options
are set (and pattern disables cleared) before entry to
the function, and the state is restored after exit. If
the function is called when the sticky emulation is
already in effect, either within an `emulate shell -c'
expression or within another function with the same
sticky emulation, entry and exit from the function do
not cause options to be altered (except due to standard
processing such as the LOCAL_OPTIONS option). This
also applies to functions marked for autoload within
the sticky emulation; the appropriate set of options
will be applied at the point the function is loaded as
well as when it is run.
For example:
emulate sh -c 'fni() { setopt cshnullglob; }
fno() { fni; }'
fno
The two functions fni and fno are defined with sticky
sh emulation. fno is then executed, causing options
associated with emulations to be set to their values in
sh. fni then calls fno; because fno is also marked for
sticky sh emulation, no option changes take place on
entry to or exit from it. Hence the option cshnull-
glob, turned off by sh emulation, will be turned on
within fni and remain on on return to fno. On exit
from fno, the emulation mode and all options will be
restored to the state they were in before entry to the
temporary emulation.
The documentation above is typically sufficient for the
intended purpose of executing code designed for other
shells in a suitable environment. More detailed rules
follow.
1. The sticky emulation environment provided by `emu-
late shell -c' is identical to that provided by
entry to a function marked for sticky emulation as
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a consequence of being defined in such an environ-
ment. Hence, for example, the sticky emulation is
inherited by subfunctions defined within functions
with sticky emulation.
2. No change of options takes place on entry to or
exit from functions that are not marked for sticky
emulation, other than those that would normally
take place, even if those functions are called
within sticky emulation.
3. No special handling is provided for functions
marked for autoload nor for functions present in
wordcode created by the zcompile command.
4. The presence or absence of the -R switch to emu-
late corresponds to different sticky emulation
modes, so for example `emulate sh -c', `emulate -R
sh -c' and `emulate csh -c' are treated as three
distinct sticky emulations.
5. Difference in shell options supplied in addition
to the basic emulation also mean the sticky emula-
tions are different, so for example `emulate zsh
-c' and `emulate zsh -o cbases -c' are treated as
distinct sticky emulations.
enable [ -afmprs ] name ...
Enable the named hash table elements, presumably dis-
abled earlier with disable. The default is to enable
builtin commands. The -a option causes enable to act
on regular or global aliases. The -s option causes
enable to act on suffix aliases. The -f option causes
enable to act on shell functions. The -r option causes
enable to act on reserved words. Without arguments all
enabled hash table elements from the corresponding hash
table are printed. With the -m flag the arguments are
taken as patterns (should be quoted) and all hash table
elements from the corresponding hash table matching
these patterns are enabled. Enabled objects can be
disabled with the disable builtin command.
enable -p reenables patterns disabled with disable -p.
Note that it does not override globbing options; for
example, `enable -p "~"' does not cause the pattern
character ~ to be active unless the EXTENDED_GLOB
option is also set. To enable all possible patterns
(so that they may be invidually disabled with disable
-p), use `setopt EXTENDED_GLOB KSH_GLOB NO_SH_GLOB'.
eval [ arg ... ]
Read the arguments as input to the shell and execute
the resulting command(s) in the current shell process.
The return status is the same as if the commands had
been executed directly by the shell; if there are no
args or they contain no commands (i.e. are an empty
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string or whitespace) the return status is zero.
exec [ -cl ] [ -a argv0 ] simple command
Replace the current shell with an external command
rather than forking. With -c clear the environment;
with -l prepend - to the argv[0] string of the command
executed (to simulate a login shell); with -a argv0 set
the argv[0] string of the command executed. See the
section `Precommand Modifiers'.
exit [ n ]
Exit the shell with the exit status specified by n; if
none is specified, use the exit status from the last
command executed. An EOF condition will also cause the
shell to exit, unless the IGNORE_EOF option is set.
See notes at the end of the section JOBS in in zsh-
misc(1) for some possibly unexpected interactions of
the exit command with jobs.
export [ name[=value] ... ]
The specified names are marked for automatic export to
the environment of subsequently executed commands.
Equivalent to typeset -gx. If a parameter specified
does not already exist, it is created in the global
scope.
false [ arg ... ]
Do nothing and return an exit status of 1.
fc [ -e ename ] [ -m match ] [ old=new ... ] [ first [ last
] ]
fc -l [ -nrdfEiD ] [ -t timefmt ] [ -m match ]
[ old=new ... ] [ first [ last ] ]
fc -p [ -a ] [ filename [ histsize [ savehistsize ] ] ]
fc -P
fc -ARWI [ filename ]
Select a range of commands from first to last from the
history list. The arguments first and last may be
specified as a number or as a string. A negative num-
ber is used as an offset to the current history event
number. A string specifies the most recent event
beginning with the given string. All substitutions
old=new, if any, are then performed on the commands.
If the -l flag is given, the resulting commands are
listed on standard output. If the -m flag is also
given the first argument is taken as a pattern (should
be quoted) and only the history events matching this
pattern will be shown. Otherwise the editor program
ename is invoked on a file containing these history
events. If ename is not given, the value of the
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parameter FCEDIT is used; if that is not set the value
of the parameter EDITOR is used; if that is not set a
builtin default, usually `vi' is used. If ename is
`-', no editor is invoked. When editing is complete,
the edited command is executed.
If first is not specified, it will be set to -1 (the
most recent event), or to -16 if the -l flag is given.
If last is not specified, it will be set to first, or
to -1 if the -l flag is given.
The flag -r reverses the order of the commands and the
flag -n suppresses command numbers when listing.
Also when listing,
-d prints timestamps for each command
-f prints full time-date stamps in the US `MM/DD/YY
hh:mm' format
-E prints full time-date stamps in the European
`dd.mm.yyyy hh:mm' format
-i prints full time-date stamps in ISO8601
`yyyy-mm-dd hh:mm' format
-t fmt
prints time and date stamps in the given format;
fmt is formatted with the strftime function with
the zsh extensions described for the %D{string}
prompt format in the section EXPANSION OF PROMPT
SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1). The resulting formatted
string must be no more than 256 characters or will
not be printed.
-D prints elapsed times; may be combined with one of
the options above.
`fc -p' pushes the current history list onto a stack
and switches to a new history list. If the -a option
is also specified, this history list will be automati-
cally popped when the current function scope is exited,
which is a much better solution than creating a trap
function to call `fc -P' manually. If no arguments are
specified, the history list is left empty, $HISTFILE is
unset, and $HISTSIZE & $SAVEHIST are set to their
default values. If one argument is given, $HISTFILE is
set to that filename, $HISTSIZE & $SAVEHIST are left
unchanged, and the history file is read in (if it
exists) to initialize the new list. If a second argu-
ment is specified, $HISTSIZE & $SAVEHIST are instead
set to the single specified numeric value. Finally, if
a third argument is specified, $SAVEHIST is set to a
separate value from $HISTSIZE. You are free to change
these environment values for the new history list how-
ever you desire in order to manipulate the new history
list.
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`fc -P' pops the history list back to an older list
saved by `fc -p'. The current list is saved to its
$HISTFILE before it is destroyed (assuming that $HIST-
FILE and $SAVEHIST are set appropriately, of course).
The values of $HISTFILE, $HISTSIZE, and $SAVEHIST are
restored to the values they had when `fc -p' was
called. Note that this restoration can conflict with
making these variables "local", so your best bet is to
avoid local declarations for these variables in func-
tions that use `fc -p'. The one other guaranteed-safe
combination is declaring these variables to be local at
the top of your function and using the automatic option
(-a) with `fc -p'. Finally, note that it is legal to
manually pop a push marked for automatic popping if you
need to do so before the function exits.
`fc -R' reads the history from the given file, `fc -W'
writes the history out to the given file, and `fc -A'
appends the history out to the given file. If no file-
name is specified, the $HISTFILE is assumed. If the -I
option is added to -R, only those events that are not
already contained within the internal history list are
added. If the -I option is added to -A or -W, only
those events that are new since last incremental
append/write to the history file are appended/written.
In any case, the created file will have no more than
$SAVEHIST entries.
fg [ job ... ]
job ...
Bring each specified job in turn to the foreground. If
no job is specified, resume the current job.
float [ {+|-}EFHghlprtux ] [ -LRZ [ n ]] [ name[=value] ...
]
Equivalent to typeset -E, except that options irrele-
vant to floating point numbers are not permitted.
functions [ {+|-}UXkmtTuz ] [ name ... ]
functions -M mathfn [ min [ max [ shellfn ] ] ]
functions -M [ -m pattern ... ]
functions +M [ -m ] mathfn
Equivalent to typeset -f, with the exception of the -M
option. Use of the -M option may not be combined with
any of the options handled by typeset -f.
functions -M mathfn defines mathfn as the name of a
mathematical function recognised in all forms of arith-
metical expressions; see the section `Arithmetic Evalu-
ation' in zshmisc(1). By default mathfn may take any
number of comma-separated arguments. If min is given,
it must have exactly min args; if min and max are both
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given, it must have at least min and at most max args.
max may be -1 to indicate that there is no upper limit.
By default the function is implemented by a shell func-
tion of the same name; if shellfn is specified it gives
the name of the corresponding shell function while
mathfn remains the name used in arithmetical expres-
sions. The name of the function in $0 is mathfn (not
shellfn as would usually be the case), provided the
option FUNCTION_ARGZERO is in effect. The positional
parameters in the shell function correspond to the
arguments of the mathematical function call. The
result of the last arithmetical expression evaluated
inside the shell function (even if it is a form that
normally only returns a status) gives the result of the
mathematical function.
functions -M with no arguments lists all such
user-defined functions in the same form as a defini-
tion. With the additional option -m and a list of
arguments, all functions whose mathfn matches one of
the pattern arguments are listed.
function +M removes the list of mathematical functions;
with the additional option -m the arguments are treated
as patterns and all functions whose mathfn matches the
pattern are removed. Note that the shell function
implementing the behaviour is not removed (regardless
of whether its name coincides with mathfn).
For example, the following prints the cube of 3:
zmath_cube() { (( $1 * $1 * $1 )) }
functions -M cube 1 1 zmath_cube
print $(( cube(3) ))
getcap
See the section `The zsh/cap Module' in zshmodules(1).
getln [ -AclneE ] name ...
Read the top value from the buffer stack and put it in
the shell parameter name. Equivalent to read -zr.
getopts optstring name [ arg ... ]
Checks the args for legal options. If the args are
omitted, use the positional parameters. A valid option
argument begins with a `+' or a `-'. An argument not
beginning with a `+' or a `-', or the argument `--',
ends the options. Note that a single `-' is not con-
sidered a valid option argument. optstring contains
the letters that getopts recognizes. If a letter is
followed by a `:', that option requires an argument.
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The options can be separated from the argument by
blanks.
Each time it is invoked, getopts places the option let-
ter it finds in the shell parameter name, prepended
with a `+' when arg begins with a `+'. The index of
the next arg is stored in OPTIND. The option argument,
if any, is stored in OPTARG.
The first option to be examined may be changed by
explicitly assigning to OPTIND. OPTIND has an initial
value of 1, and is normally reset to 1 upon exit from a
shell function. OPTARG is not reset and retains its
value from the most recent call to getopts. If either
of OPTIND or OPTARG is explicitly unset, it remains
unset, and the index or option argument is not stored.
The option itself is still stored in name in this case.
A leading `:' in optstring causes getopts to store the
letter of any invalid option in OPTARG, and to set name
to `?' for an unknown option and to `:' when a required
argument is missing. Otherwise, getopts sets name to
`?' and prints an error message when an option is
invalid. The exit status is nonzero when there are no
more options.
hash [ -Ldfmrv ] [ name[=value] ] ...
hash can be used to directly modify the contents of the
command hash table, and the named directory hash table.
Normally one would modify these tables by modifying
one's PATH (for the command hash table) or by creating
appropriate shell parameters (for the named directory
hash table). The choice of hash table to work on is
determined by the -d option; without the option the
command hash table is used, and with the option the
named directory hash table is used.
Given no arguments, and neither the -r or -f options,
the selected hash table will be listed in full.
The -r option causes the selected hash table to be emp-
tied. It will be subsequently rebuilt in the normal
fashion. The -f option causes the selected hash table
to be fully rebuilt immediately. For the command hash
table this hashes all the absolute directories in the
PATH, and for the named directory hash table this adds
all users' home directories. These two options cannot
be used with any arguments.
The -m option causes the arguments to be taken as pat-
terns (which should be quoted) and the elements of the
hash table matching those patterns are printed. This
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is the only way to display a limited selection of hash
table elements.
For each name with a corresponding value, put `name' in
the selected hash table, associating it with the path-
name `value'. In the command hash table, this means
that whenever `name' is used as a command argument, the
shell will try to execute the file given by `value'.
In the named directory hash table, this means that
`value' may be referred to as `~name'.
For each name with no corresponding value, attempt to
add name to the hash table, checking what the appropri-
ate value is in the normal manner for that hash table.
If an appropriate value can't be found, then the hash
table will be unchanged.
The -v option causes hash table entries to be listed as
they are added by explicit specification. If has no
effect if used with -f.
If the -L flag is present, then each hash table entry
is printed in the form of a call to hash.
history
Same as fc -l.
integer [ {+|-}Hghilprtux ] [ -LRZ [ n ]] [ name[=value] ...
]
Equivalent to typeset -i, except that options irrele-
vant to integers are not permitted.
jobs [ -dlprs ] [ job ... ]
jobs -Z string
Lists information about each given job, or all jobs if
job is omitted. The -l flag lists process IDs, and the
-p flag lists process groups. If the -r flag is speci-
fied only running jobs will be listed and if the -s
flag is given only stopped jobs are shown. If the -d
flag is given, the directory from which the job was
started (which may not be the current directory of the
job) will also be shown.
The -Z option replaces the shell's argument and envi-
ronment space with the given string, truncated if nec-
essary to fit. This will normally be visible in ps
(ps(1)) listings. This feature is typically used by
daemons, to indicate their state.
kill [ -s signal_name | -n signal_number | -sig ] job ...
kill -l [ sig ... ]
Sends either SIGTERM or the specified signal to the
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given jobs or processes. Signals are given by number
or by names, with or without the `SIG' prefix. If the
signal being sent is not `KILL' or `CONT', then the job
will be sent a `CONT' signal if it is stopped. The
argument job can be the process ID of a job not in the
job list. In the second form, kill -l, if sig is not
specified the signal names are listed. Otherwise, for
each sig that is a name, the corresponding signal num-
ber is listed. For each sig that is a signal number or
a number representing the exit status of a process
which was terminated or stopped by a signal the name of
the signal is printed.
On some systems, alternative signal names are allowed
for a few signals. Typical examples are SIGCHLD and
SIGCLD or SIGPOLL and SIGIO, assuming they correspond
to the same signal number. kill -l will only list the
preferred form, however kill -l alt will show if the
alternative form corresponds to a signal number. For
example, under Linux kill -l IO and kill -l POLL both
output 29, hence kill -IO and kill -POLL have the same
effect.
Many systems will allow process IDs to be negative to
kill a process group or zero to kill the current
process group.
let arg ...
Evaluate each arg as an arithmetic expression. See the
section `Arithmetic Evaluation' in zshmisc(1) for a
description of arithmetic expressions. The exit status
is 0 if the value of the last expression is nonzero, 1
if it is zero, and 2 if an error occurred.
limit [ -hs ] [ resource [ limit ] ] ...
Set or display resource limits. Unless the -s flag is
given, the limit applies only the children of the
shell. If -s is given without other arguments, the
resource limits of the current shell is set to the pre-
viously set resource limits of the children.
If limit is not specified, print the current limit
placed on resource, otherwise set the limit to the
specified value. If the -h flag is given, use hard
limits instead of soft limits. If no resource is
given, print all limits.
When looping over multiple resources, the shell will
abort immediately if it detects a badly formed argu-
ment. However, if it fails to set a limit for some
other reason it will continue trying to set the remain-
ing limits.
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resource can be one of:
addressspace
Maximum amount of address space used.
aiomemorylocked
Maximum amount of memory locked in RAM for AIO
operations.
aiooperations
Maximum number of AIO operations.
cachedthreads
Maximum number of cached threads.
coredumpsize
Maximum size of a core dump.
cputime
Maximum CPU seconds per process.
datasize
Maximum data size (including stack) for each
process.
descriptors
Maximum value for a file descriptor.
filesize
Largest single file allowed.
kqueues
Maximum number of kqueues allocated.
maxproc
Maximum number of processes.
maxpthreads
Maximum number of threads per process.
memorylocked
Maximum amount of memory locked in RAM.
memoryuse
Maximum resident set size.
msgqueue
Maximum number of bytes in POSIX message queues.
posixlocks
Maximum number of POSIX locks per user.
pseudoterminals
Maximum number of pseudo-terminals.
resident
Maximum resident set size.
sigpending
Maximum number of pending signals.
sockbufsize
Maximum size of all socket buffers.
stacksize
Maximum stack size for each process.
swapsize
Maximum amount of swap used.
vmemorysize
Maximum amount of virtual memory.
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Which of these resource limits are available depends on
the system. resource can be abbreviated to any unam-
biguous prefix. It can also be an integer, which cor-
responds to the integer defined for the resource by the
operating system.
If argument corresponds to a number which is out of the
range of the resources configured into the shell, the
shell will try to read or write the limit anyway, and
will report an error if this fails. As the shell does
not store such resources internally, an attempt to set
the limit will fail unless the -s option is present.
limit is a number, with an optional scaling factor, as
follows:
nh hours
nk kilobytes (default)
nm megabytes or minutes
[mm:]ss
minutes and seconds
The limit command is not made available by default when
the shell starts in a mode emulating another shell. It
can be made available with the command `zmodload -F
zsh/rlimits b:limit'.
local [ {+|-}AEFHUahlprtux ] [ -LRZi [ n ]] [ name[=value]
] ...
Same as typeset, except that the options -g, and -f are
not permitted. In this case the -x option does not
force the use of -g, i.e. exported variables will be
local to functions.
log List all users currently logged in who are affected by
the current setting of the watch parameter.
logout [ n ]
Same as exit, except that it only works in a login
shell.
noglob simple command
See the section `Precommand Modifiers'.
popd [ [-q] {+|-}n ]
Remove an entry from the directory stack, and perform a
cd to the new top directory. With no argument, the
current top entry is removed. An argument of the form
`+n' identifies a stack entry by counting from the left
of the list shown by the dirs command, starting with
zero. An argument of the form -n counts from the
right. If the PUSHD_MINUS option is set, the meanings
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User Commands ZSHBUILTINS(1)
of `+' and `-' in this context are swapped.
If the -q (quiet) option is specified, the hook func-
tion chpwd and the functions in the array $chpwd_func-
tions are not called, and the new directory stack is
not printed. This is useful for calls to popd that do
not change the environment seen by an interactive user.
print [ -abcDilmnNoOpPrsSz ] [ -u n ] [ -f format ] [ -C
cols ]
[ -R [ -en ]] [ arg ... ]
With the `-f' option the arguments are printed as
described by printf. With no flags or with the flag
`-', the arguments are printed on the standard output
as described by echo, with the following differences:
the escape sequence `\M-x' metafies the character x
(sets the highest bit), `\C-x' produces a control char-
acter (`\C-@' and `\C-?' give the characters NUL and
delete), and `\E' is a synonym for `\e'. Finally, if
not in an escape sequence, `\' escapes the following
character and is not printed.
-a Print arguments with the column incrementing
first. Only useful with the -c and -C options.
-b Recognize all the escape sequences defined for the
bindkey command, see zshzle(1).
-c Print the arguments in columns. Unless -a is also
given, arguments are printed with the row incre-
menting first.
-C cols
Print the arguments in cols columns. Unless -a is
also given, arguments are printed with the row
incrementing first.
-D Treat the arguments as paths, replacing directory
prefixes with ~ expressions corresponding to
directory names, as appropriate.
-i If given together with -o or -O, sorting is per-
formed case-independently.
-l Print the arguments separated by newlines instead
of spaces.
-m Take the first argument as a pattern (should be
quoted), and remove it from the argument list
together with subsequent arguments that do not
match this pattern.
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-n Do not add a newline to the output.
-N Print the arguments separated and terminated by
nulls.
-o Print the arguments sorted in ascending order.
-O Print the arguments sorted in descending order.
-p Print the arguments to the input of the coprocess.
-P Perform prompt expansion (see EXPANSION OF PROMPT
SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1)).
-r Ignore the escape conventions of echo.
-R Emulate the BSD echo command, which does not
process escape sequences unless the -e flag is
given. The -n flag suppresses the trailing new-
line. Only the -e and -n flags are recognized
after -R; all other arguments and options are
printed.
-s Place the results in the history list instead of
on the standard output. Each argument to the
print command is treated as a single word in the
history, regardless of its content.
-S Place the results in the history list instead of
on the standard output. In this case only a sin-
gle argument is allowed; it will be split into
words as if it were a full shell command line.
The effect is similar to reading the line from a
history file with the HIST_LEX_WORDS option
active.
-u n Print the arguments to file descriptor n.
-z Push the arguments onto the editing buffer stack,
separated by spaces.
If any of `-m', `-o' or `-O' are used in combination
with `-f' and there are no arguments (after the removal
process in the case of `-m') then nothing is printed.
printf format [ arg ... ]
Print the arguments according to the format specifica-
tion. Formatting rules are the same as used in C. The
same escape sequences as for echo are recognised in the
format. All C conversion specifications ending in one
of csdiouxXeEfgGn are handled. In addition to this,
`%b' can be used instead of `%s' to cause escape
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sequences in the argument to be recognised and `%q' can
be used to quote the argument in such a way that allows
it to be reused as shell input. With the numeric format
specifiers, if the corresponding argument starts with a
quote character, the numeric value of the following
character is used as the number to print otherwise the
argument is evaluated as an arithmetic expression. See
the section `Arithmetic Evaluation' in zshmisc(1) for a
description of arithmetic expressions. With `%n', the
corresponding argument is taken as an identifier which
is created as an integer parameter.
Normally, conversion specifications are applied to each
argument in order but they can explicitly specify the
nth argument is to be used by replacing `%' by `%n$'
and `*' by `*n$'. It is recommended that you do not
mix references of this explicit style with the normal
style and the handling of such mixed styles may be sub-
ject to future change.
If arguments remain unused after formatting, the format
string is reused until all arguments have been con-
sumed. With the print builtin, this can be suppressed
by using the -r option. If more arguments are required
by the format than have been specified, the behaviour
is as if zero or an empty string had been specified as
the argument.
pushd [ -qsLP ] [ arg ]
pushd [ -qsLP ] old new
pushd [ -qsLP ] {+|-}n
Change the current directory, and push the old current
directory onto the directory stack. In the first form,
change the current directory to arg. If arg is not
specified, change to the second directory on the stack
(that is, exchange the top two entries), or change to
$HOME if the PUSHD_TO_HOME option is set or if there is
only one entry on the stack. Otherwise, arg is inter-
preted as it would be by cd. The meaning of old and
new in the second form is also the same as for cd.
The third form of pushd changes directory by rotating
the directory list. An argument of the form `+n' iden-
tifies a stack entry by counting from the left of the
list shown by the dirs command, starting with zero. An
argument of the form `-n' counts from the right. If
the PUSHD_MINUS option is set, the meanings of `+' and
`-' in this context are swapped.
If the -q (quiet) option is specified, the hook func-
tion chpwd and the functions in the array $chpwd_func-
tions are not called, and the new directory stack is
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not printed. This is useful for calls to pushd that do
not change the environment seen by an interactive user.
If the option -q is not specified and the shell option
PUSHD_SILENT is not set, the directory stack will be
printed after a pushd is performed.
The options -s, -L and -P have the same meanings as for
the cd builtin.
pushln [ arg ... ]
Equivalent to print -nz.
pwd [ -rLP ]
Print the absolute pathname of the current working
directory. If the -r or the -P flag is specified, or
the CHASE_LINKS option is set and the -L flag is not
given, the printed path will not contain symbolic
links.
r Same as fc -e -.
read [ -rszpqAclneE ] [ -t [ num ] ] [ -k [ num ] ] [ -d
delim ]
[ -u n ] [ name[?prompt] ] [ name ... ]
Read one line and break it into fields using the char-
acters in $IFS as separators, except as noted below.
The first field is assigned to the first name, the sec-
ond field to the second name, etc., with leftover
fields assigned to the last name. If name is omitted
then REPLY is used for scalars and reply for arrays.
-r Raw mode: a `\' at the end of a line does not sig-
nify line continuation and backslashes in the line
don't quote the following character and are not
removed.
-s Don't echo back characters if reading from the
terminal. Currently does not work with the -q
option.
-q Read only one character from the terminal and set
name to `y' if this character was `y' or `Y' and
to `n' otherwise. With this flag set the return
status is zero only if the character was `y' or
`Y'. This option may be used with a timeout; if
the read times out, or encounters end of file,
status 2 is returned. Input is read from the ter-
minal unless one of -u or -p is present. This
option may also be used within zle widgets.
-k [ num ]
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Read only one (or num) characters. All are
assigned to the first name, without word split-
ting. This flag is ignored when -q is present.
Input is read from the terminal unless one of -u
or -p is present. This option may also be used
within zle widgets.
Note that despite the mnemonic `key' this option
does read full characters, which may consist of
multiple bytes if the option MULTIBYTE is set.
-z Read one entry from the editor buffer stack and
assign it to the first name, without word split-
ting. Text is pushed onto the stack with `print
-z' or with push-line from the line editor (see
zshzle(1)). This flag is ignored when the -k or
-q flags are present.
-e
-E The input read is printed (echoed) to the standard
output. If the -e flag is used, no input is
assigned to the parameters.
-A The first name is taken as the name of an array
and all words are assigned to it.
-c
-l These flags are allowed only if called inside a
function used for completion (specified with the
-K flag to compctl). If the -c flag is given, the
words of the current command are read. If the -l
flag is given, the whole line is assigned as a
scalar. If both flags are present, -l is used and
-c is ignored.
-n Together with -c, the number of the word the cur-
sor is on is read. With -l, the index of the
character the cursor is on is read. Note that the
command name is word number 1, not word 0, and
that when the cursor is at the end of the line,
its character index is the length of the line plus
one.
-u n Input is read from file descriptor n.
-p Input is read from the coprocess.
-d delim
Input is terminated by the first character of
delim instead of by newline.
-t [ num ]
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Test if input is available before attempting to
read. If num is present, it must begin with a
digit and will be evaluated to give a number of
seconds, which may be a floating point number; in
this case the read times out if input is not
available within this time. If num is not
present, it is taken to be zero, so that read
returns immediately if no input is available. If
no input is available, return status 1 and do not
set any variables.
This option is not available when reading from the
editor buffer with -z, when called from within
completion with -c or -l, with -q which clears the
input queue before reading, or within zle where
other mechanisms should be used to test for input.
Note that read does not attempt to alter the input
processing mode. The default mode is canonical
input, in which an entire line is read at a time,
so usually `read -t' will not read anything until
an entire line has been typed. However, when
reading from the terminal with -k input is pro-
cessed one key at a time; in this case, only
availability of the first character is tested, so
that e.g. `read -t -k 2' can still block on the
second character. Use two instances of `read -t
-k' if this is not what is wanted.
If the first argument contains a `?', the remainder of
this word is used as a prompt on standard error when
the shell is interactive.
The value (exit status) of read is 1 when an
end-of-file is encountered, or when -c or -l is present
and the command is not called from a compctl function,
or as described for -q. Otherwise the value is 0.
The behavior of some combinations of the -k, -p, -q, -u
and -z flags is undefined. Presently -q cancels all
the others, -p cancels -u, -k cancels -z, and otherwise
-z cancels both -p and -u.
The -c or -l flags cancel any and all of -kpquz.
readonly
Same as typeset -r.
rehash
Same as hash -r.
return [ n ]
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Causes a shell function or `.' script to return to the
invoking script with the return status specified by n.
If n is omitted, the return status is that of the last
command executed.
If return was executed from a trap in a TRAPNAL func-
tion, the effect is different for zero and non-zero
return status. With zero status (or after an implicit
return at the end of the trap), the shell will return
to whatever it was previously processing; with a
non-zero status, the shell will behave as interrupted
except that the return status of the trap is retained.
Note that the numeric value of the signal which caused
the trap is passed as the first argument, so the state-
ment `return $((128+$1))' will return the same status
as if the signal had not been trapped.
sched
See the section `The zsh/sched Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
] ] [ arg ... ]
set [ {+|-}options | {+|-}o [ option_name ] ] ... [ {+|-}A [
name
Set the options for the shell and/or set the positional
parameters, or declare and set an array. If the -s
option is given, it causes the specified arguments to
be sorted before assigning them to the positional
parameters (or to the array name if -A is used). With
+s sort arguments in descending order. For the meaning
of the other flags, see zshoptions(1). Flags may be
specified by name using the -o option. If no option
name is supplied with -o, the current option states are
printed: see the description of setopt below for more
information on the format. With +o they are printed in
a form that can be used as input to the shell.
If the -A flag is specified, name is set to an array
containing the given args; if no name is specified, all
arrays are printed together with their values.
If +A is used and name is an array, the given arguments
will replace the initial elements of that array; if no
name is specified, all arrays are printed without their
values.
The behaviour of arguments after -A name or +A name
depends on whether the option KSH_ARRAYS is set. If it
is not set, all arguments following name are treated as
values for the array, regardless of their form. If the
option is set, normal option processing continues at
that point; only regular arguments are treated as
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values for the array. This means that
set -A array -x -- foo
sets array to `-x -- foo' if KSH_ARRAYS is not set, but
sets the array to foo and turns on the option `-x' if
it is set.
If the -A flag is not present, but there are arguments
beyond the options, the positional parameters are set.
If the option list (if any) is terminated by `--', and
there are no further arguments, the positional parame-
ters will be unset.
If no arguments and no `--' are given, then the names
and values of all parameters are printed on the stan-
dard output. If the only argument is `+', the names of
all parameters are printed.
For historical reasons, `set -' is treated as `set +xv'
and `set - args' as `set +xv -- args' when in any other
emulation mode than zsh's native mode.
setcap
See the section `The zsh/cap Module' in zshmodules(1).
setopt [ {+|-}options | {+|-}o option_name ] [ name ... ]
Set the options for the shell. All options specified
either with flags or by name are set.
If no arguments are supplied, the names of all options
currently set are printed. The form is chosen so as to
minimize the differences from the default options for
the current emulation (the default emulation being
native zsh, shown as <Z> in zshoptions(1)). Options
that are on by default for the emulation are shown with
the prefix no only if they are off, while other options
are shown without the prefix no and only if they are
on. In addition to options changed from the default
state by the user, any options activated automatically
by the shell (for example, SHIN_STDIN or INTERACTIVE)
will be shown in the list. The format is further modi-
fied by the option KSH_OPTION_PRINT, however the ratio-
nale for choosing options with or without the no prefix
remains the same in this case.
If the -m flag is given the arguments are taken as pat-
terns (which should be quoted to protect them from
filename expansion), and all options with names match-
ing these patterns are set.
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Note that a bad option name does not cause execution of
subsequent shell code to be aborted; this is behaviour
is different from that of `set -o'. This is because
set is regarded as a special builtin by the POSIX stan-
dard, but setopt is not.
shift [ n ] [ name ... ]
The positional parameters ${n+1} ... are renamed to $1
..., where n is an arithmetic expression that defaults
to 1. If any names are given then the arrays with
these names are shifted instead of the positional
parameters.
source file [ arg ... ]
Same as `.', except that the current directory is
always searched and is always searched first, before
directories in $path.
stat See the section `The zsh/stat Module' in zshmodules(1).
suspend [ -f ]
Suspend the execution of the shell (send it a SIGTSTP)
until it receives a SIGCONT. Unless the -f option is
given, this will refuse to suspend a login shell.
test [ arg ... ]
[ [ arg ... ] ]
Like the system version of test. Added for compatibil-
ity; use conditional expressions instead (see the sec-
tion `Conditional Expressions'). The main differences
between the conditional expression syntax and the test
and [ builtins are: these commands are not handled
syntactically, so for example an empty variable expan-
sion may cause an argument to be omitted; syntax errors
cause status 2 to be returned instead of a shell error;
and arithmetic operators expect integer arguments
rather than arithmetic expressions.
The command attempts to implement POSIX and its exten-
sions where these are specified. Unfortunately there
are intrinsic ambiguities in the syntax; in particular
there is no distinction between test operators and
strings that resemble them. The standard attempts to
resolve these for small numbers of arguments (up to
four); for five or more arguments compatibility cannot
be relied on. Users are urged wherever possible to use
the `[[' test syntax which does not have these ambigui-
ties.
times
Print the accumulated user and system times for the
shell and for processes run from the shell.
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trap [ arg ] [ sig ... ]
arg is a series of commands (usually quoted to protect
it from immediate evaluation by the shell) to be read
and executed when the shell receives any of the signals
specified by one or more sig args. Each sig can be
given as a number, or as the name of a signal either
with or without the string SIG in front (e.g. 1, HUP,
and SIGHUP are all the same signal).
If arg is `-', then the specified signals are reset to
their defaults, or, if no sig args are present, all
traps are reset.
If arg is an empty string, then the specified signals
are ignored by the shell (and by the commands it
invokes).
If arg is omitted but one or more sig args are provided
(i.e. the first argument is a valid signal number or
name), the effect is the same as if arg had been speci-
fied as `-'.
The trap command with no arguments prints a list of
commands associated with each signal.
If sig is ZERR then arg will be executed after each
command with a nonzero exit status. ERR is an alias
for ZERR on systems that have no SIGERR signal (this is
the usual case).
If sig is DEBUG then arg will be executed before each
command if the option DEBUG_BEFORE_CMD is set (as it is
by default), else after each command. Here, a `com-
mand' is what is described as a `sublist' in the shell
grammar, see the section SIMPLE COMMANDS & PIPELINES in
zshmisc(1). If DEBUG_BEFORE_CMD is set various addi-
tional features are available. First, it is possible
to skip the next command by setting the option
ERR_EXIT; see the description of the ERR_EXIT option in
zshoptions(1). Also, the shell parameter ZSH_DEBUG_CMD
is set to the string corresponding to the command to be
executed following the trap. Note that this string is
reconstructed from the internal format and may not be
formatted the same way as the original text. The
parameter is unset after the trap is executed.
If sig is 0 or EXIT and the trap statement is executed
inside the body of a function, then the command arg is
executed after the function completes. The value of $?
at the start of execution is the exit status of the
shell or the return status of the function exiting. If
sig is 0 or EXIT and the trap statement is not executed
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inside the body of a function, then the command arg is
executed when the shell terminates; the trap runs
before any zshexit hook functions.
ZERR, DEBUG, and EXIT traps are not executed inside
other traps. ZERR and DEBUG traps are kept within sub-
shells, while other traps are reset.
Note that traps defined with the trap builtin are
slightly different from those defined as `TRAPNAL () {
... }', as the latter have their own function environ-
ment (line numbers, local variables, etc.) while the
former use the environment of the command in which they
were called. For example,
trap 'print $LINENO' DEBUG
will print the line number of a command executed after
it has run, while
TRAPDEBUG() { print $LINENO; }
will always print the number zero.
Alternative signal names are allowed as described under
kill above. Defining a trap under either name causes
any trap under an alternative name to be removed. How-
ever, it is recommended that for consistency users
stick exclusively to one name or another.
true [ arg ... ]
Do nothing and return an exit status of 0.
ttyctl -fu
The -f option freezes the tty, and -u unfreezes it.
When the tty is frozen, no changes made to the tty set-
tings by external programs will be honored by the
shell, except for changes in the size of the screen;
the shell will simply reset the settings to their pre-
vious values as soon as each command exits or is sus-
pended. Thus, stty and similar programs have no effect
when the tty is frozen. Without options it reports
whether the terminal is frozen or not.
type [ -wfpams ] name ...
Equivalent to whence -v.
... ]
typeset [ {+|-}AEFHUafghklprtuxmz ] [ -LRZi [ n ]] [
name[=value]
]
typeset -T [ {+|-}Urux ] [ -LRZ [ n ]] SCALAR[=value] array
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[ sep
Set or display attributes and values for shell parame-
ters.
A parameter is created for each name that does not
already refer to one. When inside a function, a new
parameter is created for every name (even those that
already exist), and is unset again when the function
completes. See `Local Parameters' in zshparam(1). The
same rules apply to special shell parameters, which
retain their special attributes when made local.
For each name=value assignment, the parameter name is
set to value. Note that arrays currently cannot be
assigned in typeset expressions, only scalars and inte-
gers. Unless the option KSH_TYPESET is set, normal
expansion rules apply to assignment arguments, so value
may be split into separate words; if the option is set,
assignments which can be recognised when expansion is
performed are treated as single words. For example the
command typeset vbl=$(echo one two) is treated as hav-
ing one argument if KSH_TYPESET is set, but otherwise
is treated as having the two arguments vbl=one and two.
If the shell option TYPESET_SILENT is not set, for each
remaining name that refers to a parameter that is set,
the name and value of the parameter are printed in the
form of an assignment. Nothing is printed for
newly-created parameters, or when any attribute flags
listed below are given along with the name. Using `+'
instead of minus to introduce an attribute turns it
off.
If the -p option is given, parameters and values are
printed in the form of a typeset command and an assign-
ment (which will be printed separately for arrays and
associative arrays), regardless of other flags and
options. Note that the -h flag on parameters is
respected; no value will be shown for these parameters.
If the -T option is given, two or three arguments must
be present (an exception is that zero arguments are
allowed to show the list of parameters created in this
fashion). The first two are the name of a scalar and
an array parameter (in that order) that will be tied
together in the manner of $PATH and $path. The
optional third argument is a single-character separator
which will be used to join the elements of the array to
form the scalar; if absent, a colon is used, as with
$PATH. Only the first character of the separator is
significant; any remaining characters are ignored.
Only the scalar parameter may be assigned an initial
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value. Both the scalar and the array may otherwise be
manipulated as normal. If one is unset, the other will
automatically be unset too. There is no way of untying
the variables without unsetting them, or converting the
type of one of them with another typeset command; +T
does not work, assigning an array to SCALAR is an
error, and assigning a scalar to array sets it to be a
single-element array. Note that both `typeset -xT ...'
and `export -T ...' work, but only the scalar will be
marked for export. Setting the value using the scalar
version causes a split on all separators (which cannot
be quoted). It is possible to use the same two tied
variables with a different separator character in which
case the variables remain joined as before but the sep-
arator is changed. This flag has a different meaning
when used with -f; see below.
The -g (global) flag is treated specially: it means
that any resulting parameter will not be restricted to
local scope. Note that this does not necessarily mean
that the parameter will be global, as the flag will
apply to any existing parameter (even if unset) from an
enclosing function. This flag does not affect the
parameter after creation, hence it has no effect when
listing existing parameters, nor does the flag +g have
any effect except in combination with -m (see below).
If no name is present, the names and values of all
parameters are printed. In this case the attribute
flags restrict the display to only those parameters
that have the specified attributes, and using `+'
rather than `-' to introduce the flag suppresses print-
ing of the values of parameters when there is no param-
eter name. Also, if the last option is the word `+',
then names are printed but values are not.
If the -m flag is given the name arguments are taken as
patterns (which should be quoted). With no attribute
flags, all parameters (or functions with the -f flag)
with matching names are printed (the shell option TYPE-
SET_SILENT is not used in this case). Note that -m is
ignored if no patterns are given. If the +g flag is
combined with -m, a new local parameter is created for
every matching parameter that is not already local.
Otherwise -m applies all other flags or assignments to
the existing parameters. Except when assignments are
made with name=value, using +m forces the matching
parameters to be printed, even inside a function.
If no attribute flags are given and either no -m flag
is present or the +m form was used, each parameter name
printed is preceded by a list of the attributes of that
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parameter (array, association, exported, integer, read-
only). If +m is used with attribute flags, and all
those flags are introduced with +, the matching parame-
ter names are printed but their values are not.
Attribute flags that transform the final value (-L, -R,
-Z, -l, u) are only applied to the expanded value at
the point of a parameter expansion expression using
`$'. They are not applied when a parameter is
retrieved internally by the shell for any purpose.
The following attribute flags may be specified:
-A The names refer to associative array parameters;
see `Array Parameters' in zshparam(1).
-L Left justify and remove leading blanks from value.
If n is nonzero, it defines the width of the
field. If n is zero, the width is determined by
the width of the value of the first assignment.
In the case of numeric parameters, the length of
the complete value assigned to the parameter is
used to determine the width, not the value that
would be output.
The width is the count of characters, which may be
multibyte characters if the MULTIBYTE option is in
effect. Note that the screen width of the charac-
ter is not taken into account; if this is
required, use padding with parameter expansion
flags ${(ml...)...} as described in `Parameter
Expansion Flags' in zshexpn(1).
When the parameter is expanded, it is filled on
the right with blanks or truncated if necessary to
fit the field. Note truncation can lead to unex-
pected results with numeric parameters. Leading
zeros are removed if the -Z flag is also set.
-R Similar to -L, except that right justification is
used; when the parameter is expanded, the field is
left filled with blanks or truncated from the end.
May not be combined with the -Z flag.
-U For arrays (but not for associative arrays), keep
only the first occurrence of each duplicated
value. This may also be set for colon-separated
special parameters like PATH or FIGNORE, etc.
This flag has a different meaning when used with
-f; see below.
-Z Specially handled if set along with the -L flag.
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Otherwise, similar to -R, except that leading
zeros are used for padding instead of blanks if
the first non-blank character is a digit. Numeric
parameters are specially handled: they are always
eligible for padding with zeroes, and the zeroes
are inserted at an appropriate place in the out-
put.
-a The names refer to array parameters. An array
parameter may be created this way, but it may not
be assigned to in the typeset statement. When
displaying, both normal and associative arrays are
shown.
-f The names refer to functions rather than parame-
ters. No assignments can be made, and the only
other valid flags are -t, -T, -k, -u, -U and -z.
The flag -t turns on execution tracing for this
function; the flag -T does the same, but turns off
tracing on any function called from the present
one, unless that function also has the -t or -T
flag. The -u and -U flags cause the function to
be marked for autoloading; -U also causes alias
expansion to be suppressed when the function is
loaded. The fpath parameter will be searched to
find the function definition when the function is
first referenced; see the section `Functions'. The
-k and -z flags make the function be loaded using
ksh-style or zsh-style autoloading respectively.
If neither is given, the setting of the
KSH_AUTOLOAD option determines how the function is
loaded.
-h Hide: only useful for special parameters (those
marked `<S>' in the table in zshparam(1)), and for
local parameters with the same name as a special
parameter, though harmless for others. A special
parameter with this attribute will not retain its
special effect when made local. Thus after `type-
set -h PATH', a function containing `typeset PATH'
will create an ordinary local parameter without
the usual behaviour of PATH. Alternatively, the
local parameter may itself be given this
attribute; hence inside a function `typeset -h
PATH' creates an ordinary local parameter and the
special PATH parameter is not altered in any way.
It is also possible to create a local parameter
using `typeset +h special', where the local copy
of special will retain its special properties
regardless of having the -h attribute. Global
special parameters loaded from shell modules (cur-
rently those in zsh/mapfile and zsh/parameter) are
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automatically given the -h attribute to avoid name
clashes.
-H Hide value: specifies that typeset will not dis-
play the value of the parameter when listing
parameters; the display for such parameters is
always as if the `+' flag had been given. Use of
the parameter is in other respects normal, and the
option does not apply if the parameter is speci-
fied by name, or by pattern with the -m option.
This is on by default for the parameters in the
zsh/parameter and zsh/mapfile modules. Note, how-
ever, that unlike the -h flag this is also useful
for non-special parameters.
-i Use an internal integer representation. If n is
nonzero it defines the output arithmetic base,
otherwise it is determined by the first assign-
ment. Bases from 2 to 36 inclusive are allowed.
-E Use an internal double-precision floating point
representation. On output the variable will be
converted to scientific notation. If n is nonzero
it defines the number of significant figures to
display; the default is ten.
-F Use an internal double-precision floating point
representation. On output the variable will be
converted to fixed-point decimal notation. If n
is nonzero it defines the number of digits to dis-
play after the decimal point; the default is ten.
-l Convert the result to lower case whenever the
parameter is expanded. The value is not converted
when assigned.
-r The given names are marked readonly. Note that if
name is a special parameter, the readonly
attribute can be turned on, but cannot then be
turned off.
-t Tags the named parameters. Tags have no special
meaning to the shell. This flag has a different
meaning when used with -f; see above.
-u Convert the result to upper case whenever the
parameter is expanded. The value is not converted
when assigned. This flag has a different meaning
when used with -f; see above.
-x Mark for automatic export to the environment of
subsequently executed commands. If the option
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GLOBAL_EXPORT is set, this implies the option -g,
unless +g is also explicitly given; in other words
the parameter is not made local to the enclosing
function. This is for compatibility with previous
versions of zsh.
ulimit [ [ -SHacdfiklmnpqsTtvwx | -N resource [ limit ] ...
]
Set or display resource limits of the shell and the
processes started by the shell. The value of limit can
be a number in the unit specified below or one of the
values `unlimited', which removes the limit on the
resource, or `hard', which uses the current value of
the hard limit on the resource.
By default, only soft limits are manipulated. If the -H
flag is given use hard limits instead of soft limits.
If the -S flag is given together with the -H flag set
both hard and soft limits.
If no options are used, the file size limit (-f) is
assumed.
If limit is omitted the current value of the specified
resources are printed. When more than one resource
value is printed, the limit name and unit is printed
before each value.
When looping over multiple resources, the shell will
abort immediately if it detects a badly formed argu-
ment. However, if it fails to set a limit for some
other reason it will continue trying to set the remain-
ing limits.
Not all the following resources are supported on all
systems. Running ulimit -a will show which are sup-
ported.
-a Lists all of the current resource limits.
-b Socket buffer size in bytes (N.B. not kilobytes)
-c 512-byte blocks on the size of core dumps.
-d Kilobytes on the size of the data segment.
-f 512-byte blocks on the size of files written.
-i The number of pending signals.
-k The number of kqueues allocated.
-l Kilobytes on the size of locked-in memory.
-m Kilobytes on the size of physical memory.
-n open file descriptors.
-p The number of pseudo-terminals.
-q Bytes in POSIX message queues.
-s Kilobytes on the size of the stack.
-T The number of simultaneous threads available to
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the user.
-t CPU seconds to be used.
-u The number of processes available to the user.
-v Kilobytes on the size of virtual memory. On some
systems this refers to the limit called `address
space'.
-w Kilobytes on the size of swapped out memory.
-x The number of locks on files.
A resource may also be specified by integer in the form
`-N resource', where resource corresponds to the inte-
ger defined for the resource by the operating system.
This may be used to set the limits for resources known
to the shell which do not correspond to option letters.
Such limits will be shown by number in the output of
`ulimit -a'.
The number may alternatively be out of the range of
limits compiled into the shell. The shell will try to
read or write the limit anyway, and will report an
error if this fails.
umask [ -S ] [ mask ]
The umask is set to mask. mask can be either an octal
number or a symbolic value as described in chmod(1).
If mask is omitted, the current value is printed. The
-S option causes the mask to be printed as a symbolic
value. Otherwise, the mask is printed as an octal num-
ber. Note that in the symbolic form the permissions
you specify are those which are to be allowed (not
denied) to the users specified.
unalias
Same as unhash -a.
unfunction
Same as unhash -f.
unhash [ -adfms ] name ...
Remove the element named name from an internal hash ta-
ble. The default is remove elements from the command
hash table. The -a option causes unhash to remove reg-
ular or global aliases; note when removing a global
aliases that the argument must be quoted to prevent it
from being expanded before being passed to the command.
The -s option causes unhash to remove suffix aliases.
The -f option causes unhash to remove shell functions.
The -d options causes unhash to remove named directo-
ries. If the -m flag is given the arguments are taken
as patterns (should be quoted) and all elements of the
corresponding hash table with matching names will be
removed.
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unlimit [ -hs ] resource ...
The resource limit for each resource is set to the hard
limit. If the -h flag is given and the shell has
appropriate privileges, the hard resource limit for
each resource is removed. The resources of the shell
process are only changed if the -s flag is given.
The unlimit command is not made available by default
when the shell starts in a mode emulating another
shell. It can be made available with the command
`zmodload -F zsh/rlimits b:unlimit'.
unset [ -fmv ] name ...
Each named parameter is unset. Local parameters remain
local even if unset; they appear unset within scope,
but the previous value will still reappear when the
scope ends.
Individual elements of associative array parameters may
be unset by using subscript syntax on name, which
should be quoted (or the entire command prefixed with
noglob) to protect the subscript from filename genera-
tion.
If the -m flag is specified the arguments are taken as
patterns (should be quoted) and all parameters with
matching names are unset. Note that this cannot be
used when unsetting associative array elements, as the
subscript will be treated as part of the pattern.
The -v flag specifies that name refers to parameters.
This is the default behaviour.
unset -f is equivalent to unfunction.
unsetopt [ {+|-}options | {+|-}o option_name ] [ name ... ]
Unset the options for the shell. All options specified
either with flags or by name are unset. If no argu-
ments are supplied, the names of all options currently
unset are printed. If the -m flag is given the argu-
ments are taken as patterns (which should be quoted to
preserve them from being interpreted as glob patterns),
and all options with names matching these patterns are
unset.
vared
See the section `Zle Builtins' in zshzle(1).
wait [ job ... ]
Wait for the specified jobs or processes. If job is
not given then all currently active child processes are
waited for. Each job can be either a job specification
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or the process ID of a job in the job table. The exit
status from this command is that of the job waited for.
whence [ -vcwfpams ] name ...
For each name, indicate how it would be interpreted if
used as a command name.
-v Produce a more verbose report.
-c Print the results in a csh-like format. This
takes precedence over -v.
-w For each name, print `name: word' where word is
one of alias, builtin, command, function, hashed,
reserved or none, according as name corresponds to
an alias, a built-in command, an external command,
a shell function, a command defined with the hash
builtin, a reserved word, or is not recognised.
This takes precedence over -v and -c.
-f Causes the contents of a shell function to be dis-
played, which would otherwise not happen unless
the -c flag were used.
-p Do a path search for name even if it is an alias,
reserved word, shell function or builtin.
-a Do a search for all occurrences of name throughout
the command path. Normally only the first occur-
rence is printed.
-m The arguments are taken as patterns (should be
quoted), and the information is displayed for each
command matching one of these patterns.
-s If a pathname contains symlinks, print the sym-
link-free pathname as well.
where [ -wpms ] name ...
Equivalent to whence -ca.
which [ -wpams ] name ...
Equivalent to whence -c.
zcompile [ -U ] [ -z | -k ] [ -R | -M ] file [ name ... ]
zcompile -ca [ -m ] [ -R | -M ] file [ name ... ]
zcompile -t file [ name ... ]
This builtin command can be used to compile functions
or scripts, storing the compiled form in a file, and to
examine files containing the compiled form. This
allows faster autoloading of functions and execution of
scripts by avoiding parsing of the text when the files
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are read.
The first form (without the -c, -a or -t options) cre-
ates a compiled file. If only the file argument is
given, the output file has the name `file.zwc' and will
be placed in the same directory as the file. The shell
will load the compiled file instead of the normal func-
tion file when the function is autoloaded; see the sec-
tion `Autoloading Functions' in zshmisc(1) for a
description of how autoloaded functions are searched.
The extension .zwc stands for `zsh word code'.
If there is at least one name argument, all the named
files are compiled into the output file given as the
first argument. If file does not end in .zwc, this
extension is automatically appended. Files containing
multiple compiled functions are called `digest' files,
and are intended to be used as elements of the
FPATH/fpath special array.
The second form, with the -c or -a options, writes the
compiled definitions for all the named functions into
file. For -c, the names must be functions currently
defined in the shell, not those marked for autoloading.
Undefined functions that are marked for autoloading may
be written by using the -a option, in which case the
fpath is searched and the contents of the definition
files for those functions, if found, are compiled into
file. If both -c and -a are given, names of both
defined functions and functions marked for autoloading
may be given. In either case, the functions in files
written with the -c or -a option will be autoloaded as
if the KSH_AUTOLOAD option were unset.
The reason for handling loaded and not-yet-loaded func-
tions with different options is that some definition
files for autoloading define multiple functions,
including the function with the same name as the file,
and, at the end, call that function. In such cases the
output of `zcompile -c' does not include the additional
functions defined in the file, and any other initial-
ization code in the file is lost. Using `zcompile -a'
captures all this extra information.
If the -m option is combined with -c or -a, the names
are used as patterns and all functions whose names
match one of these patterns will be written. If no name
is given, the definitions of all functions currently
defined or marked as autoloaded will be written.
The third form, with the -t option, examines an exist-
ing compiled file. Without further arguments, the
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names of the original files compiled into it are
listed. The first line of output shows the version of
the shell which compiled the file and how the file will
be used (i.e. by reading it directly or by mapping it
into memory). With arguments, nothing is output and
the return status is set to zero if definitions for all
names were found in the compiled file, and non-zero if
the definition for at least one name was not found.
Other options:
-U Aliases are not expanded when compiling the named
files.
-R When the compiled file is read, its contents are
copied into the shell's memory, rather than mem-
ory-mapped (see -M). This happens automatically
on systems that do not support memory mapping.
When compiling scripts instead of autoloadable
functions, it is often desirable to use this
option; otherwise the whole file, including the
code to define functions which have already been
defined, will remain mapped, consequently wasting
memory.
-M The compiled file is mapped into the shell's mem-
ory when read. This is done in such a way that
multiple instances of the shell running on the
same host will share this mapped file. If neither
-R nor -M is given, the zcompile builtin decides
what to do based on the size of the compiled file.
-k
-z These options are used when the compiled file con-
tains functions which are to be autoloaded. If -z
is given, the function will be autoloaded as if
the KSH_AUTOLOAD option is not set, even if it is
set at the time the compiled file is read, while
if the -k is given, the function will be loaded as
if KSH_AUTOLOAD is set. These options also take
precedence over any -k or -z options specified to
the autoload builtin. If neither of these options
is given, the function will be loaded as deter-
mined by the setting of the KSH_AUTOLOAD option at
the time the compiled file is read.
These options may also appear as many times as
necessary between the listed names to specify the
loading style of all following functions, up to
the next -k or -z.
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The created file always contains two versions of
the compiled format, one for big-endian machines
and one for small-endian machines. The upshot of
this is that the compiled file is machine indepen-
dent and if it is read or mapped, only one half of
the file is actually used (and mapped).
zformat
See the section `The zsh/zutil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
zftp See the section `The zsh/zftp Module' in zshmodules(1).
zle See the section `Zle Builtins' in zshzle(1).
zmodload [ -dL ] [ ... ]
zmodload -F [ -lLme -P param ] module [+-]feature...
zmodload -e [ -A ] [ ... ]
zmodload [ -a [ -bcpf [ -I ] ] ] [ -iL ] ...
zmodload -u [ -abcdpf [ -I ] ] [ -iL ] ...
zmodload -A [ -L ] [ modalias[=module] ... ]
zmodload -R modalias ...
Performs operations relating to zsh's loadable modules.
Loading of modules while the shell is running (`dynami-
cal loading') is not available on all operating sys-
tems, or on all installations on a particular operating
system, although the zmodload command itself is always
available and can be used to manipulate modules built
into versions of the shell executable without dynamical
loading.
Without arguments the names of all currently loaded
binary modules are printed. The -L option causes this
list to be in the form of a series of zmodload com-
mands. Forms with arguments are:
zmodload [ -i ] name ...
zmodload -u [ -i ] name ...
In the simplest case, zmodload loads a binary mod-
ule. The module must be in a file with a name
consisting of the specified name followed by a
standard suffix, usually `.so' (`.sl' on HPUX).
If the module to be loaded is already loaded the
duplicate module is ignored. If zmodload detects
an inconsistency, such as an invalid module name
or circular dependency list, the current code
block is aborted. Hence `zmodload module
2>/dev/null' is sufficient to test whether a mod-
ule is available. If it is available, the module
is loaded if necessary, while if it is not avail-
able, non-zero status is silently returned. The
option -i is accepted for compatibility but has no
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effect.
The named module is searched for in the same way a
command is, using $module_path instead of $path.
However, the path search is performed even when
the module name contains a `/', which it usually
does. There is no way to prevent the path search.
If the module supports features (see below), zmod-
load tries to enable all features when loading a
module. If the module was successfully loaded but
not all features could be enabled, zmodload
returns status 2.
With -u, zmodload unloads modules. The same name
must be given that was given when the module was
loaded, but it is not necessary for the module to
exist in the file system. The -i option sup-
presses the error if the module is already
unloaded (or was never loaded).
Each module has a boot and a cleanup function.
The module will not be loaded if its boot function
fails. Similarly a module can only be unloaded if
its cleanup function runs successfully.
zmodload -F [ -almLe -P param ] module [+-]feature...
zmodload -F allows more selective control over the
features provided by modules. With no options
apart from -F, the module named module is loaded,
if it was not already loaded, and the list of fea-
tures is set to the required state. If no fea-
tures are specified, the module is loaded, if it
was not already loaded, but the state of features
is unchanged. Each feature may be preceded by a +
to turn the feature on, or - to turn it off; the +
is assumed if neither character is present. Any
feature not explicitly mentioned is left in its
current state; if the module was not previously
loaded this means any such features will remain
disabled. The return status is zero if all fea-
tures were set, 1 if the module failed to load,
and 2 if some features could not be set (for exam-
ple, a parameter couldn't be added because there
was a different parameter of the same name) but
the module was loaded.
The standard features are builtins, conditions,
parameters and math functions; these are indicated
by the prefix `b:', `c:' (`C:' for an infix condi-
tion), `p:' and `f:', respectively, followed by
the name that the corresponding feature would have
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in the shell. For example, `b:strftime' indicates
a builtin named strftime and p:EPOCHSECONDS indi-
cates a parameter named EPOCHSECONDS. The module
may provide other (`abstract') features of its own
as indicated by its documentation; these have no
prefix.
With -l or -L, features provided by the module are
listed. With -l alone, a list of features
together with their states is shown, one feature
per line. With -L alone, a zmodload -F command
that would cause enabled features of the module to
be turned on is shown. With -lL, a zmodload -F
command that would cause all the features to be
set to their current state is shown. If one of
these combinations is given the option -P param
then the parameter param is set to an array of
features, either features together with their
state or (if -L alone is given) enabled features.
With the option -L the module name may be omitted;
then a list of all enabled features for all mod-
ules providing features is printed in the form of
zmodload -F commands. If -l is also given, the
state of both enabled and disabled features is
output in that form.
A set of features may be provided together with -l
or -L and a module name; in that case only the
state of those features is considered. Each fea-
ture may be preceded by + or - but the character
has no effect. If no set of features is provided,
all features are considered.
With -e, the command first tests that the module
is loaded; if it is not, status 1 is returned. If
the module is loaded, the list of features given
as an argument is examined. Any feature given
with no prefix is simply tested to see if the mod-
ule provides it; any feature given with a prefix +
or - is tested to see if is provided and in the
given state. If the tests on all features in the
list succeed, status 0 is returned, else status 1.
With -m, each entry in the given list of features
is taken as a pattern to be matched against the
list of features provided by the module. An ini-
tial + or - must be given explicitly. This may
not be combined with the -a option as autoloads
must be specified explicitly.
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With -a, the given list of features is marked for
autoload from the specified module, which may not
yet be loaded. An optional + may appear before
the feature name. If the feature is prefixed with
-, any existing autoload is removed. The options
-l and -L may be used to list autoloads.
Autoloading is specific to individual features;
when the module is loaded only the requested fea-
ture is enabled. Autoload requests are preserved
if the module is subsequently unloaded until an
explicit `zmodload -Fa module -feature' is issued.
It is not an error to request an autoload for a
feature of a module that is already loaded.
When the module is loaded each autoload is checked
against the features actually provided by the mod-
ule; if the feature is not provided the autoload
request is deleted. A warning message is output;
if the module is being loaded to provide a differ-
ent feature, and that autoload is successful,
there is no effect on the status of the current
command. If the module is already loaded at the
time when zmodload -Fa is run, an error message is
printed and status 1 returned.
zmodload -Fa can be used with the -l, -L, -e and
-P options for listing and testing the existence
of autoloadable features. In this case -l is
ignored if -L is specified. zmodload -FaL with no
module name lists autoloads for all modules.
Note that only standard features as described
above can be autoloaded; other features require
the module to be loaded before enabling.
zmodload -d [ -L ] [ name ]
zmodload -d name dep ...
zmodload -ud name [ dep ... ]
The -d option can be used to specify module depen-
dencies. The modules named in the second and sub-
sequent arguments will be loaded before the module
named in the first argument.
With -d and one argument, all dependencies for
that module are listed. With -d and no arguments,
all module dependencies are listed. This listing
is by default in a Makefile-like format. The -L
option changes this format to a list of zmodload
-d commands.
If -d and -u are both used, dependencies are
removed. If only one argument is given, all
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dependencies for that module are removed.
zmodload -ab [ -L ]
zmodload -ab [ -i ] name [ builtin ... ]
zmodload -ub [ -i ] builtin ...
The -ab option defines autoloaded builtins. It
defines the specified builtins. When any of those
builtins is called, the module specified in the
first argument is loaded and all its features are
enabled (for selective control of features use
`zmodload -F -a' as described above). If only the
name is given, one builtin is defined, with the
same name as the module. -i suppresses the error
if the builtin is already defined or autoloaded,
but not if another builtin of the same name is
already defined.
With -ab and no arguments, all autoloaded builtins
are listed, with the module name (if different)
shown in parentheses after the builtin name. The
-L option changes this format to a list of zmod-
load -a commands.
If -b is used together with the -u option, it
removes builtins previously defined with -ab.
This is only possible if the builtin is not yet
loaded. -i suppresses the error if the builtin is
already removed (or never existed).
Autoload requests are retained if the module is
subsequently unloaded until an explicit `zmodload
-ub builtin' is issued.
zmodload -ac [ -IL ]
zmodload -ac [ -iI ] name [ cond ... ]
zmodload -uc [ -iI ] cond ...
The -ac option is used to define autoloaded condi-
tion codes. The cond strings give the names of the
conditions defined by the module. The optional -I
option is used to define infix condition names.
Without this option prefix condition names are
defined.
If given no condition names, all defined names are
listed (as a series of zmodload commands if the -L
option is given).
The -uc option removes definitions for autoloaded
conditions.
zmodload -ap [ -L ]
zmodload -ap [ -i ] name [ parameter ... ]
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zmodload -up [ -i ] parameter ...
The -p option is like the -b and -c options, but
makes zmodload work on autoloaded parameters
instead.
zmodload -af [ -L ]
zmodload -af [ -i ] name [ function ... ]
zmodload -uf [ -i ] function ...
The -f option is like the -b, -p, and -c options,
but makes zmodload work on autoloaded math func-
tions instead.
zmodload -a [ -L ]
zmodload -a [ -i ] name [ builtin ... ]
zmodload -ua [ -i ] builtin ...
Equivalent to -ab and -ub.
zmodload -e [ -A ] [ string ... ]
The -e option without arguments lists all loaded
modules; if the -A option is also given, module
aliases corresponding to loaded modules are also
shown. If arguments are provided, nothing is
printed; the return status is set to zero if all
strings given as arguments are names of loaded
modules and to one if at least on string is not
the name of a loaded module. This can be used to
test for the availability of things implemented by
modules. In this case, any aliases are automati-
cally resolved and the -A flag is not used.
zmodload -A [ -L ] [ modalias[=module] ... ]
For each argument, if both modalias and module are
given, define modalias to be an alias for the mod-
ule module. If the module modalias is ever subse-
quently requested, either via a call to zmodload
or implicitly, the shell will attempt to load mod-
ule instead. If module is not given, show the
definition of modalias. If no arguments are
given, list all defined module aliases. When
listing, if the -L flag was also given, list the
definition as a zmodload command to recreate the
alias.
The existence of aliases for modules is completely
independent of whether the name resolved is actu-
ally loaded as a module: while the alias exists,
loading and unloading the module under any alias
has exactly the same effect as using the resolved
name, and does not affect the connection between
the alias and the resolved name which can be
removed either by zmodload -R or by redefining the
alias. Chains of aliases (i.e. where the first
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resolved name is itself an alias) are valid so
long as these are not circular. As the aliases
take the same format as module names, they may
include path separators: in this case, there is
no requirement for any part of the path named to
exist as the alias will be resolved first. For
example, `any/old/alias' is always a valid alias.
Dependencies added to aliased modules are actually
added to the resolved module; these remain if the
alias is removed. It is valid to create an alias
whose name is one of the standard shell modules
and which resolves to a different module. How-
ever, if a module has dependencies, it will not be
possible to use the module name as an alias as the
module will already be marked as a loadable module
in its own right.
Apart from the above, aliases can be used in the
zmodload command anywhere module names are
required. However, aliases will not be shown in
lists of loaded modules with a bare `zmodload'.
zmodload -R modalias ...
For each modalias argument that was previously
defined as a module alias via zmodload -A, delete
the alias. If any was not defined, an error is
caused and the remainder of the line is ignored.
Note that zsh makes no distinction between modules that
were linked into the shell and modules that are loaded
dynamically. In both cases this builtin command has to
be used to make available the builtins and other things
defined by modules (unless the module is autoloaded on
these definitions). This is true even for systems that
don't support dynamic loading of modules.
zparseopts
See the section `The zsh/zutil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
zprof
See the section `The zsh/zprof Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
zpty See the section `The zsh/zpty Module' in zshmodules(1).
zregexparse
See the section `The zsh/zutil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
zsocket
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See the section `The zsh/net/socket Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
zstyle
See the section `The zsh/zutil Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
ztcp See the section `The zsh/net/tcp Module' in zshmod-
ules(1).
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 51
User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
NAME
zshzle - zsh command line editor
DESCRIPTION
If the ZLE option is set (which it is by default in interac-
tive shells) and the shell input is attached to the termi-
nal, the user is able to edit command lines.
There are two display modes. The first, multiline mode, is
the default. It only works if the TERM parameter is set to
a valid terminal type that can move the cursor up. The sec-
ond, single line mode, is used if TERM is invalid or inca-
pable of moving the cursor up, or if the SINGLE_LINE_ZLE
option is set. This mode is similar to ksh, and uses no
termcap sequences. If TERM is "emacs", the ZLE option will
be unset by default.
The parameters BAUD, COLUMNS, and LINES are also used by the
line editor. See Parameters Used By The Shell in zsh-
param(1).
The parameter zle_highlight is also used by the line editor;
see Character Highlighting below. Highlighting of special
characters and the region between the cursor and the mark
(as set with set-mark-command in Emacs mode) is enabled by
default; consult this reference for more information. Iras-
cible conservatives will wish to know that all highlighting
may be disabled by the following setting:
zle_highlight=(none)
KEYMAPS
A keymap in ZLE contains a set of bindings between key
sequences and ZLE commands. The empty key sequence cannot
be bound.
There can be any number of keymaps at any time, and each
keymap has one or more names. If all of a keymap's names
are deleted, it disappears. bindkey can be used to manipu-
late keymap names.
Initially, there are six keymaps:
emacs
EMACS emulation
viins
vi emulation - insert mode
vicmd
vi emulation - command mode
isearch
incremental search mode
command
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 1
User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
read a command name
.safe
fallback keymap
The `.safe' keymap is special. It can never be altered, and
the name can never be removed. However, it can be linked to
other names, which can be removed. In the future other spe-
cial keymaps may be added; users should avoid using names
beginning with `.' for their own keymaps.
In addition to these names, either `emacs' or `viins' is
also linked to the name `main'. If one of the VISUAL or
EDITOR environment variables contain the string `vi' when
the shell starts up then it will be `viins', otherwise it
will be `emacs'. bindkey's -e and -v options provide a con-
venient way to override this default choice.
When the editor starts up, it will select the `main' keymap.
If that keymap doesn't exist, it will use `.safe' instead.
In the `.safe' keymap, each single key is bound to
self-insert, except for ^J (line feed) and ^M (return) which
are bound to accept-line. This is deliberately not pleasant
to use; if you are using it, it means you deleted the main
keymap, and you should put it back.
Reading Commands
When ZLE is reading a command from the terminal, it may read
a sequence that is bound to some command and is also a pre-
fix of a longer bound string. In this case ZLE will wait a
certain time to see if more characters are typed, and if not
(or they don't match any longer string) it will execute the
binding. This timeout is defined by the KEYTIMEOUT parame-
ter; its default is 0.4 sec. There is no timeout if the
prefix string is not itself bound to a command.
The key timeout is also applied when ZLE is reading the
bytes from a multibyte character string when it is in the
appropriate mode. (This requires that the shell was com-
piled with multibyte mode enabled; typically also the locale
has characters with the UTF-8 encoding, although any multi-
byte encoding known to the operating system is supported.)
If the second or a subsequent byte is not read within the
timeout period, the shell acts as if ? were typed and resets
the input state.
As well as ZLE commands, key sequences can be bound to other
strings, by using `bindkey -s'. When such a sequence is
read, the replacement string is pushed back as input, and
the command reading process starts again using these fake
keystrokes. This input can itself invoke further replace-
ment strings, but in order to detect loops the process will
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 2
User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
be stopped if there are twenty such replacements without a
real command being read.
A key sequence typed by the user can be turned into a com-
mand name for use in user-defined widgets with the read-com-
mand widget, described below.
ZLE BUILTINS
The ZLE module contains three related builtin commands. The
bindkey command manipulates keymaps and key bindings; the
vared command invokes ZLE on the value of a shell parameter;
and the zle command manipulates editing widgets and allows
command line access to ZLE commands from within shell func-
tions.
bindkey [ options ] -l [ -L ] [ keymap ... ]
bindkey [ options ] -d
bindkey [ options ] -D keymap ...
bindkey [ options ] -A old-keymap new-keymap
bindkey [ options ] -N new-keymap [ old-keymap ]
bindkey [ options ] -m
bindkey [ options ] -r in-string ...
bindkey [ options ] -s in-string out-string ...
bindkey [ options ] in-string command ...
bindkey [ options ] [ in-string ]
bindkey's options can be divided into three categories:
keymap selection for the current command, operation
selection, and others. The keymap selection options
are:
-e Selects keymap `emacs' for any operations by the
current command, and also links `emacs' to `main'
so that it is selected by default the next time
the editor starts.
-v Selects keymap `viins' for any operations by the
current command, and also links `viins' to `main'
so that it is selected by default the next time
the editor starts.
-a Selects keymap `vicmd' for any operations by the
current command.
-M keymap
The keymap specifies a keymap name that is
selected for any operations by the current com-
mand.
If a keymap selection is required and none of the
options above are used, the `main' keymap is used.
Some operations do not permit a keymap to be selected,
namely:
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
-l List all existing keymap names; if any arguments
are given, list just those keymaps.
If the -L option is also used, list in the form of
bindkey commands to create or link the keymaps.
`bindkey -lL main' shows which keymap is linked to
`main', if any, and hence if the standard emacs or
vi emulation is in effect. This option does not
show the .safe keymap because it cannot be created
in that fashion; however, neither is `bindkey -lL
.safe' reported as an error, it simply outputs
nothing.
-d Delete all existing keymaps and reset to the
default state.
-D keymap ...
Delete the named keymaps.
-A old-keymap new-keymap
Make the new-keymap name an alias for old-keymap,
so that both names refer to the same keymap. The
names have equal standing; if either is deleted,
the other remains. If there is already a keymap
with the new-keymap name, it is deleted.
-N new-keymap [ old-keymap ]
Create a new keymap, named new-keymap. If a
keymap already has that name, it is deleted. If
an old-keymap name is given, the new keymap is
initialized to be a duplicate of it, otherwise the
new keymap will be empty.
To use a newly created keymap, it should be linked to
main. Hence the sequence of commands to create and use
a new keymap `mymap' initialized from the emacs keymap
(which remains unchanged) is:
bindkey -N mymap emacs
bindkey -A mymap main
Note that while `bindkey -A newmap main' will work when
newmap is emacs or viins, it will not work for vicmd,
as switching from vi insert to command mode becomes
impossible.
The following operations act on the `main' keymap if no
keymap selection option was given:
-m Add the built-in set of meta-key bindings to the
selected keymap. Only keys that are unbound or
bound to self-insert are affected.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
-r in-string ...
Unbind the specified in-strings in the selected
keymap. This is exactly equivalent to binding the
strings to undefined-key.
When -R is also used, interpret the in-strings as
ranges.
When -p is also used, the in-strings specify pre-
fixes. Any binding that has the given in-string
as a prefix, not including the binding for the
in-string itself, if any, will be removed. For
example,
bindkey -rpM viins '^['
will remove all bindings in the vi-insert keymap
beginning with an escape character (probably cur-
sor keys), but leave the binding for the escape
character itself (probably vi-cmd-mode). This is
incompatible with the option -R.
-s in-string out-string ...
Bind each in-string to each out-string. When
in-string is typed, out-string will be pushed back
and treated as input to the line editor. When -R
is also used, interpret the in-strings as ranges.
in-string command ...
Bind each in-string to each command. When -R is
used, interpret the in-strings as ranges.
[ in-string ]
List key bindings. If an in-string is specified,
the binding of that string in the selected keymap
is displayed. Otherwise, all key bindings in the
selected keymap are displayed. (As a special
case, if the -e or -v option is used alone, the
keymap is not displayed - the implicit linking of
keymaps is the only thing that happens.)
When the option -p is used, the in-string must be
present. The listing shows all bindings which
have the given key sequence as a prefix, not
including any bindings for the key sequence
itself.
When the -L option is used, the list is in the
form of bindkey commands to create the key bind-
ings.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
When the -R option is used as noted above, a valid range
consists of two characters, with an optional `-' between
them. All characters between the two specified, inclusive,
are bound as specified.
For either in-string or out-string, the following escape
sequences are recognised:
\a bell character
\b backspace
\e, \E
escape
\f form feed
\n linefeed (newline)
\r carriage return
\t horizontal tab
\v vertical tab
\NNN character code in octal
\xNN character code in hexadecimal
\M[-]X
character with meta bit set
\C[-]X
control character
^X control character
In all other cases, `\' escapes the following character.
Delete is written as `^?'. Note that `\M^?' and `^\M?' are
not the same, and that (unlike emacs), the bindings `\M-X'
and `\eX' are entirely distinct, although they are initial-
ized to the same bindings by `bindkey -m'.
vared [ -Aache ] [ -p prompt ] [ -r rprompt ]
[ -M main-keymap ] [ -m vicmd-keymap ]
[ -i init-widget ] [ -f finish-widget ]
[ -t tty ] name
The value of the parameter name is loaded into the edit
buffer, and the line editor is invoked. When the editor
exits, name is set to the string value returned by the edi-
tor. When the -c flag is given, the parameter is created if
it doesn't already exist. The -a flag may be given with -c
to create an array parameter, or the -A flag to create an
associative array. If the type of an existing parameter
does not match the type to be created, the parameter is
unset and recreated.
If an array or array slice is being edited, separator char-
acters as defined in $IFS will be shown quoted with a back-
slash, as will backslashes themselves. Conversely, when the
edited text is split into an array, a backslash quotes an
immediately following separator character or backslash; no
other special handling of backslashes, or any handling of
quotes, is performed.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Individual elements of existing array or associative array
parameters may be edited by using subscript syntax on name.
New elements are created automatically, even without -c.
If the -p flag is given, the following string will be taken
as the prompt to display at the left. If the -r flag is
given, the following string gives the prompt to display at
the right. If the -h flag is specified, the history can be
accessed from ZLE. If the -e flag is given, typing ^D (Con-
trol-D) on an empty line causes vared to exit immediately
with a non-zero return value.
The -M option gives a keymap to link to the main keymap dur-
ing editing, and the -m option gives a keymap to link to the
vicmd keymap during editing. For vi-style editing, this
allows a pair of keymaps to override viins and vicmd. For
emacs-style editing, only -M is normally needed but the -m
option may still be used. On exit, the previous keymaps
will be restored.
Vared calls the usual `zle-line-init' and `zle-line-finish'
hooks before and after it takes control. Using the -i and -f
options, it is possible to replace these with other custom
widgets.
If `-t tty' is given, tty is the name of a terminal device
to be used instead of the default /dev/tty. If tty does not
refer to a terminal an error is reported.
zle
zle -l [ -L | -a ] [ string ... ]
zle -D widget ...
zle -A old-widget new-widget
zle -N widget [ function ]
zle -C widget completion-widget function
zle -R [ -c ] [ display-string ] [ string ... ]
zle -M string
zle -U string
zle -K keymap
zle -F [ -L | -w ] [ fd [ handler ] ]
zle -I
zle -T [ tc function | -r tc | -L ]
zle widget [ -n num ] [ -Nw ] [ -K keymap ] args ...
The zle builtin performs a number of different actions con-
cerning ZLE.
With no options and no arguments, only the return status
will be set. It is zero if ZLE is currently active and wid-
gets could be invoked using this builtin command and
non-zero otherwise. Note that even if non-zero status is
returned, zle may still be active as part of the completion
system; this does not allow direct calls to ZLE widgets.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Otherwise, which operation it performs depends on its
options:
-l [ -L | -a ]
List all existing user-defined widgets. If the -L
option is used, list in the form of zle commands to
create the widgets.
When combined with the -a option, all widget names are
listed, including the builtin ones. In this case the -L
option is ignored.
If at least one string is given, and -a is present or
-L is not used, nothing will be printed. The return
status will be zero if all strings are names of exist-
ing widgets and non-zero if at least one string is not
a name of a defined widget. If -a is also present, all
widget names are used for the comparison including
builtin widgets, else only user-defined widgets are
used.
If at least one string is present and the -L option is
used, user-defined widgets matching any string are
listed in the form of zle commands to create the wid-
gets.
-D widget ...
Delete the named widgets.
-A old-widget new-widget
Make the new-widget name an alias for old-widget, so
that both names refer to the same widget. The names
have equal standing; if either is deleted, the other
remains. If there is already a widget with the
new-widget name, it is deleted.
-N widget [ function ]
Create a user-defined widget. If there is already a
widget with the specified name, it is overwritten.
When the new widget is invoked from within the editor,
the specified shell function is called. If no function
name is specified, it defaults to the same name as the
widget. For further information, see the section Wid-
gets in zshzle(1).
-C widget completion-widget function
Create a user-defined completion widget named widget.
The completion widget will behave like the built-in
completion-widget whose name is given as comple-
tion-widget. To generate the completions, the shell
function function will be called. For further informa-
tion, see zshcompwid(1).
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
-R [ -c ] [ display-string ] [ string ... ]
Redisplay the command line; this is to be called from
within a user-defined widget to allow changes to become
visible. If a display-string is given and not empty,
this is shown in the status line (immediately below the
line being edited).
If the optional strings are given they are listed below
the prompt in the same way as completion lists are
printed. If no strings are given but the -c option is
used such a list is cleared.
Note that this option is only useful for widgets that
do not exit immediately after using it because the
strings displayed will be erased immediately after
return from the widget.
This command can safely be called outside user defined
widgets; if zle is active, the display will be
refreshed, while if zle is not active, the command has
no effect. In this case there will usually be no other
arguments.
The status is zero if zle was active, else one.
-M string
As with the -R option, the string will be displayed
below the command line; unlike the -R option, the
string will not be put into the status line but will
instead be printed normally below the prompt. This
means that the string will still be displayed after the
widget returns (until it is overwritten by subsequent
commands).
-U string
This pushes the characters in the string onto the input
stack of ZLE. After the widget currently executed fin-
ishes ZLE will behave as if the characters in the
string were typed by the user.
As ZLE uses a stack, if this option is used repeatedly
the last string pushed onto the stack will be processed
first. However, the characters in each string will be
processed in the order in which they appear in the
string.
-K keymap
Selects the keymap named keymap. An error message will
be displayed if there is no such keymap.
This keymap selection affects the interpretation of
following keystrokes within this invocation of ZLE.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Any following invocation (e.g., the next command line)
will start as usual with the `main' keymap selected.
-F [ -L | -w ] [ fd [ handler ] ]
Only available if your system supports one of the
`poll' or `select' system calls; most modern systems
do.
Installs handler (the name of a shell function) to han-
dle input from file descriptor fd. When zle is
attempting to read data, it will examine both the ter-
minal and the list of handled fd's. If data becomes
available on a handled fd, zle will call handler with
the fd which is ready for reading as the only argument.
If the handler produces output to the terminal, it
should call `zle -I' before doing so (see below). The
handler should not attempt to read from the terminal.
Note that zle makes no attempt to check whether this fd
is actually readable when installing the handler. The
user must make their own arrangements for handling the
file descriptor when zle is not active.
If the option -w is also given, the handler is instead
a line editor widget, typically a shell function made
into a widget using zle -N. In that case handler can
use all the facilities of zle to update the current
editing line. Note, however, that as handling fd takes
place at a low level changes to the display will not
automatically appear; the widget should call zle -R to
force redisplay.
Any number of handlers for any number of readable file
descriptors may be installed. Installing a handler for
an fd which is already handled causes the existing han-
dler to be replaced.
If no handler is given, but an fd is present, any han-
dler for that fd is removed. If there is none, an
error message is printed and status 1 is returned.
If no arguments are given, or the -L option is sup-
plied, a list of handlers is printed in a form which
can be stored for later execution.
An fd (but not a handler) may optionally be given with
the -L option; in this case, the function will list the
handler if any, else silently return status 1.
Note that this feature should be used with care.
Activity on one of the fd's which is not properly han-
dled can cause the terminal to become unusable.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Here is a simple example of using this feature. A con-
nection to a remote TCP port is created using the ztcp
command; see the description of the zsh/net/tcp module
in zshmodules(1). Then a handler is installed which
simply prints out any data which arrives on this con-
nection. Note that `select' will indicate that the
file descriptor needs handling if the remote side has
closed the connection; we handle that by testing for a
failed read.
if ztcp pwspc 2811; then
tcpfd=$REPLY
handler() {
zle -I
local line
if ! read -r line <&$1; then
# select marks this fd if we reach EOF,
# so handle this specially.
print "[Read on fd $1 failed, removing.]" >&2
zle -F $1
return 1
fi
print -r - $line
}
zle -F $tcpfd handler
fi
-I Unusually, this option is most useful outside ordinary
widget functions, though it may be used within if nor-
mal output to the terminal is required. It invalidates
the current zle display in preparation for output; typ-
ically this will be from a trap function. It has no
effect if zle is not active. When a trap exits, the
shell checks to see if the display needs restoring,
hence the following will print output in such a way as
not to disturb the line being edited:
TRAPUSR1() {
# Invalidate zle display
[[ -o zle ]] && zle -I
# Show output
print Hello
}
In general, the trap function may need to test whether
zle is active before using this method (as shown in the
example), since the zsh/zle module may not even be
loaded; if it is not, the command can be skipped.
It is possible to call `zle -I' several times before
control is returned to the editor; the display will
only be invalidated the first time to minimise disrup-
tion.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Note that there are normally better ways of manipulat-
ing the display from within zle widgets; see, for exam-
ple, `zle -R' above.
The returned status is zero if zle was invalidated,
even though this may have been by a previous call to
`zle -I' or by a system notification. To test if a zle
widget may be called at this point, execute zle with no
arguments and examine the return status.
-T This is used to add, list or remove internal transfor-
mations on the processing performed by the line editor.
It is typically used only for debugging or testing and
is therefore of little interest to the general user.
`zle -T transformation func' specifies that the given
transformation (see below) is effected by shell func-
tion func.
`zle -Tr transformation' removes the given transforma-
tion if it was present (it is not an error if none
was).
`zle -TL' can be used to list all transformations cur-
rently in operation.
Currently the only transformation is tc. This is used
instead of outputting termcap codes to the terminal.
When the transformation is in operation the shell func-
tion is passed the termcap code that would be output as
its first argument; if the operation required a numeric
argument, that is passed as a second argument. The
function should set the shell variable REPLY to the
transformed termcap code. Typically this is used to
produce some simply formatted version of the code and
optional argument for debugging or testing. Note that
this transformation is not applied to other non-print-
ing characters such as carriage returns and newlines.
widget [ -n num ] [ -Nw ] [ -K keymap ] args ...
Invoke the specified widget. This can only be done
when ZLE is active; normally this will be within a
user-defined widget.
With the options -n and -N, the current numerical argu-
ment will be saved and then restored after the call to
widget; `-n num' sets the numerical argument temporar-
ily to num, while `-N' sets it to the default, i.e. as
if there were none.
With the option -K, keymap will be used as the current
keymap during the execution of the widget. The
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previous keymap will be restored when the widget exits.
Normally, calling a widget in this way does not set the
special parameter WIDGET and related parameters, so
that the environment appears as if the top-level widget
called by the user were still active. With the option
-w, WIDGET and related parameters are set to reflect
the widget being executed by the zle call.
Any further arguments will be passed to the widget;
note that as standard argument handling is performed,
any general argument list should be preceded by --. If
it is a shell function, these are passed down as posi-
tional parameters; for builtin widgets it is up to the
widget in question what it does with them. Currently
arguments are only handled by the incremental-search
commands, the history-search-forward and -backward and
the corresponding functions prefixed by vi-, and by
universal-argument. No error is flagged if the command
does not use the arguments, or only uses some of them.
The return status reflects the success or failure of
the operation carried out by the widget, or if it is a
user-defined widget the return status of the shell
function.
A non-zero return status causes the shell to beep when
the widget exits, unless the BEEP options was unset or
the widget was called via the zle command. Thus if a
user defined widget requires an immediate beep, it
should call the beep widget directly.
WIDGETS
All actions in the editor are performed by `widgets'. A
widget's job is simply to perform some small action. The
ZLE commands that key sequences in keymaps are bound to are
in fact widgets. Widgets can be user-defined or built in.
The standard widgets built into ZLE are listed in Standard
Widgets below. Other built-in widgets can be defined by
other modules (see zshmodules(1)). Each built-in widget has
two names: its normal canonical name, and the same name pre-
ceded by a `.'. The `.' name is special: it can't be
rebound to a different widget. This makes the widget avail-
able even when its usual name has been redefined.
User-defined widgets are defined using `zle -N', and imple-
mented as shell functions. When the widget is executed, the
corresponding shell function is executed, and can perform
editing (or other) actions. It is recommended that
user-defined widgets should not have names starting with
`.'.
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USER-DEFINED WIDGETS
User-defined widgets, being implemented as shell functions,
can execute any normal shell command. They can also run
other widgets (whether built-in or user-defined) using the
zle builtin command. The standard input of the function is
closed to prevent external commands from unintentionally
blocking ZLE by reading from the terminal, but read -k or
read -q can be used to read characters. Finally, they can
examine and edit the ZLE buffer being edited by reading and
setting the special parameters described below.
These special parameters are always available in widget
functions, but are not in any way special outside ZLE. If
they have some normal value outside ZLE, that value is tem-
porarily inaccessible, but will return when the widget func-
tion exits. These special parameters in fact have local
scope, like parameters created in a function using local.
Inside completion widgets and traps called while ZLE is
active, these parameters are available read-only.
BUFFER (scalar)
The entire contents of the edit buffer. If it is writ-
ten to, the cursor remains at the same offset, unless
that would put it outside the buffer.
BUFFERLINES (integer)
The number of screen lines needed for the edit buffer
currently displayed on screen (i.e. without any changes
to the preceding parameters done after the last redis-
play); read-only.
CONTEXT (scalar)
The context in which zle was called to read a line;
read-only. One of the values:
start
The start of a command line (at prompt PS1).
cont A continuation to a command line (at prompt PS2).
select
In a select loop.
vared
Editing a variable in vared.
CURSOR (integer)
The offset of the cursor, within the edit buffer. This is
in the range 0 to $#BUFFER, and is by definition equal to
$#LBUFFER. Attempts to move the cursor outside the buffer
will result in the cursor being moved to the appropriate end
of the buffer.
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CUTBUFFER (scalar)
The last item cut using one of the `kill-' commands; the
string which the next yank would insert in the line. Later
entries in the kill ring are in the array killring. Note
that the command `zle copy-region-as-kill string' can be
used to set the text of the cut buffer from a shell function
and cycle the kill ring in the same way as interactively
killing text.
HISTNO (integer)
The current history number. Setting this has the same
effect as moving up or down in the history to the corre-
sponding history line. An attempt to set it is ignored if
the line is not stored in the history. Note this is not the
same as the parameter HISTCMD, which always gives the number
of the history line being added to the main shell's history.
HISTNO refers to the line being retrieved within zle.
KEYMAP (scalar)
The name of the currently selected keymap; read-only.
KEYS (scalar)
The keys typed to invoke this widget, as a literal string;
read-only.
killring (array)
The array of previously killed items, with the most recently
killed first. This gives the items that would be retrieved
by a yank-pop in the same order. Note, however, that the
most recently killed item is in $CUTBUFFER; $killring shows
the array of previous entries.
The default size for the kill ring is eight, however the
length may be changed by normal array operations. Any empty
string in the kill ring is ignored by the yank-pop command,
hence the size of the array effectively sets the maximum
length of the kill ring, while the number of non-zero
strings gives the current length, both as seen by the user
at the command line.
LASTABORTEDSEARCH (scalar)
The last search string used by an interactive search that
was aborted by the user (status 3 returned by the search
widget).
LASTSEARCH (scalar)
The last search string used by an interactive search;
read-only. This is set even if the search failed (status 0,
1 or 2 returned by the search widget), but not if it was
aborted by the user.
LASTWIDGET (scalar)
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The name of the last widget that was executed; read-only.
LBUFFER (scalar)
The part of the buffer that lies to the left of the cursor
position. If it is assigned to, only that part of the
buffer is replaced, and the cursor remains between the new
$LBUFFER and the old $RBUFFER.
MARK (integer)
Like CURSOR, but for the mark.
NUMERIC (integer)
The numeric argument. If no numeric argument was given, this
parameter is unset. When this is set inside a widget func-
tion, builtin widgets called with the zle builtin command
will use the value assigned. If it is unset inside a widget
function, builtin widgets called behave as if no numeric
argument was given.
PENDING (integer)
The number of bytes pending for input, i.e. the number of
bytes which have already been typed and can immediately be
read. On systems where the shell is not able to get this
information, this parameter will always have a value of
zero. Read-only.
PREBUFFER (scalar)
In a multi-line input at the secondary prompt, this
read-only parameter contains the contents of the lines
before the one the cursor is currently in.
PREDISPLAY (scalar)
Text to be displayed before the start of the editable text
buffer. This does not have to be a complete line; to dis-
play a complete line, a newline must be appended explicitly.
The text is reset on each new invocation (but not recursive
invocation) of zle.
POSTDISPLAY (scalar)
Text to be displayed after the end of the editable text
buffer. This does not have to be a complete line; to dis-
play a complete line, a newline must be prepended explic-
itly. The text is reset on each new invocation (but not
recursive invocation) of zle.
RBUFFER (scalar)
The part of the buffer that lies to the right of the cursor
position. If it is assigned to, only that part of the
buffer is replaced, and the cursor remains between the old
$LBUFFER and the new $RBUFFER.
REGION_ACTIVE (integer)
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Indicates if the region is currently active. It can be
assigned 0 or 1 to deactivate and activate the region
respectively; see Character Highlighting below.
region_highlight (array)
Each element of this array may be set to a string that
describes highlighting for an arbitrary region of the com-
mand line that will take effect the next time the command
line is redisplayed. Highlighting of the non-editable parts
of the command line in PREDISPLAY and POSTDISPLAY are possi-
ble, but note that the P flag is needed for character index-
ing to include PREDISPLAY.
Each string consists of the following parts:
Optionally, a `P' to signify that the start and end offset
that
follow include any string set by the PREDISPLAY special
parameter; this is needed if the predisplay string
itself is to be highlighted. Whitespace may follow the
`P'.
A start offset in the same units as CURSOR, terminated by
whitespace.
An end offset in the same units as CURSOR, terminated by
whitespace.
A highlight specification in the same format as
used for contexts in the parameter zle_highlight, see
Character Highlighting below; for example, standout or
fg=red,bold.
For example,
region_highlight=("P0 20 bold")
specifies that the first twenty characters of the text
including any predisplay string should be highlighted in
bold.
Note that the effect of region_highlight is not saved and
disappears as soon as the line is accepted.
UNDO_CHANGE_NO (integer)
A number representing the state of the undo history. The
only use of this is passing as an argument to the undo wid-
get in order to undo back to the recorded point. Read-only.
WIDGET (scalar)
The name of the widget currently being executed; read-only.
WIDGETFUNC (scalar)
The name of the shell function that implements a widget
defined with either zle -N or zle -C. In the former case,
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this is the second argument to the zle -N command that
defined the widget, or the first argument if there was no
second argument. In the latter case this is the third argu-
ment to the zle -C command that defined the widget.
Read-only.
WIDGETSTYLE (scalar)
Describes the implementation behind the completion widget
currently being executed; the second argument that followed
zle -C when the widget was defined. This is the name of a
builtin completion widget. For widgets defined with zle -N
this is set to the empty string. Read-only.
ZLE_STATE (scalar)
Contains a set of space-separated words that describe the
current zle state.
Currently, the states shown are the insert mode as set by
the overwrite-mode or vi-replace widgets and whether history
commands will visit imported entries as controlled by the
set-local-history widget. The string contains `insert' if
characters to be inserted on the command line move existing
characters to the right or `overwrite' if characters to be
inserted overwrite existing characters. It contains `local-
history' if only local history commands will be visited or
`globalhistory' if imported history commands will also be
visited.
The substrings are sorted in alphabetical order so that if
you want to test for two specific substrings in a
future-proof way, you can do match by doing:
if [[ $ZLE_STATE == *insert*globalhistory* ]]; then ...; fi
Special Widgets
There are a few user-defined widgets which are special to
the shell. If they do not exist, no special action is
taken. The environment provided is identical to that for
any other editing widget.
zle-isearch-exit
Executed at the end of incremental search at the point
where the isearch prompt is removed from the display.
See zle-isearch-update for an example.
zle-isearch-update
Executed within incremental search when the display is
about to be redrawn. Additional output below the
incremental search prompt can be generated by using
`zle -M' within the widget. For example,
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
zle-isearch-update() { zle -M "Line $HISTNO"; }
zle -N zle-isearch-update
Note the line output by `zle -M' is not deleted on exit
from incremental search. This can be done from a
zle-isearch-exit widget:
zle-isearch-exit() { zle -M ""; }
zle -N zle-isearch-exit
zle-line-init
Executed every time the line editor is started to read
a new line of input. The following example puts the
line editor into vi command mode when it starts up.
zle-line-init() { zle -K vicmd; }
zle -N zle-line-init
(The command inside the function sets the keymap
directly; it is equivalent to zle vi-cmd-mode.)
zle-line-finish
This is similar to zle-line-init but is executed every
time the line editor has finished reading a line of
input.
zle-history-line-set
Executed when the history line changes.
zle-keymap-select
Executed every time the keymap changes, i.e. the spe-
cial parameter KEYMAP is set to a different value,
while the line editor is active. Initialising the
keymap when the line editor starts does not cause the
widget to be called.
The value $KEYMAP within the function reflects the new
keymap. The old keymap is passed as the sole argument.
This can be used for detecting switches between the vi
command (vicmd) and insert (usually main) keymaps.
STANDARD WIDGETS
The following is a list of all the standard widgets, and
their default bindings in emacs mode, vi command mode and vi
insert mode (the `emacs', `vicmd' and `viins' keymaps,
respectively).
Note that cursor keys are bound to movement keys in all
three keymaps; the shell assumes that the cursor keys send
the key sequences reported by the terminal-handling library
(termcap or terminfo). The key sequences shown in the list
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are those based on the VT100, common on many modern termi-
nals, but in fact these are not necessarily bound. In the
case of the viins keymap, the initial escape character of
the sequences serves also to return to the vicmd keymap:
whether this happens is determined by the KEYTIMEOUT parame-
ter, see zshparam(1).
Movement
vi-backward-blank-word (unbound) (B) (unbound)
Move backward one word, where a word is defined as a
series of non-blank characters.
backward-char (^B ESC-[D) (unbound) (unbound)
Move backward one character.
vi-backward-char (unbound) (^H h ^?) (ESC-[D)
Move backward one character, without changing lines.
backward-word (ESC-B ESC-b) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the beginning of the previous word.
emacs-backward-word
Move to the beginning of the previous word.
vi-backward-word (unbound) (b) (unbound)
Move to the beginning of the previous word, vi-style.
beginning-of-line (^A) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the beginning of the line. If already at the
beginning of the line, move to the beginning of the
previous line, if any.
vi-beginning-of-line
Move to the beginning of the line, without changing
lines.
end-of-line (^E) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the end of the line. If already at the end of
the line, move to the end of the next line, if any.
vi-end-of-line (unbound) ($) (unbound)
Move to the end of the line. If an argument is given
to this command, the cursor will be moved to the end of
the line (argument - 1) lines down.
vi-forward-blank-word (unbound) (W) (unbound)
Move forward one word, where a word is defined as a
series of non-blank characters.
vi-forward-blank-word-end (unbound) (E) (unbound)
Move to the end of the current word, or, if at the end
of the current word, to the end of the next word, where
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a word is defined as a series of non-blank characters.
forward-char (^F ESC-[C) (unbound) (unbound)
Move forward one character.
vi-forward-char (unbound) (space l) (ESC-[C)
Move forward one character.
vi-find-next-char (^X^F) (f) (unbound)
Read a character from the keyboard, and move to the
next occurrence of it in the line.
vi-find-next-char-skip (unbound) (t) (unbound)
Read a character from the keyboard, and move to the
position just before the next occurrence of it in the
line.
vi-find-prev-char (unbound) (F) (unbound)
Read a character from the keyboard, and move to the
previous occurrence of it in the line.
vi-find-prev-char-skip (unbound) (T) (unbound)
Read a character from the keyboard, and move to the
position just after the previous occurrence of it in
the line.
vi-first-non-blank (unbound) (^) (unbound)
Move to the first non-blank character in the line.
vi-forward-word (unbound) (w) (unbound)
Move forward one word, vi-style.
forward-word (ESC-F ESC-f) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the beginning of the next word. The editor's
idea of a word is specified with the WORDCHARS parame-
ter.
emacs-forward-word
Move to the end of the next word.
vi-forward-word-end (unbound) (e) (unbound)
Move to the end of the next word.
vi-goto-column (ESC-|) (|) (unbound)
Move to the column specified by the numeric argument.
vi-goto-mark (unbound) (`) (unbound)
Move to the specified mark.
vi-goto-mark-line (unbound) (') (unbound)
Move to beginning of the line containing the specified
mark.
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vi-repeat-find (unbound) (;) (unbound)
Repeat the last vi-find command.
vi-rev-repeat-find (unbound) (,) (unbound)
Repeat the last vi-find command in the opposite direc-
tion.
History Control
beginning-of-buffer-or-history (ESC-<) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the beginning of the buffer, or if already
there, move to the first event in the history list.
beginning-of-line-hist
Move to the beginning of the line. If already at the
beginning of the buffer, move to the previous history
line.
beginning-of-history
Move to the first event in the history list.
down-line-or-history (^N ESC-[B) (j) (ESC-[B)
Move down a line in the buffer, or if already at the
bottom line, move to the next event in the history
list.
vi-down-line-or-history (unbound) (+) (unbound)
Move down a line in the buffer, or if already at the
bottom line, move to the next event in the history
list. Then move to the first non-blank character on
the line.
down-line-or-search
Move down a line in the buffer, or if already at the
bottom line, search forward in the history for a line
beginning with the first word in the buffer.
If called from a function by the zle command with argu-
ments, the first argument is taken as the string for
which to search, rather than the first word in the
buffer.
down-history (unbound) (^N) (unbound)
Move to the next event in the history list.
history-beginning-search-backward
Search backward in the history for a line beginning
with the current line up to the cursor. This leaves
the cursor in its original position.
end-of-buffer-or-history (ESC->) (unbound) (unbound)
Move to the end of the buffer, or if already there,
move to the last event in the history list.
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end-of-line-hist
Move to the end of the line. If already at the end of
the buffer, move to the next history line.
end-of-history
Move to the last event in the history list.
vi-fetch-history (unbound) (G) (unbound)
Fetch the history line specified by the numeric argu-
ment. This defaults to the current history line (i.e.
the one that isn't history yet).
history-incremental-search-backward (^R ^Xr) (unbound)
(unbound)
Search backward incrementally for a specified string.
The search is case-insensitive if the search string
does not have uppercase letters and no numeric argument
was given. The string may begin with `^' to anchor the
search to the beginning of the line. When called from
a user-defined function returns the following statuses:
0, if the search succeeded; 1, if the search failed; 2,
if the search term was a bad pattern; 3, if the search
was aborted by the send-break command.
A restricted set of editing functions is available in
the mini-buffer. Keys are looked up in the special
isearch keymap, and if not found there in the main
keymap (note that by default the isearch keymap is
empty). An interrupt signal, as defined by the stty
setting, will stop the search and go back to the origi-
nal line. An undefined key will have the same effect.
Note that the following always perform the same task
within incremental searches and cannot be replaced by
user defined widgets, nor can the set of functions be
extended. The supported functions are:
accept-and-hold
accept-and-infer-next-history
accept-line
accept-line-and-down-history
Perform the usual function after exiting incremen-
tal search. The command line displayed is exe-
cuted.
backward-delete-char
vi-backward-delete-char
Back up one place in the search history. If the
search has been repeated this does not immediately
erase a character in the minibuffer.
accept-search
Exit incremental search, retaining the command
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
line but performing no further action. Note that
this function is not bound by default and has no
effect outside incremental search.
backward-delete-word
backward-kill-word
vi-backward-kill-word
Back up one character in the minibuffer; if multi-
ple searches have been performed since the charac-
ter was inserted the search history is rewound to
the point just before the character was entered.
Hence this has the effect of repeating back-
ward-delete-char.
clear-screen
Clear the screen, remaining in incremental search
mode.
history-incremental-search-backward
Find the next occurrence of the contents of the
mini-buffer.
history-incremental-search-forward
Invert the sense of the search.
magic-space
Inserts a non-magical space.
quoted-insert
vi-quoted-insert
Quote the character to insert into the minibuffer.
redisplay
Redisplay the command line, remaining in incremen-
tal search mode.
vi-cmd-mode
Toggle between the `main' and `vicmd' keymaps; the
`main' keymap (insert mode) will be selected ini-
tially.
vi-repeat-search
vi-rev-repeat-search
Repeat the search. The direction of the search is
indicated in the mini-buffer.
Any character that is not bound to one of the above
functions, or self-insert or self-insert-unmeta, will
cause the mode to be exited. The character is then
looked up and executed in the keymap in effect at that
point.
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When called from a widget function by the zle command,
the incremental search commands can take a string argu-
ment. This will be treated as a string of keys, as for
arguments to the bindkey command, and used as initial
input for the command. Any characters in the string
which are unused by the incremental search will be
silently ignored. For example,
zle history-incremental-search-backward forceps
will search backwards for forceps, leaving the
minibuffer containing the string `forceps'.
history-incremental-search-forward (^S ^Xs) (unbound)
(unbound)
Search forward incrementally for a specified string.
The search is case-insensitive if the search string
does not have uppercase letters and no numeric argument
was given. The string may begin with `^' to anchor the
search to the beginning of the line. The functions
available in the mini-buffer are the same as for his-
tory-incremental-search-backward.
history-incremental-pattern-search-backward
history-incremental-pattern-search-forward
These widgets behave similarly to the corresponding
widgets with no -pattern, but the search string typed
by the user is treated as a pattern, respecting the
current settings of the various options affecting pat-
tern matching. See FILENAME GENERATION in zshexpn(1)
for a description of patterns. If no numeric argument
was given lowercase letters in the search string may
match uppercase letters in the history. The string may
begin with `^' to anchor the search to the beginning of
the line.
The prompt changes to indicate an invalid pattern; this
may simply indicate the pattern is not yet complete.
Note that only non-overlapping matches are reported, so
an expression with wildcards may return fewer matches
on a line than are visible by inspection.
history-search-backward (ESC-P ESC-p) (unbound) (unbound)
Search backward in the history for a line beginning
with the first word in the buffer.
If called from a function by the zle command with argu-
ments, the first argument is taken as the string for
which to search, rather than the first word in the
buffer.
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vi-history-search-backward (unbound) (/) (unbound)
Search backward in the history for a specified string.
The string may begin with `^' to anchor the search to
the beginning of the line.
A restricted set of editing functions is available in
the mini-buffer. An interrupt signal, as defined by
the stty setting, will stop the search. The functions
available in the mini-buffer are: accept-line, back-
ward-delete-char, vi-backward-delete-char, back-
ward-kill-word, vi-backward-kill-word, clear-screen,
redisplay, quoted-insert and vi-quoted-insert.
vi-cmd-mode is treated the same as accept-line, and
magic-space is treated as a space. Any other character
that is not bound to self-insert or self-insert-unmeta
will beep and be ignored. If the function is called
from vi command mode, the bindings of the current
insert mode will be used.
If called from a function by the zle command with argu-
ments, the first argument is taken as the string for
which to search, rather than the first word in the
buffer.
history-search-forward (ESC-N ESC-n) (unbound) (unbound)
Search forward in the history for a line beginning with
the first word in the buffer.
If called from a function by the zle command with argu-
ments, the first argument is taken as the string for
which to search, rather than the first word in the
buffer.
vi-history-search-forward (unbound) (?) (unbound)
Search forward in the history for a specified string.
The string may begin with `^' to anchor the search to
the beginning of the line. The functions available in
the mini-buffer are the same as for vi-his-
tory-search-backward. Argument handling is also the
same as for that command.
infer-next-history (^X^N) (unbound) (unbound)
Search in the history list for a line matching the cur-
rent one and fetch the event following it.
insert-last-word (ESC-_ ESC-.) (unbound) (unbound)
Insert the last word from the previous history event at
the cursor position. If a positive numeric argument is
given, insert that word from the end of the previous
history event. If the argument is zero or negative
insert that word from the left (zero inserts the
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
previous command word). Repeating this command
replaces the word just inserted with the last word from
the history event prior to the one just used; numeric
arguments can be used in the same way to pick a word
from that event.
When called from a shell function invoked from a
user-defined widget, the command can take one to three
arguments. The first argument specifies a history off-
set which applies to successive calls to this widget:
if it is -1, the default behaviour is used, while if it
is 1, successive calls will move forwards through the
history. The value 0 can be used to indicate that the
history line examined by the previous execution of the
command will be reexamined. Note that negative numbers
should be preceded by a `--' argument to avoid confus-
ing them with options.
If two arguments are given, the second specifies the
word on the command line in normal array index notation
(as a more natural alternative to the prefix argument).
Hence 1 is the first word, and -1 (the default) is the
last word.
If a third argument is given, its value is ignored, but
it is used to signify that the history offset is rela-
tive to the current history line, rather than the one
remembered after the previous invocations of
insert-last-word.
For example, the default behaviour of the command cor-
responds to
zle insert-last-word -- -1 -1
while the command
zle insert-last-word -- -1 1 -
always copies the first word of the line in the history
immediately before the line being edited. This has the
side effect that later invocations of the widget will
be relative to that line.
vi-repeat-search (unbound) (n) (unbound)
Repeat the last vi history search.
vi-rev-repeat-search (unbound) (N) (unbound)
Repeat the last vi history search, but in reverse.
up-line-or-history (^P ESC-[A) (k) (ESC-[A)
Move up a line in the buffer, or if already at the top
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line, move to the previous event in the history list.
vi-up-line-or-history (unbound) (-) (unbound)
Move up a line in the buffer, or if already at the top
line, move to the previous event in the history list.
Then move to the first non-blank character on the line.
up-line-or-search
Move up a line in the buffer, or if already at the top
line, search backward in the history for a line begin-
ning with the first word in the buffer.
If called from a function by the zle command with argu-
ments, the first argument is taken as the string for
which to search, rather than the first word in the
buffer.
up-history (unbound) (^P) (unbound)
Move to the previous event in the history list.
history-beginning-search-forward
Search forward in the history for a line beginning with
the current line up to the cursor. This leaves the
cursor in its original position.
set-local-history
By default, history movement commands visit the
imported lines as well as the local lines. This widget
lets you toggle this on and off, or set it with the
numeric argument. Zero for both local and imported
lines and nonzero for only local lines.
Modifying Text
vi-add-eol (unbound) (A) (unbound)
Move to the end of the line and enter insert mode.
vi-add-next (unbound) (a) (unbound)
Enter insert mode after the current cursor position,
without changing lines.
backward-delete-char (^H ^?) (unbound) (unbound)
Delete the character behind the cursor.
vi-backward-delete-char (unbound) (X) (^H)
Delete the character behind the cursor, without chang-
ing lines. If in insert mode, this won't delete past
the point where insert mode was last entered.
backward-delete-word
Delete the word behind the cursor.
backward-kill-line
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Kill from the beginning of the line to the cursor posi-
tion.
backward-kill-word (^W ESC-^H ESC-^?) (unbound) (unbound)
Kill the word behind the cursor.
vi-backward-kill-word (unbound) (unbound) (^W)
Kill the word behind the cursor, without going past the
point where insert mode was last entered.
capitalize-word (ESC-C ESC-c) (unbound) (unbound)
Capitalize the current word and move past it.
vi-change (unbound) (c) (unbound)
Read a movement command from the keyboard, and kill
from the cursor position to the endpoint of the move-
ment. Then enter insert mode. If the command is
vi-change, change the current line.
vi-change-eol (unbound) (C) (unbound)
Kill to the end of the line and enter insert mode.
vi-change-whole-line (unbound) (S) (unbound)
Kill the current line and enter insert mode.
copy-region-as-kill (ESC-W ESC-w) (unbound) (unbound)
Copy the area from the cursor to the mark to the kill
buffer.
If called from a ZLE widget function in the form `zle
copy-region-as-kill string' then string will be taken
as the text to copy to the kill buffer. The cursor,
the mark and the text on the command line are not used
in this case.
copy-prev-word (ESC-^_) (unbound) (unbound)
Duplicate the word to the left of the cursor.
copy-prev-shell-word
Like copy-prev-word, but the word is found by using
shell parsing, whereas copy-prev-word looks for blanks.
This makes a difference when the word is quoted and
contains spaces.
vi-delete (unbound) (d) (unbound)
Read a movement command from the keyboard, and kill
from the cursor position to the endpoint of the move-
ment. If the command is vi-delete, kill the current
line.
delete-char
Delete the character under the cursor.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
vi-delete-char (unbound) (x) (unbound)
Delete the character under the cursor, without going
past the end of the line.
delete-word
Delete the current word.
down-case-word (ESC-L ESC-l) (unbound) (unbound)
Convert the current word to all lowercase and move past
it.
kill-word (ESC-D ESC-d) (unbound) (unbound)
Kill the current word.
gosmacs-transpose-chars
Exchange the two characters behind the cursor.
vi-indent (unbound) (>) (unbound)
Indent a number of lines.
vi-insert (unbound) (i) (unbound)
Enter insert mode.
vi-insert-bol (unbound) (I) (unbound)
Move to the first non-blank character on the line and
enter insert mode.
vi-join (^X^J) (J) (unbound)
Join the current line with the next one.
kill-line (^K) (unbound) (unbound)
Kill from the cursor to the end of the line. If
already on the end of the line, kill the newline char-
acter.
vi-kill-line (unbound) (unbound) (^U)
Kill from the cursor back to wherever insert mode was
last entered.
vi-kill-eol (unbound) (D) (unbound)
Kill from the cursor to the end of the line.
kill-region
Kill from the cursor to the mark.
kill-buffer (^X^K) (unbound) (unbound)
Kill the entire buffer.
kill-whole-line (^U) (unbound) (unbound)
Kill the current line.
vi-match-bracket (^X^B) (%) (unbound)
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Move to the bracket character (one of {}, () or [])
that matches the one under the cursor. If the cursor
is not on a bracket character, move forward without
going past the end of the line to find one, and then go
to the matching bracket.
vi-open-line-above (unbound) (O) (unbound)
Open a line above the cursor and enter insert mode.
vi-open-line-below (unbound) (o) (unbound)
Open a line below the cursor and enter insert mode.
vi-oper-swap-case
Read a movement command from the keyboard, and swap the
case of all characters from the cursor position to the
endpoint of the movement. If the movement command is
vi-oper-swap-case, swap the case of all characters on
the current line.
overwrite-mode (^X^O) (unbound) (unbound)
Toggle between overwrite mode and insert mode.
vi-put-before (unbound) (P) (unbound)
Insert the contents of the kill buffer before the cur-
sor. If the kill buffer contains a sequence of lines
(as opposed to characters), paste it above the current
line.
vi-put-after (unbound) (p) (unbound)
Insert the contents of the kill buffer after the cur-
sor. If the kill buffer contains a sequence of lines
(as opposed to characters), paste it below the current
line.
quoted-insert (^V) (unbound) (unbound)
Insert the next character typed into the buffer liter-
ally. An interrupt character will not be inserted.
vi-quoted-insert (unbound) (unbound) (^Q ^V)
Display a `^' at the cursor position, and insert the
next character typed into the buffer literally. An
interrupt character will not be inserted.
quote-line (ESC-') (unbound) (unbound)
Quote the current line; that is, put a `'' character at
the beginning and the end, and convert all `'' charac-
ters to `'\'''.
quote-region (ESC-") (unbound) (unbound)
Quote the region from the cursor to the mark.
vi-replace (unbound) (R) (unbound)
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
Enter overwrite mode.
vi-repeat-change (unbound) (.) (unbound)
Repeat the last vi mode text modification. If a count
was used with the modification, it is remembered. If a
count is given to this command, it overrides the remem-
bered count, and is remembered for future uses of this
command. The cut buffer specification is similarly
remembered.
vi-replace-chars (unbound) (r) (unbound)
Replace the character under the cursor with a character
read from the keyboard.
ters and some control characters)
self-insert (printable characters) (unbound) (printable
charac-
Insert a character into the buffer at the cursor posi-
tion.
self-insert-unmeta (ESC-^I ESC-^J ESC-^M) (unbound)
(unbound)
Insert a character into the buffer after stripping the
meta bit and converting ^M to ^J.
vi-substitute (unbound) (s) (unbound)
Substitute the next character(s).
vi-swap-case (unbound) (~) (unbound)
Swap the case of the character under the cursor and
move past it.
transpose-chars (^T) (unbound) (unbound)
Exchange the two characters to the left of the cursor
if at end of line, else exchange the character under
the cursor with the character to the left.
transpose-words (ESC-T ESC-t) (unbound) (unbound)
Exchange the current word with the one before it.
vi-unindent (unbound) (<) (unbound)
Unindent a number of lines.
up-case-word (ESC-U ESC-u) (unbound) (unbound)
Convert the current word to all caps and move past it.
yank (^Y) (unbound) (unbound)
Insert the contents of the kill buffer at the cursor
position.
yank-pop (ESC-y) (unbound) (unbound)
Remove the text just yanked, rotate the kill-ring (the
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
history of previously killed text) and yank the new
top. Only works following yank or yank-pop.
vi-yank (unbound) (y) (unbound)
Read a movement command from the keyboard, and copy the
region from the cursor position to the endpoint of the
movement into the kill buffer. If the command is
vi-yank, copy the current line.
vi-yank-whole-line (unbound) (Y) (unbound)
Copy the current line into the kill buffer.
vi-yank-eol
Copy the region from the cursor position to the end of
the line into the kill buffer. Arguably, this is what
Y should do in vi, but it isn't what it actually does.
Arguments
digit-argument (ESC-0..ESC-9) (1-9) (unbound)
Start a new numeric argument, or add to the current
one. See also vi-digit-or-beginning-of-line. This
only works if bound to a key sequence ending in a deci-
mal digit.
Inside a widget function, a call to this function
treats the last key of the key sequence which called
the widget as the digit.
neg-argument (ESC--) (unbound) (unbound)
Changes the sign of the following argument.
universal-argument
Multiply the argument of the next command by 4. Alter-
natively, if this command is followed by an integer
(positive or negative), use that as the argument for
the next command. Thus digits cannot be repeated using
this command. For example, if this command occurs
twice, followed immediately by forward-char, move for-
ward sixteen spaces; if instead it is followed by -2,
then forward-char, move backward two spaces.
Inside a widget function, if passed an argument, i.e.
`zle universal-argument num', the numerical argument
will be set to num; this is equivalent to
`NUMERIC=num'.
argument-base
Use the existing numeric argument as a numeric base,
which must be in the range 2 to 36 inclusive. Subse-
quent use of digit-argument and universal-argument will
input a new prefix in the given base. The usual hexa-
decimal convention is used: the letter a or A
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
corresponds to 10, and so on. Arguments in bases
requiring digits from 10 upwards are more conveniently
input with universal-argument, since ESC-a etc. are not
usually bound to digit-argument.
The function can be used with a command argument inside
a user-defined widget. The following code sets the
base to 16 and lets the user input a hexadecimal argu-
ment until a key out of the digit range is typed:
zle argument-base 16
zle universal-argument
Completion
accept-and-menu-complete
In a menu completion, insert the current completion
into the buffer, and advance to the next possible com-
pletion.
complete-word
Attempt completion on the current word.
delete-char-or-list (^D) (unbound) (unbound)
Delete the character under the cursor. If the cursor
is at the end of the line, list possible completions
for the current word.
expand-cmd-path
Expand the current command to its full pathname.
expand-or-complete (TAB) (unbound) (TAB)
Attempt shell expansion on the current word. If that
fails, attempt completion.
expand-or-complete-prefix
Attempt shell expansion on the current word up to cur-
sor.
expand-history (ESC-space ESC-!) (unbound) (unbound)
Perform history expansion on the edit buffer.
expand-word (^X*) (unbound) (unbound)
Attempt shell expansion on the current word.
list-choices (ESC-^D) (^D =) (^D)
List possible completions for the current word.
list-expand (^Xg ^XG) (^G) (^G)
List the expansion of the current word.
magic-space
Perform history expansion and insert a space into the
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
buffer. This is intended to be bound to space.
menu-complete
Like complete-word, except that menu completion is
used. See the MENU_COMPLETE option.
menu-expand-or-complete
Like expand-or-complete, except that menu completion is
used.
reverse-menu-complete
Perform menu completion, like menu-complete, except
that if a menu completion is already in progress, move
to the previous completion rather than the next.
end-of-list
When a previous completion displayed a list below the
prompt, this widget can be used to move the prompt
below the list.
Miscellaneous
accept-and-hold (ESC-A ESC-a) (unbound) (unbound)
Push the contents of the buffer on the buffer stack and
execute it.
accept-and-infer-next-history
Execute the contents of the buffer. Then search the
history list for a line matching the current one and
push the event following onto the buffer stack.
accept-line (^J ^M) (^J ^M) (^J ^M)
Finish editing the buffer. Normally this causes the
buffer to be executed as a shell command.
accept-line-and-down-history (^O) (unbound) (unbound)
Execute the current line, and push the next history
event on the buffer stack.
auto-suffix-remove
If the previous action added a suffix (space, slash,
etc.) to the word on the command line, remove it. Oth-
erwise do nothing. Removing the suffix ends any active
menu completion or menu selection.
This widget is intended to be called from user-defined
widgets to enforce a desired suffix-removal behavior.
auto-suffix-retain
If the previous action added a suffix (space, slash,
etc.) to the word on the command line, force it to be
preserved. Otherwise do nothing. Retaining the suffix
ends any active menu completion or menu selection.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
This widget is intended to be called from user-defined
widgets to enforce a desired suffix-preservation behav-
ior.
beep Beep, unless the BEEP option is unset.
vi-cmd-mode (^X^V) (unbound) (^[)
Enter command mode; that is, select the `vicmd' keymap.
Yes, this is bound by default in emacs mode.
vi-caps-lock-panic
Hang until any lowercase key is pressed. This is for
vi users without the mental capacity to keep track of
their caps lock key (like the author).
clear-screen (^L ESC-^L) (^L) (^L)
Clear the screen and redraw the prompt.
describe-key-briefly
Reads a key sequence, then prints the function bound to
that sequence.
exchange-point-and-mark (^X^X) (unbound) (unbound)
Exchange the cursor position (point) with the position
of the mark. Unless a negative prefix argument is
given, the region between point and mark is activated
so that it can be highlighted. If a zero prefix argu-
ment is given, the region is activated but point and
mark are not swapped.
execute-named-cmd (ESC-x) (:) (unbound)
Read the name of an editor command and execute it. A
restricted set of editing functions is available in the
mini-buffer. Keys are looked up in the special command
keymap, and if not found there in the main keymap. An
interrupt signal, as defined by the stty setting, will
abort the function. Note that the following always
perform the same task within the executed-named-cmd
environment and cannot be replaced by user defined wid-
gets, nor can the set of functions be extended. The
allowed functions are: backward-delete-char, vi-back-
ward-delete-char, clear-screen, redisplay,
quoted-insert, vi-quoted-insert, backward-kill-word,
vi-backward-kill-word, kill-whole-line, vi-kill-line,
backward-kill-line, list-choices, delete-char-or-list,
complete-word, accept-line, expand-or-complete and
expand-or-complete-prefix.
kill-region kills the last word, and vi-cmd-mode is
treated the same as accept-line. The space and tab
characters, if not bound to one of these functions,
will complete the name and then list the possibilities
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 36
User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
if the AUTO_LIST option is set. Any other character
that is not bound to self-insert or self-insert-unmeta
will beep and be ignored. The bindings of the current
insert mode will be used.
Currently this command may not be redefined or called
by name.
execute-last-named-cmd (ESC-z) (unbound) (unbound)
Redo the last function executed with execute-named-cmd.
Currently this command may not be redefined or called
by name.
get-line (ESC-G ESC-g) (unbound) (unbound)
Pop the top line off the buffer stack and insert it at
the cursor position.
pound-insert (unbound) (#) (unbound)
If there is no # character at the beginning of the
buffer, add one to the beginning of each line. If
there is one, remove a # from each line that has one.
In either case, accept the current line. The INTERAC-
TIVE_COMMENTS option must be set for this to have any
usefulness.
vi-pound-insert
If there is no # character at the beginning of the cur-
rent line, add one. If there is one, remove it. The
INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS option must be set for this to
have any usefulness.
push-input
Push the entire current multiline construct onto the
buffer stack and return to the top-level (PS1) prompt.
If the current parser construct is only a single line,
this is exactly like push-line. Next time the editor
starts up or is popped with get-line, the construct
will be popped off the top of the buffer stack and
loaded into the editing buffer.
push-line (^Q ESC-Q ESC-q) (unbound) (unbound)
Push the current buffer onto the buffer stack and clear
the buffer. Next time the editor starts up, the buffer
will be popped off the top of the buffer stack and
loaded into the editing buffer.
push-line-or-edit
At the top-level (PS1) prompt, equivalent to push-line.
At a secondary (PS2) prompt, move the entire current
multiline construct into the editor buffer. The latter
is equivalent to push-input followed by get-line.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
read-command
Only useful from a user-defined widget. A keystroke is
read just as in normal operation, but instead of the
command being executed the name of the command that
would be executed is stored in the shell parameter
REPLY. This can be used as the argument of a future
zle command. If the key sequence is not bound, status
1 is returned; typically, however, REPLY is set to
undefined-key to indicate a useless key sequence.
recursive-edit
Only useful from a user-defined widget. At this point
in the function, the editor regains control until one
of the standard widgets which would normally cause zle
to exit (typically an accept-line caused by hitting the
return key) is executed. Instead, control returns to
the user-defined widget. The status returned is
non-zero if the return was caused by an error, but the
function still continues executing and hence may tidy
up. This makes it safe for the user-defined widget to
alter the command line or key bindings temporarily.
The following widget, caps-lock, serves as an example.
self-insert-ucase() {
LBUFFER+=${(U)KEYS[-1]}
}
integer stat
zle -N self-insert self-insert-ucase
zle -A caps-lock save-caps-lock
zle -A accept-line caps-lock
zle recursive-edit
stat=$?
zle -A .self-insert self-insert
zle -A save-caps-lock caps-lock
zle -D save-caps-lock
(( stat )) && zle send-break
return $stat
This causes typed letters to be inserted capitalised
until either accept-line (i.e. typically the return
key) is typed or the caps-lock widget is invoked again;
the later is handled by saving the old definition of
caps-lock as save-caps-lock and then rebinding it to
invoke accept-line. Note that an error from the recur-
sive edit is detected as a non-zero return status and
propagated by using the send-break widget.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
redisplay (unbound) (^R) (^R)
Redisplays the edit buffer.
reset-prompt (unbound) (unbound) (unbound)
Force the prompts on both the left and right of the
screen to be re-expanded, then redisplay the edit
buffer. This reflects changes both to the prompt vari-
ables themselves and changes in the expansion of the
values (for example, changes in time or directory, or
changes to the value of variables referred to by the
prompt).
Otherwise, the prompt is only expanded each time zle
starts, and when the display as been interrupted by
output from another part of the shell (such as a job
notification) which causes the command line to be
reprinted.
send-break (^G ESC-^G) (unbound) (unbound)
Abort the current editor function, e.g. exe-
cute-named-command, or the editor itself, e.g. if you
are in vared. Otherwise abort the parsing of the cur-
rent line; in this case the aborted line is available
in the shell variable ZLE_LINE_ABORTED.
run-help (ESC-H ESC-h) (unbound) (unbound)
Push the buffer onto the buffer stack, and execute the
command `run-help cmd', where cmd is the current com-
mand. run-help is normally aliased to man.
vi-set-buffer (unbound) (") (unbound)
Specify a buffer to be used in the following command.
There are 35 buffers that can be specified: the 26
`named' buffers "a to "z and the nine `queued' buffers
"1 to "9. The named buffers can also be specified as
"A to "Z.
When a buffer is specified for a cut command, the text
being cut replaces the previous contents of the speci-
fied buffer. If a named buffer is specified using a
capital, the newly cut text is appended to the buffer
instead of overwriting it.
If no buffer is specified for a cut command, "1 is
used, and the contents of "1 to "8 are each shifted
along one buffer; the contents of "9 is lost.
vi-set-mark (unbound) (m) (unbound)
Set the specified mark at the cursor position.
set-mark-command (^@) (unbound) (unbound)
Set the mark at the cursor position. If called with a
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
negative prefix argument, do not set the mark but deac-
tivate the region so that it is no longer highlighted
(it is still usable for other purposes). Otherwise the
region is marked as active.
spell-word (ESC-$ ESC-S ESC-s) (unbound) (unbound)
Attempt spelling correction on the current word.
undefined-key
This command is executed when a key sequence that is
not bound to any command is typed. By default it
beeps.
undo (^_ ^Xu ^X^U) (unbound) (unbound)
Incrementally undo the last text modification. When
called from a user-defined widget, takes an optional
argument indicating a previous state of the undo his-
tory as returned by the UNDO_CHANGE_NO variable; modi-
fications are undone until that state is reached.
redo Incrementally redo undone text modifications.
vi-undo-change (unbound) (u) (unbound)
Undo the last text modification. If repeated, redo the
modification.
what-cursor-position (^X=) (unbound) (unbound)
Print the character under the cursor, its code as an
octal, decimal and hexadecimal number, the current cur-
sor position within the buffer and the column of the
cursor in the current line.
where-is
Read the name of an editor command and print the list-
ing of key sequences that invoke the specified command.
A restricted set of editing functions is available in
the mini-buffer. Keys are looked up in the special
command keymap, and if not found there in the main
keymap.
which-command (ESC-?) (unbound) (unbound)
Push the buffer onto the buffer stack, and execute the
command `which-command cmd'. where cmd is the current
command. which-command is normally aliased to whence.
vi-digit-or-beginning-of-line (unbound) (0) (unbound)
If the last command executed was a digit as part of an
argument, continue the argument. Otherwise, execute
vi-beginning-of-line.
CHARACTER HIGHLIGHTING
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
The line editor has the ability to highlight characters or
regions of the line that have a particular significance.
This is controlled by the array parameter zle_highlight, if
it has been set by the user.
If the parameter contains the single entry none all high-
lighting is turned off. Note the parameter is still
expected to be an array.
Otherwise each entry of the array should consist of a word
indicating a context for highlighting, then a colon, then a
comma-separated list of the types of highlighting to apply
in that context.
The contexts available for highlighting are the following:
default
Any text within the command line not affected by any
other highlighting. Text outside the editable area of
the command line is not affected.
isearch
When one of the incremental history search widgets is
active, the area of the command line matched by the
search string or pattern.
region
The region between the cursor (point) and the mark as
set with set-mark-command. The region is only high-
lighted if it is active, which is the case if
set-mark-command or exchange-point-and-mark has been
called and the line has not been subsequently modified.
The region can be deactivated by calling set-mark-com-
mand with a negative prefix argument, or reactivated by
calling exchange-point-and-mark with a zero prefix
argument. Note that whether or not the region is
active has no effect on its use within widgets, it sim-
ply determines whether it is highlighted.
special
Individual characters that have no direct printable
representation but are shown in a special manner by the
line editor. These characters are described below.
suffix
This context is used in completion for characters that
are marked as suffixes that will be removed if the com-
pletion ends at that point, the most obvious example
being a slash (/) after a directory name. Note that
suffix removal is configurable; the circumstances under
which the suffix will be removed may differ for differ-
ent completions.
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
zle_highlight may contain additional fields for controlling
how terminal sequences to change colours are output. Each
of the following is followed by a colon and a string in the
same form as for key bindings. This will not be necessary
for the vast majority of terminals as the defaults shown in
parentheses are widely used.
fg_start_code (\e[3)
The start of the escape sequence for the foreground
colour. This is followed by an ASCII digit represent-
ing the colour.
fg_default_code (9)
The number to use instead of the colour to reset the
default foreground colour.
fg_end_code (m)
The end of the escape sequence for the foreground
colour.
bg_start_code (\e[4)
The start of the escape sequence for the background
colour. This is followed by an ASCII digit represent-
ing the colour.
bg_default_code (9)
The number to use instead of the colour to reset the
default background colour.
bg_end_code (m)
The end of the escape sequence for the background
colour.
The available types of highlighting are the following. Note
that not all types of highlighting are available on all ter-
minals:
none No highlighting is applied to the given context. It is
not useful for this to appear with other types of high-
lighting; it is used to override a default.
fg=colour
The foreground colour should be set to colour, a deci-
mal integer or the name of one of the eight most
widely-supported colours.
Not all terminals support this and, of those that do,
not all provide facilities to test the support, hence
the user should decide based on the terminal type.
Most terminals support the colours black, red, green,
yellow, blue, magenta, cyan and white, which can be set
by name. In addition. default may be used to set the
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 42
User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
terminal's default foreground colour. Abbreviations
are allowed; b or bl selects black. Some terminals may
generate additional colours if the bold attribute is
also present.
On recent terminals and on systems with an up-to-date
terminal database the number of colours supported may
be tested by the command `echotc Co'; if this succeeds,
it indicates a limit on the number of colours which
will be enforced by the line editor. The number of
colours is in any case limited to 256 (i.e. the range 0
to 255).
Colour is also known as color.
bg=colour
The background colour should be set to colour. This
works similarly to the foreground colour, except the
background is not usually affected by the bold
attribute.
bold The characters in the given context are shown in a bold
font. Not all terminals distinguish bold fonts.
standout
The characters in the given context are shown in the
terminal's standout mode. The actual effect is spe-
cific to the terminal; on many terminals it is inverse
video. On some such terminals, where the cursor does
not blink it appears with standout mode negated, making
it less than clear where the cursor actually is. On
such terminals one of the other effects may be prefer-
able for highlighting the region and matched search
string.
underline
The characters in the given context are shown under-
lined. Some terminals show the foreground in a differ-
ent colour instead; in this case whitespace will not be
highlighted.
The characters described above as `special' are as follows.
The formatting described here is used irrespective of
whether the characters are highlighted:
ASCII control characters
Control characters in the ASCII range are shown as `^'
followed by the base character.
Unprintable multibyte characters
This item applies to control characters not in the
ASCII range, plus other characters as follows. If the
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User Commands ZSHZLE(1)
MULTIBYTE option is in effect, multibyte characters not
in the ASCII character set that are reported as having
zero width are treated as combining characters when the
option COMBINING_CHARS is on. If the option is off, or
if a character appears where a combining character is
not valid, the character is treated as unprintable.
Unprintable multibyte characters are shown as a hexa-
decimal number between angle brackets. The number is
the code point of the character in the wide character
set; this may or may not be Unicode, depending on the
operating system.
Invalid multibyte characters
If the MULTIBYTE option is in effect, any sequence of
one or more bytes that does not form a valid character
in the current character set is treated as a series of
bytes each shown as a special character. This case can
be distinguished from other unprintable characters as
the bytes are represented as two hexadecimal digits
between angle brackets, as distinct from the four or
eight digits that are used for unprintable characters
that are nonetheless valid in the current character
set.
Not all systems support this: for it to work, the sys-
tem's representation of wide characters must be code
values from the Universal Character Set, as defined by
IS0 10646 (also known as Unicode).
Wrapped double-width characters
When a double-width character appears in the final col-
umn of a line, it is instead shown on the next line.
The empty space left in the original position is high-
lighted as a special character.
If zle_highlight is not set or no value applies to a partic-
ular context, the defaults applied are equivalent to
zle_highlight=(region:standout special:standout
suffix:bold isearch:underline)
i.e. both the region and special characters are shown in
standout mode.
Within widgets, arbitrary regions may be highlighted by set-
ting the special array parameter region_highlight; see
above.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
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+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 45
User Commands ZSHCOMPWID(1)
NAME
zshcompwid - zsh completion widgets
DESCRIPTION
The shell's programmable completion mechanism can be manipu-
lated in two ways; here the low-level features supporting
the newer, function-based mechanism are defined. A complete
set of shell functions based on these features is described
in zshcompsys(1), and users with no interest in adding to
that system (or, potentially, writing their own -- see dic-
tionary entry for `hubris') should skip the current section.
The older system based on the compctl builtin command is
described in zshcompctl(1).
Completion widgets are defined by the -C option to the zle
builtin command provided by the zsh/zle module (see zsh-
zle(1)). For example,
zle -C complete expand-or-complete completer
defines a widget named `complete'. The second argument is
the name of any of the builtin widgets that handle comple-
tions: complete-word, expand-or-complete, expand-or-com-
plete-prefix, menu-complete, menu-expand-or-complete,
reverse-menu-complete, list-choices, or delete-char-or-list.
Note that this will still work even if the widget in ques-
tion has been re-bound.
When this newly defined widget is bound to a key using the
bindkey builtin command defined in the zsh/zle module (see
zshzle(1)), typing that key will call the shell function
`completer'. This function is responsible for generating the
possible matches using the builtins described below. As
with other ZLE widgets, the function is called with its
standard input closed.
Once the function returns, the completion code takes over
control again and treats the matches in the same manner as
the specified builtin widget, in this case expand-or-com-
plete.
COMPLETION SPECIAL PARAMETERS
The parameters ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS and ZLE_SPACE_SUF-
FIX_CHARS are used by the completion mechanism, but are not
special. See Parameters Used By The Shell in zshparam(1).
Inside completion widgets, and any functions called from
them, some parameters have special meaning; outside these
functions they are not special to the shell in any way.
These parameters are used to pass information between the
completion code and the completion widget. Some of the
builtin commands and the condition codes use or change the
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current values of these parameters. Any existing values
will be hidden during execution of completion widgets;
except for compstate, the parameters are reset on each func-
tion exit (including nested function calls from within the
completion widget) to the values they had when the function
was entered.
CURRENT
This is the number of the current word, i.e. the word
the cursor is currently on in the words array. Note
that this value is only correct if the ksharrays option
is not set.
IPREFIX
Initially this will be set to the empty string. This
parameter functions like PREFIX; it contains a string
which precedes the one in PREFIX and is not considered
part of the list of matches. Typically, a string is
transferred from the beginning of PREFIX to the end of
IPREFIX, for example:
IPREFIX=${PREFIX%%\=*}=
PREFIX=${PREFIX#*=}
causes the part of the prefix up to and including the
first equal sign not to be treated as part of a matched
string. This can be done automatically by the compset
builtin, see below.
ISUFFIX
As IPREFIX, but for a suffix that should not be consid-
ered part of the matches; note that the ISUFFIX string
follows the SUFFIX string.
PREFIX
Initially this will be set to the part of the current
word from the beginning of the word up to the position
of the cursor; it may be altered to give a common pre-
fix for all matches.
QIPREFIX
This parameter is read-only and contains the quoted
string up to the word being completed. E.g. when com-
pleting `"foo', this parameter contains the double
quote. If the -q option of compset is used (see below),
and the original string was `"foo bar' with the cursor
on the `bar', this parameter contains `"foo '.
QISUFFIX
Like QIPREFIX, but containing the suffix.
SUFFIX
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Initially this will be set to the part of the current
word from the cursor position to the end; it may be
altered to give a common suffix for all matches. It is
most useful when the option COMPLETE_IN_WORD is set, as
otherwise the whole word on the command line is treated
as a prefix.
compstate
This is an associative array with various keys and val-
ues that the completion code uses to exchange informa-
tion with the completion widget. The keys are:
all_quotes
The -q option of the compset builtin command (see
below) allows a quoted string to be broken into
separate words; if the cursor is on one of those
words, that word will be completed, possibly
invoking `compset -q' recursively. With this key
it is possible to test the types of quoted strings
which are currently broken into parts in this
fashion. Its value contains one character for
each quoting level. The characters are a single
quote or a double quote for strings quoted with
these characters, a dollars sign for strings
quoted with $'...' and a backslash for strings not
starting with a quote character. The first char-
acter in the value always corresponds to the
innermost quoting level.
context
This will be set by the completion code to the
overall context in which completion is attempted.
Possible values are:
array_value
when completing inside the value of an array
parameter assignment; in this case the words
array contains the words inside the parenthe-
ses.
brace_parameter
when completing the name of a parameter in a
parameter expansion beginning with ${. This
context will also be set when completing
parameter flags following ${(; the full com-
mand line argument is presented and the han-
dler must test the value to be completed to
ascertain that this is the case.
assign_parameter
when completing the name of a parameter in a
parameter assignment.
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command
when completing for a normal command (either
in command position or for an argument of the
command).
condition
when completing inside a `[[...]]' condi-
tional expression; in this case the words
array contains only the words inside the con-
ditional expression.
math when completing in a mathematical environment
such as a `((...))' construct.
parameter
when completing the name of a parameter in a
parameter expansion beginning with $ but not
${.
redirect
when completing after a redirection operator.
subscript
when completing inside a parameter subscript.
value
when completing the value of a parameter
assignment.
exact
Controls the behaviour when the REC_EXACT option
is set. It will be set to accept if an exact
match would be accepted, and will be unset other-
wise.
If it was set when at least one match equal to the
string on the line was generated, the match is
accepted.
exact_string
The string of an exact match if one was found,
otherwise unset.
ignored
The number of words that were ignored because they
matched one of the patterns given with the -F
option to the compadd builtin command.
insert
This controls the manner in which a match is
inserted into the command line. On entry to the
widget function, if it is unset the command line
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is not to be changed; if set to unambiguous, any
prefix common to all matches is to be inserted; if
set to automenu-unambiguous, the common prefix is
to be inserted and the next invocation of the com-
pletion code may start menu completion (due to the
AUTO_MENU option being set); if set to menu or
automenu menu completion will be started for the
matches currently generated (in the latter case
this will happen because the AUTO_MENU is set).
The value may also contain the string `tab' when
the completion code would normally not really do
completion, but only insert the TAB character.
On exit it may be set to any of the values above
(where setting it to the empty string is the same
as unsetting it), or to a number, in which case
the match whose number is given will be inserted
into the command line. Negative numbers count
backward from the last match (with `-1' selecting
the last match) and out-of-range values are
wrapped around, so that a value of zero selects
the last match and a value one more than the maxi-
mum selects the first. Unless the value of this
key ends in a space, the match is inserted as in a
menu completion, i.e. without automatically
appending a space.
Both menu and automenu may also specify the number
of the match to insert, given after a colon. For
example, `menu:2' says to start menu completion,
beginning with the second match.
Note that a value containing the substring `tab'
makes the matches generated be ignored and only
the TAB be inserted.
Finally, it may also be set to all, which makes
all matches generated be inserted into the line.
insert_positions
When the completion system inserts an unambiguous
string into the line, there may be multiple places
where characters are missing or where the charac-
ter inserted differs from at least one match. The
value of this key contains a colon separated list
of all these positions, as indexes into the com-
mand line.
last_prompt
If this is set to a non-empty string for every
match added, the completion code will move the
cursor back to the previous prompt after the list
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of completions has been displayed. Initially this
is set or unset according to the
ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT option.
list This controls whether or how the list of matches
will be displayed. If it is unset or empty they
will never be listed; if its value begins with
list, they will always be listed; if it begins
with autolist or ambiguous, they will be listed
when the AUTO_LIST or LIST_AMBIGUOUS options
respectively would normally cause them to be.
If the substring force appears in the value, this
makes the list be shown even if there is only one
match. Normally, the list would be shown only if
there are at least two matches.
The value contains the substring packed if the
LIST_PACKED option is set. If this substring is
given for all matches added to a group, this group
will show the LIST_PACKED behavior. The same is
done for the LIST_ROWS_FIRST option with the sub-
string rows.
Finally, if the value contains the string explana-
tions, only the explanation strings, if any, will
be listed and if it contains messages, only the
messages (added with the -x option of compadd)
will be listed. If it contains both explanations
and messages both kinds of explanation strings
will be listed. It will be set appropriately on
entry to a completion widget and may be changed
there.
list_lines
This gives the number of lines that are needed to
display the full list of completions. Note that
to calculate the total number of lines to display
you need to add the number of lines needed for the
command line to this value, this is available as
the value of the BUFFERLINES special parameter.
list_max
Initially this is set to the value of the LISTMAX
parameter. It may be set to any other value; when
the widget exits this value will be used in the
same way as the value of LISTMAX.
nmatches
The number of matches generated and accepted by
the completion code so far.
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old_insert
On entry to the widget this will be set to the
number of the match of an old list of completions
that is currently inserted into the command line.
If no match has been inserted, this is unset.
As with old_list, the value of this key will only
be used if it is the string keep. If it was set to
this value by the widget and there was an old
match inserted into the command line, this match
will be kept and if the value of the insert key
specifies that another match should be inserted,
this will be inserted after the old one.
old_list
This is set to yes if there is still a valid list
of completions from a previous completion at the
time the widget is invoked. This will usually be
the case if and only if the previous editing oper-
ation was a completion widget or one of the
builtin completion functions. If there is a valid
list and it is also currently shown on the screen,
the value of this key is shown.
After the widget has exited the value of this key
is only used if it was set to keep. In this case
the completion code will continue to use this old
list. If the widget generated new matches, they
will not be used.
parameter
The name of the parameter when completing in a
subscript or in the value of a parameter assign-
ment.
pattern_insert
Normally this is set to menu, which specifies that
menu completion will be used whenever a set of
matches was generated using pattern matching. If
it is set to any other non-empty string by the
user and menu completion is not selected by other
option settings, the code will instead insert any
common prefix for the generated matches as with
normal completion.
pattern_match
Locally controls the behaviour given by the
GLOB_COMPLETE option. Initially it is set to `*'
if and only if the option is set. The completion
widget may set it to this value, to an empty
string (which has the same effect as unsetting
it), or to any other non-empty string. If it is
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non-empty, unquoted metacharacters on the command
line will be treated as patterns; if it is `*',
then additionally a wildcard `*' is assumed at the
cursor position; if it is empty or unset,
metacharacters will be treated literally.
Note that the matcher specifications given to the
compadd builtin command are not used if this is
set to a non-empty string.
quote
When completing inside quotes, this contains the
quotation character (i.e. either a single quote, a
double quote, or a backtick). Otherwise it is
unset.
quoting
When completing inside single quotes, this is set
to the string single; inside double quotes, the
string double; inside backticks, the string back-
tick. Otherwise it is unset.
redirect
The redirection operator when completing in a re-
direction position, i.e. one of <, >, etc.
restore
This is set to auto before a function is entered,
which forces the special parameters mentioned
above (words, CURRENT, PREFIX, IPREFIX, SUFFIX,
and ISUFFIX) to be restored to their previous val-
ues when the function exits. If a function
unsets it or sets it to any other string, they
will not be restored.
to_end
Specifies the occasions on which the cursor is
moved to the end of a string when a match is
inserted. On entry to a widget function, it may
be single if this will happen when a single unam-
biguous match was inserted or match if it will
happen any time a match is inserted (for example,
by menu completion; this is likely to be the
effect of the ALWAYS_TO_END option).
On exit, it may be set to single as above. It may
also be set to always, or to the empty string or
unset; in those cases the cursor will be moved to
the end of the string always or never respec-
tively. Any other string is treated as match.
unambiguous
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This key is read-only and will always be set to
the common (unambiguous) prefix the completion
code has generated for all matches added so far.
unambiguous_cursor
This gives the position the cursor would be placed
at if the common prefix in the unambiguous key
were inserted, relative to the value of that key.
The cursor would be placed before the character
whose index is given by this key.
unambiguous_positions
This contains all positions where characters in
the unambiguous string are missing or where the
character inserted differs from at least one of
the matches. The positions are given as indexes
into the string given by the value of the unam-
biguous key.
vared
If completion is called while editing a line using
the vared builtin, the value of this key is set to
the name of the parameter given as an argument to
vared. This key is only set while a vared command
is active.
words
This array contains the words present on the command
line currently being edited.
COMPLETION BUILTIN COMMANDS
compadd [ -akqQfenUld12C ] [ -F array ]
[ -P prefix ] [ -S suffix ]
[ -p hidden-prefix ] [ -s hidden-suffix ]
[ -i ignored-prefix ] [ -I ignored-suffix ]
[ -W file-prefix ] [ -d array ]
[ -J name ] [ -V name ] [ -X explanation ] [ -x message ]
[ -r remove-chars ] [ -R remove-func ]
[ -D array ] [ -O array ] [ -A array ]
[ -E number ]
[ -M match-spec ] [ -- ] [ words ... ]
This builtin command can be used to add matches
directly and control all the information the completion
code stores with each possible match. The return status
is zero if at least one match was added and non-zero if
no matches were added.
The completion code breaks the string to complete into
seven fields in the order:
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<ipre><apre><hpre><word><hsuf><asuf><isuf>
The first field is an ignored prefix taken from the
command line, the contents of the IPREFIX parameter
plus the string given with the -i option. With the -U
option, only the string from the -i option is used. The
field <apre> is an optional prefix string given with
the -P option. The <hpre> field is a string that is
considered part of the match but that should not be
shown when listing completions, given with the -p
option; for example, functions that do filename genera-
tion might specify a common path prefix this way.
<word> is the part of the match that should appear in
the list of completions, i.e. one of the words given at
the end of the compadd command line. The suffixes
<hsuf>, <asuf> and <isuf> correspond to the prefixes
<hpre>, <apre> and <ipre> and are given by the options
-s, -S and -I, respectively.
The supported flags are:
-P prefix
This gives a string to be inserted before the
given words. The string given is not considered
as part of the match and any shell metacharacters
in it will not be quoted when the string is
inserted.
-S suffix
Like -P, but gives a string to be inserted after
the match.
-p hidden-prefix
This gives a string that should be inserted into
the command line before the match but that should
not appear in the list of matches. Unless the -U
option is given, this string must be matched as
part of the string on the command line.
-s hidden-suffix
Like `-p', but gives a string to insert after the
match.
-i ignored-prefix
This gives a string to insert into the command
line just before any string given with the `-P'
option. Without `-P' the string is inserted
before the string given with `-p' or directly
before the match.
-I ignored-suffix
Like -i, but gives an ignored suffix.
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-a With this flag the words are taken as names of
arrays and the possible matches are their values.
If only some elements of the arrays are needed,
the words may also contain subscripts, as in
`foo[2,-1]'.
-k With this flag the words are taken as names of
associative arrays and the possible matches are
their keys. As for -a, the words may also contain
subscripts, as in `foo[(R)*bar*]'.
-d array
This adds per-match display strings. The array
should contain one element per word given. The
completion code will then display the first ele-
ment instead of the first word, and so on. The
array may be given as the name of an array parame-
ter or directly as a space-separated list of words
in parentheses.
If there are fewer display strings than words, the
leftover words will be displayed unchanged and if
there are more display strings than words, the
leftover display strings will be silently ignored.
-l This option only has an effect if used together
with the -d option. If it is given, the display
strings are listed one per line, not arrayed in
columns.
-o This option only has an effect if used together
with the -d option. If it is given, the order of
the output is determined by the match strings;
otherwise it is determined by the display strings
(i.e. the strings given by the -d option).
-J name
Gives the name of the group of matches the words
should be stored in.
-V name
Like -J but naming an unsorted group. These are in
a different name space than groups created with
the -J flag.
-1 If given together with the -V option, makes only
consecutive duplicates in the group be removed. If
combined with the -J option, this has no visible
effect. Note that groups with and without this
flag are in different name spaces.
-2 If given together with the -J or -V option, makes
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all duplicates be kept. Again, groups with and
without this flag are in different name spaces.
-X explanation
The explanation string will be printed with the
list of matches, above the group currently
selected.
-x message
Like -X, but the message will be printed even if
there are no matches in the group.
-q The suffix given with -S will be automatically
removed if the next character typed is a blank or
does not insert anything, or if the suffix con-
sists of only one character and the next character
typed is the same character.
-r remove-chars
This is a more versatile form of the -q option.
The suffix given with -S or the slash automati-
cally added after completing directories will be
automatically removed if the next character typed
inserts one of the characters given in the
remove-chars. This string is parsed as a charac-
ters class and understands the backslash sequences
used by the print command. For example, `-r
"a-z\t"' removes the suffix if the next character
typed inserts a lower case character or a TAB, and
`-r "^0-9"' removes the suffix if the next charac-
ter typed inserts anything but a digit. One extra
backslash sequence is understood in this string:
`\-' stands for all characters that insert noth-
ing. Thus `-S "=" -q' is the same as `-S "=" -r "=
\t\n\-"'.
This option may also be used without the -S
option; then any automatically added space will be
removed when one of the characters in the list is
typed.
-R remove-func
This is another form of the -r option. When a suf-
fix has been inserted and the completion accepted,
the function remove-func will be called after the
next character typed. It is passed the length of
the suffix as an argument and can use the special
parameters available in ordinary (non-completion)
zle widgets (see zshzle(1)) to analyse and modify
the command line.
-f If this flag is given, all of the matches built
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from words are marked as being the names of files.
They are not required to be actual filenames, but
if they are, and the option LIST_TYPES is set, the
characters describing the types of the files in
the completion lists will be shown. This also
forces a slash to be added when the name of a
directory is completed.
-e This flag can be used to tell the completion code
that the matches added are parameter names for a
parameter expansion. This will make the
AUTO_PARAM_SLASH and AUTO_PARAM_KEYS options be
used for the matches.
-W file-prefix
This string is a pathname that will be prepended
to each of the matches formed by the given words
together with any prefix specified by the -p
option to form a complete filename for testing.
Hence it is only useful if combined with the -f
flag, as the tests will not otherwise be per-
formed.
-F array
Specifies an array containing patterns. Words
matching one of these patterns are ignored, i.e.
not considered to be possible matches.
The array may be the name of an array parameter or
a list of literal patterns enclosed in parentheses
and quoted, as in `-F "(*?.o *?.h)"'. If the name
of an array is given, the elements of the array
are taken as the patterns.
-Q This flag instructs the completion code not to
quote any metacharacters in the words when insert-
ing them into the command line.
-M match-spec
This gives local match specifications as described
below in the section `Completion Matching Con-
trol'. This option may be given more than once.
In this case all match-specs given are concate-
nated with spaces between them to form the speci-
fication string to use. Note that they will only
be used if the -U option is not given.
-n Specifies that the words added are to be used as
possible matches, but are not to appear in the
completion listing.
-U If this flag is given, all words given will be
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accepted and no matching will be done by the com-
pletion code. Normally this is used in functions
that do the matching themselves.
-O array
If this option is given, the words are not added
to the set of possible completions. Instead,
matching is done as usual and all of the words
given as arguments that match the string on the
command line will be stored in the array parameter
whose name is given as array.
-A array
As the -O option, except that instead of those of
the words which match being stored in array, the
strings generated internally by the completion
code are stored. For example, with a matching
specification of `-M "L:|no="', the string `nof'
on the command line and the string `foo' as one of
the words, this option stores the string `nofoo'
in the array, whereas the -O option stores the
`foo' originally given.
-D array
As with -O, the words are not added to the set of
possible completions. Instead, the completion
code tests whether each word in turn matches what
is on the line. If the nth word does not match,
the nth element of the array is removed. Elements
for which the corresponding word is matched are
retained.
-C This option adds a special match which expands to
all other matches when inserted into the line,
even those that are added after this option is
used. Together with the -d option it is possible
to specify a string that should be displayed in
the list for this special match. If no string is
given, it will be shown as a string containing the
strings that would be inserted for the other
matches, truncated to the width of the screen.
-E This option adds number empty matches after the
words have been added. An empty match takes up
space in completion listings but will never be
inserted in the line and can't be selected with
menu completion or menu selection. This makes
empty matches only useful to format completion
lists and to make explanatory string be shown in
completion lists (since empty matches can be given
display strings with the -d option). And because
all but one empty string would otherwise be
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removed, this option implies the -V and -2 options
(even if an explicit -J option is given).
-
-- This flag ends the list of flags and options. All
arguments after it will be taken as the words to
use as matches even if they begin with hyphens.
Except for the -M flag, if any of these flags is given
more than once, the first one (and its argument) will
be used.
compset -p number
compset -P [ number ] pattern
compset -s number
compset -S [ number ] pattern
compset -n begin [ end ]
compset -N beg-pat [ end-pat ]
compset -q
This command simplifies modification of the special
parameters, while its return status allows tests on
them to be carried out.
The options are:
-p number
If the contents of the PREFIX parameter is longer
than number characters, the first number charac-
ters are removed from it and appended to the con-
tents of the IPREFIX parameter.
-P [ number ] pattern
If the value of the PREFIX parameter begins with
anything that matches the pattern, the matched
portion is removed from PREFIX and appended to
IPREFIX.
Without the optional number, the longest match is
taken, but if number is given, anything up to the
numberth match is moved. If the number is nega-
tive, the numberth longest match is moved. For
example, if PREFIX contains the string `a=b=c',
then compset -P '*\=' will move the string `a=b='
into the IPREFIX parameter, but compset -P 1 '*\='
will move only the string `a='.
-s number
As -p, but transfer the last number characters
from the value of SUFFIX to the front of the value
of ISUFFIX.
-S [ number ] pattern
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As -P, but match the last portion of SUFFIX and
transfer the matched portion to the front of the
value of ISUFFIX.
-n begin [ end ]
If the current word position as specified by the
parameter CURRENT is greater than or equal to
begin, anything up to the beginth word is removed
from the words array and the value of the parame-
ter CURRENT is decremented by begin.
If the optional end is given, the modification is
done only if the current word position is also
less than or equal to end. In this case, the words
from position end onwards are also removed from
the words array.
Both begin and end may be negative to count back-
wards from the last element of the words array.
-N beg-pat [ end-pat ]
If one of the elements of the words array before
the one at the index given by the value of the
parameter CURRENT matches the pattern beg-pat, all
elements up to and including the matching one are
removed from the words array and the value of CUR-
RENT is changed to point to the same word in the
changed array.
If the optional pattern end-pat is also given, and
there is an element in the words array matching
this pattern, the parameters are modified only if
the index of this word is higher than the one
given by the CURRENT parameter (so that the match-
ing word has to be after the cursor). In this
case, the words starting with the one matching
end-pat are also removed from the words array. If
words contains no word matching end-pat, the test-
ing and modification is performed as if it were
not given.
-q The word currently being completed is split on
spaces into separate words, respecting the usual
shell quoting conventions. The resulting words
are stored in the words array, and CURRENT, PRE-
FIX, SUFFIX, QIPREFIX, and QISUFFIX are modified
to reflect the word part that is completed.
In all the above cases the return status is zero if the
test succeeded and the parameters were modified and
non-zero otherwise. This allows one to use this builtin
in tests such as:
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if compset -P '*\='; then ...
This forces anything up to and including the last equal
sign to be ignored by the completion code.
compcall [ -TD ]
This allows the use of completions defined with the
compctl builtin from within completion widgets. The
list of matches will be generated as if one of the
non-widget completion functions (complete-word, etc.)
had been called, except that only compctls given for
specific commands are used. To force the code to try
completions defined with the -T option of compctl
and/or the default completion (whether defined by com-
pctl -D or the builtin default) in the appropriate
places, the -T and/or -D flags can be passed to comp-
call.
The return status can be used to test if a matching
compctl definition was found. It is non-zero if a com-
pctl was found and zero otherwise.
Note that this builtin is defined by the zsh/compctl
module.
COMPLETION CONDITION CODES
The following additional condition codes for use within the
[[ ... ]] construct are available in completion widgets.
These work on the special parameters. All of these tests
can also be performed by the compset builtin, but in the
case of the condition codes the contents of the special
parameters are not modified.
-prefix [ number ] pattern
true if the test for the -P option of compset would
succeed.
-suffix [ number ] pattern
true if the test for the -S option of compset would
succeed.
-after beg-pat
true if the test of the -N option with only the beg-pat
given would succeed.
-between beg-pat end-pat
true if the test for the -N option with both patterns
would succeed.
COMPLETION MATCHING CONTROL
It is possible by use of the -M option of the compadd
builtin command to specify how the characters in the string
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to be completed (referred to here as the command line) map
onto the characters in the list of matches produced by the
completion code (referred to here as the trial completions).
Note that this is not used if the command line contains a
glob pattern and the GLOB_COMPLETE option is set or the pat-
tern_match of the compstate special association is set to a
non-empty string.
The match-spec given as the argument to the -M option (see
`Completion Builtin Commands' above) consists of one or more
matching descriptions separated by whitespace. Each
description consists of a letter followed by a colon and
then the patterns describing which character sequences on
the line match which character sequences in the trial com-
pletion. Any sequence of characters not handled in this
fashion must match exactly, as usual.
The forms of match-spec understood are as follows. In each
case, the form with an upper case initial character retains
the string already typed on the command line as the final
result of completion, while with a lower case initial char-
acter the string on the command line is changed into the
corresponding part of the trial completion.
m:lpat=tpat
M:lpat=tpat
Here, lpat is a pattern that matches on the command
line, corresponding to tpat which matches in the trial
completion.
l:lanchor|lpat=tpat
L:lanchor|lpat=tpat
l:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
L:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
b:lpat=tpat
B:lpat=tpat
These letters are for patterns that are anchored by
another pattern on the left side. Matching for lpat and
tpat is as for m and M, but the pattern lpat matched on
the command line must be preceded by the pattern lan-
chor. The lanchor can be blank to anchor the match to
the start of the command line string; otherwise the
anchor can occur anywhere, but must match in both the
command line and trial completion strings.
If no lpat is given but a ranchor is, this matches the
gap between substrings matched by lanchor and ranchor.
Unlike lanchor, the ranchor only needs to match the
trial completion string.
The b and B forms are similar to l and L with an empty
anchor, but need to match only the beginning of the
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trial completion or the word on the command line,
respectively.
r:lpat|ranchor=tpat
R:lpat|ranchor=tpat
r:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
R:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
e:lpat=tpat
E:lpat=tpat
As l, L, b and B, with the difference that the command
line and trial completion patterns are anchored on the
right side. Here an empty ranchor and the e and E
forms force the match to the end of the trial comple-
tion or command line string.
Each lpat, tpat or anchor is either an empty string or con-
sists of a sequence of literal characters (which may be
quoted with a backslash), question marks, character classes,
and correspondence classes; ordinary shell patterns are not
used. Literal characters match only themselves, question
marks match any character, and character classes are formed
as for globbing and match any character in the given set.
Correspondence classes are defined like character classes,
but with two differences: they are delimited by a pair of
braces, and negated classes are not allowed, so the charac-
ters ! and ^ have no special meaning directly after the
opening brace. They indicate that a range of characters on
the line match a range of characters in the trial comple-
tion, but (unlike ordinary character classes) paired accord-
ing to the corresponding position in the sequence. For
example, to make any ASCII lower case letter on the line
match the corresponding upper case letter in the trial com-
pletion, you can use `m:{a-z}={A-Z}' (however, see below for
the recommended form for this). More than one pair of
classes can occur, in which case the first class before the
= corresponds to the first after it, and so on. If one side
has more such classes than the other side, the superfluous
classes behave like normal character classes. In anchor
patterns correspondence classes also behave like normal
character classes.
The standard `[:name:]' forms described for standard shell
patterns, see the section FILENAME GENERATION in zshexpn(1),
may appear in correspondence classes as well as normal char-
acter classes. The only special behaviour in correspondence
classes is if the form on the left and the form on the right
are each one of [:upper:], [:lower:]. In these cases the
character in the word and the character on the line must be
the same up to a difference in case. Hence to make any
lower case character on the line match the corresponding
upper case character in the trial completion you can use
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`m:{[:lower:]}={[:upper:]}'. Although the matching system
does not yet handle multibyte characters, this is likely to
be a future extension, at which point this syntax will han-
dle arbitrary alphabets; hence this form, rather than the
use of explicit ranges, is the recommended form. In other
cases `[:name:]' forms are allowed. If the two forms on the
left and right are the same, the characters must match
exactly. In remaining cases, the corresponding tests are
applied to both characters, but they are not otherwise con-
strained; any matching character in one set goes with any
matching character in the other set: this is equivalent to
the behaviour of ordinary character classes.
The pattern tpat may also be one or two stars, `*' or `**'.
This means that the pattern on the command line can match
any number of characters in the trial completion. In this
case the pattern must be anchored (on either side); in the
case of a single star, the anchor then determines how much
of the trial completion is to be included -- only the char-
acters up to the next appearance of the anchor will be
matched. With two stars, substrings matched by the anchor
can be matched, too.
Examples:
The keys of the options association defined by the parameter
module are the option names in all-lower-case form, without
underscores, and without the optional no at the beginning
even though the builtins setopt and unsetopt understand
option names with upper case letters, underscores, and the
optional no. The following alters the matching rules so
that the prefix no and any underscore are ignored when try-
ing to match the trial completions generated and upper case
letters on the line match the corresponding lower case let-
ters in the words:
compadd -M 'L:|[nN][oO]= M:_= M:{[:upper:]}={[:lower:]}' - \
${(k)options}
The first part says that the pattern `[nN][oO]' at the
beginning (the empty anchor before the pipe symbol) of the
string on the line matches the empty string in the list of
words generated by completion, so it will be ignored if
present. The second part does the same for an underscore
anywhere in the command line string, and the third part uses
correspondence classes so that any upper case letter on the
line matches the corresponding lower case letter in the
word. The use of the upper case forms of the specification
characters (L and M) guarantees that what has already been
typed on the command line (in particular the prefix no) will
not be deleted.
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Note that the use of L in the first part means that it
matches only when at the beginning of both the command line
string and the trial completion. I.e., the string `_NO_f'
would not be completed to `_NO_foo', nor would `NONO_f' be
completed to `NONO_foo' because of the leading underscore or
the second `NO' on the line which makes the pattern fail
even though they are otherwise ignored. To fix this, one
would use `B:[nN][oO]=' instead of the first part. As
described above, this matches at the beginning of the trial
completion, independent of other characters or substrings at
the beginning of the command line word which are ignored by
the same or other match-specs.
The second example makes completion case insensitive. This
is just the same as in the option example, except here we
wish to retain the characters in the list of completions:
compadd -M 'm:{[:lower:]}={[:upper:]}' ...
This makes lower case letters match their upper case coun-
terparts. To make upper case letters match the lower case
forms as well:
compadd -M 'm:{[:lower:][:upper:]}={[:upper:][:lower:]}' ...
A nice example for the use of * patterns is partial word
completion. Sometimes you would like to make strings like
`c.s.u' complete to strings like `comp.source.unix', i.e.
the word on the command line consists of multiple parts,
separated by a dot in this example, where each part should
be completed separately -- note, however, that the case
where each part of the word, i.e. `comp', `source' and
`unix' in this example, is to be completed from separate
sets of matches is a different problem to be solved by the
implementation of the completion widget. The example can be
handled by:
compadd -M 'r:|.=* r:|=*' \
- comp.sources.unix comp.sources.misc ...
The first specification says that lpat is the empty string,
while anchor is a dot; tpat is *, so this can match anything
except for the `.' from the anchor in the trial completion
word. So in `c.s.u', the matcher sees `c', followed by the
empty string, followed by the anchor `.', and likewise for
the second dot, and replaces the empty strings before the
anchors, giving `c[omp].s[ources].u[nix]', where the last
part of the completion is just as normal.
With the pattern shown above, the string `c.u' could not be
completed to `comp.sources.unix' because the single star
means that no dot (matched by the anchor) can be skipped. By
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using two stars as in `r:|.=**', however, `c.u' could be
completed to `comp.sources.unix'. This also shows that in
some cases, especially if the anchor is a real pattern, like
a character class, the form with two stars may result in
more matches than one would like.
The second specification is needed to make this work when
the cursor is in the middle of the string on the command
line and the option COMPLETE_IN_WORD is set. In this case
the completion code would normally try to match trial com-
pletions that end with the string as typed so far, i.e. it
will only insert new characters at the cursor position
rather than at the end. However in our example we would
like the code to recognise matches which contain extra char-
acters after the string on the line (the `nix' in the exam-
ple). Hence we say that the empty string at the end of the
string on the line matches any characters at the end of the
trial completion.
More generally, the specification
compadd -M 'r:|[.,_-]=* r:|=*' ...
allows one to complete words with abbreviations before any
of the characters in the square brackets. For example, to
complete veryverylongfile.c rather than veryverylongheader.h
with the above in effect, you can just type very.c before
attempting completion.
The specifications with both a left and a right anchor are
useful to complete partial words whose parts are not sepa-
rated by some special character. For example, in some places
strings have to be completed that are formed `LikeThis'
(i.e. the separate parts are determined by a leading upper
case letter) or maybe one has to complete strings with
trailing numbers. Here one could use the simple form with
only one anchor as in:
compadd -M 'r:|[[:upper:]0-9]=* r:|=*' LikeTHIS FooHoo 5foo123 5bar234
But with this, the string `H' would neither complete to
`FooHoo' nor to `LikeTHIS' because in each case there is an
upper case letter before the `H' and that is matched by the
anchor. Likewise, a `2' would not be completed. In both
cases this could be changed by using `r:|[[:upper:]0-9]=**',
but then `H' completes to both `LikeTHIS' and `FooHoo' and a
`2' matches the other strings because characters can be
inserted before every upper case letter and digit. To avoid
this one would use:
compadd -M 'r:[^[:upper:]0-9]||[[:upper:]0-9]=** r:|=*' \
LikeTHIS FooHoo foo123 bar234
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By using these two anchors, a `H' matches only upper case
`H's that are immediately preceded by something matching the
left anchor `[^[:upper:]0-9]'. The effect is, of course,
that `H' matches only the string `FooHoo', a `2' matches
only `bar234' and so on.
When using the completion system (see zshcompsys(1)), users
can define match specifications that are to be used for spe-
cific contexts by using the matcher and matcher-list styles.
The values for the latter will be used everywhere.
COMPLETION WIDGET EXAMPLE
The first step is to define the widget:
zle -C complete complete-word complete-files
Then the widget can be bound to a key using the bindkey
builtin command:
bindkey '^X\t' complete
After that the shell function complete-files will be invoked
after typing control-X and TAB. The function should then
generate the matches, e.g.:
complete-files () { compadd - * }
This function will complete files in the current directory
matching the current word.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
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NAME
zshcompsys - zsh completion system
DESCRIPTION
This describes the shell code for the `new' completion sys-
tem, referred to as compsys. It is written in shell func-
tions based on the features described in zshcompwid(1).
The features are contextual, sensitive to the point at which
completion is started. Many completions are already pro-
vided. For this reason, a user can perform a great many
tasks without knowing any details beyond how to initialize
the system, which is described below in INITIALIZATION.
The context that decides what completion is to be performed
may be
o an argument or option position: these describe the
position on the command line at which completion is
requested. For example `first argument to rmdir, the
word being completed names a directory';
o a special context, denoting an element in the shell's
syntax. For example `a word in command position' or
`an array subscript'.
A full context specification contains other elements, as we
shall describe.
Besides commands names and contexts, the system employs two
more concepts, styles and tags. These provide ways for the
user to configure the system's behaviour.
Tags play a dual role. They serve as a classification sys-
tem for the matches, typically indicating a class of object
that the user may need to distinguish. For example, when
completing arguments of the ls command the user may prefer
to try files before directories, so both of these are tags.
They also appear as the rightmost element in a context spec-
ification.
Styles modify various operations of the completion system,
such as output formatting, but also what kinds of completers
are used (and in what order), or which tags are examined.
Styles may accept arguments and are manipulated using the
zstyle command described in see zshmodules(1).
In summary, tags describe what the completion objects are,
and style how they are to be completed. At various points
of execution, the completion system checks what styles
and/or tags are defined for the current context, and uses
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that to modify its behavior. The full description of con-
text handling, which determines how tags and other elements
of the context influence the behaviour of styles, is
described below in COMPLETION SYSTEM CONFIGURATION.
When a completion is requested, a dispatcher function is
called; see the description of _main_complete in the list of
control functions below. This dispatcher decides which func-
tion should be called to produce the completions, and calls
it. The result is passed to one or more completers, func-
tions that implement individual completion strategies: sim-
ple completion, error correction, completion with error cor-
rection, menu selection, etc.
More generally, the shell functions contained in the comple-
tion system are of two types:
o those beginning `comp' are to be called directly; there
are only a few of these;
o those beginning `_' are called by the completion code.
The shell functions of this set, which implement com-
pletion behaviour and may be bound to keystrokes, are
referred to as `widgets'. These proliferate as new
completions are required.
INITIALIZATION
If the system was installed completely, it should be enough
to call the shell function compinit from your initialization
file; see the next section. However, the function compin-
stall can be run by a user to configure various aspects of
the completion system.
Usually, compinstall will insert code into .zshrc, although
if that is not writable it will save it in another file and
tell you that file's location. Note that it is up to you to
make sure that the lines added to .zshrc are actually run;
you may, for example, need to move them to an earlier place
in the file if .zshrc usually returns early. So long as you
keep them all together (including the comment lines at the
start and finish), you can rerun compinstall and it will
correctly locate and modify these lines. Note, however,
that any code you add to this section by hand is likely to
be lost if you rerun compinstall, although lines using the
command `zstyle' should be gracefully handled.
The new code will take effect next time you start the shell,
or run .zshrc by hand; there is also an option to make them
take effect immediately. However, if compinstall has
removed definitions, you will need to restart the shell to
see the changes.
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To run compinstall you will need to make sure it is in a
directory mentioned in your fpath parameter, which should
already be the case if zsh was properly configured as long
as your startup files do not remove the appropriate directo-
ries from fpath. Then it must be autoloaded (`autoload -U
compinstall' is recommended). You can abort the installa-
tion any time you are being prompted for information, and
your .zshrc will not be altered at all; changes only take
place right at the end, where you are specifically asked for
confirmation.
Use of compinit
This section describes the use of compinit to initialize
completion for the current session when called directly; if
you have run compinstall it will be called automatically
from your .zshrc.
To initialize the system, the function compinit should be in
a directory mentioned in the fpath parameter, and should be
autoloaded (`autoload -U compinit' is recommended), and then
run simply as `compinit'. This will define a few utility
functions, arrange for all the necessary shell functions to
be autoloaded, and will then re-define all widgets that do
completion to use the new system. If you use the
menu-select widget, which is part of the zsh/complist mod-
ule, you should make sure that that module is loaded before
the call to compinit so that that widget is also re-defined.
If completion styles (see below) are set up to perform
expansion as well as completion by default, and the TAB key
is bound to expand-or-complete, compinit will rebind it to
complete-word; this is necessary to use the correct form of
expansion.
Should you need to use the original completion commands, you
can still bind keys to the old widgets by putting a `.' in
front of the widget name, e.g. `.expand-or-complete'.
To speed up the running of compinit, it can be made to pro-
duce a dumped configuration that will be read in on future
invocations; this is the default, but can be turned off by
calling compinit with the option -D. The dumped file is
.zcompdump in the same directory as the startup files (i.e.
$ZDOTDIR or $HOME); alternatively, an explicit file name can
be given by `compinit -d dumpfile'. The next invocation of
compinit will read the dumped file instead of performing a
full initialization.
If the number of completion files changes, compinit will
recognise this and produce a new dump file. However, if the
name of a function or the arguments in the first line of a
#compdef function (as described below) change, it is easiest
to delete the dump file by hand so that compinit will
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re-create it the next time it is run. The check performed
to see if there are new functions can be omitted by giving
the option -C. In this case the dump file will only be cre-
ated if there isn't one already.
The dumping is actually done by another function, compdump,
but you will only need to run this yourself if you change
the configuration (e.g. using compdef) and then want to dump
the new one. The name of the old dumped file will be remem-
bered for this purpose.
If the parameter _compdir is set, compinit uses it as a
directory where completion functions can be found; this is
only necessary if they are not already in the function
search path.
For security reasons compinit also checks if the completion
system would use files not owned by root or by the current
user, or files in directories that are world- or
group-writable or that are not owned by root or by the cur-
rent user. If such files or directories are found, compinit
will ask if the completion system should really be used. To
avoid these tests and make all files found be used without
asking, use the option -u, and to make compinit silently
ignore all insecure files and directories use the option -i.
This security check is skipped entirely when the -C option
is given.
The security check can be retried at any time by running the
function compaudit. This is the same check used by
compinit, but when it is executed directly any changes to
fpath are made local to the function so they do not persist.
The directories to be checked may be passed as arguments; if
none are given, compaudit uses fpath and _compdir to find
completion system directories, adding missing ones to fpath
as necessary. To force a check of exactly the directories
currently named in fpath, set _compdir to an empty string
before calling compaudit or compinit.
The function bashcompinit provides compatibility with bash's
programmable completion system. When run it will define the
functions, compgen and complete which correspond to the bash
builtins with the same names. It will then be possible to
use completion specifications and functions written for
bash.
Autoloaded files
The convention for autoloaded functions used in completion
is that they start with an underscore; as already mentioned,
the fpath/FPATH parameter must contain the directory in
which they are stored. If zsh was properly installed on
your system, then fpath/FPATH automatically contains the
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required directories for the standard functions.
For incomplete installations, if compinit does not find
enough files beginning with an underscore (fewer than
twenty) in the search path, it will try to find more by
adding the directory _compdir to the search path. If that
directory has a subdirectory named Base, all subdirectories
will be added to the path. Furthermore, if the subdirectory
Base has a subdirectory named Core, compinit will add all
subdirectories of the subdirectories is to the path: this
allows the functions to be in the same format as in the zsh
source distribution.
When compinit is run, it searches all such files accessible
via fpath/FPATH and reads the first line of each of them.
This line should contain one of the tags described below.
Files whose first line does not start with one of these tags
are not considered to be part of the completion system and
will not be treated specially.
The tags are:
#compdef names... [ -[pP] patterns... [ -N names... ] ]
The file will be made autoloadable and the function
defined in it will be called when completing names,
each of which is either the name of a command whose
arguments are to be completed or one of a number of
special contexts in the form -context- described below.
Each name may also be of the form `cmd=service'. When
completing the command cmd, the function typically
behaves as if the command (or special context) service
was being completed instead. This provides a way of
altering the behaviour of functions that can perform
many different completions. It is implemented by set-
ting the parameter $service when calling the function;
the function may choose to interpret this how it
wishes, and simpler functions will probably ignore it.
If the #compdef line contains one of the options -p or
-P, the words following are taken to be patterns. The
function will be called when completion is attempted
for a command or context that matches one of the pat-
terns. The options -p and -P are used to specify pat-
terns to be tried before or after other completions
respectively. Hence -P may be used to specify default
actions.
The option -N is used after a list following -p or -P;
it specifies that remaining words no longer define pat-
terns. It is possible to toggle between the three
options as many times as necessary.
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#compdef -k style key-sequences...
This option creates a widget behaving like the builtin
widget style and binds it to the given key-sequences,
if any. The style must be one of the builtin widgets
that perform completion, namely complete-word,
delete-char-or-list, expand-or-complete, expand-or-com-
plete-prefix, list-choices, menu-complete,
menu-expand-or-complete, or reverse-menu-complete. If
the zsh/complist module is loaded (see zshmodules(1))
the widget menu-select is also available.
When one of the key-sequences is typed, the function in
the file will be invoked to generate the matches. Note
that a key will not be re-bound if it already was (that
is, was bound to something other than undefined-key).
The widget created has the same name as the file and
can be bound to any other keys using bindkey as usual.
#compdef -K widget-name style key-sequences ...
This is similar to -k except that only one
key-sequences argument may be given for each wid-
get-name style pair. However, the entire set of three
arguments may be repeated with a different set of argu-
ments. Note in particular that the widget-name must be
distinct in each set. If it does not begin with `_'
this will be added. The widget-name should not clash
with the name of any existing widget: names based on
the name of the function are most useful. For example,
#compdef -K _foo_complete complete-word "^X^C" \
_foo_list list-choices "^X^D"
(all on one line) defines a widget _foo_complete for
completion, bound to `^X^C', and a widget _foo_list for
listing, bound to `^X^D'.
#autoload [ options ]
Functions with the #autoload tag are marked for
autoloading but are not otherwise treated specially.
Typically they are to be called from within one of the
completion functions. Any options supplied will be
passed to the autoload builtin; a typical use is +X to
force the function to be loaded immediately. Note that
the -U and -z flags are always added implicitly.
The # is part of the tag name and no white space is allowed
after it. The #compdef tags use the compdef function
described below; the main difference is that the name of the
function is supplied implicitly.
The special contexts for which completion functions can be
defined are:
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-array-value-
The right hand side of an array-assignment
(`foo=(...)')
-brace-parameter-
The name of a parameter expansion within braces
(`${...}')
-assign-parameter-
The name of a parameter in an assignment, i.e. on the
left hand side of an `='
-command-
A word in command position
-condition-
A word inside a condition (`[[...]]')
-default-
Any word for which no other completion is defined
-equal-
A word beginning with an equals sign
-first-
This is tried before any other completion function.
The function called may set the _compskip parameter to
one of various values: all: no further completion is
attempted; a string containing the substring patterns:
no pattern completion functions will be called; a
string containing default: the function for the
`-default-' context will not be called, but functions
defined for commands will
-math-
Inside mathematical contexts, such as `((...))'
-parameter-
The name of a parameter expansion (`$...')
-redirect-
The word after a redirection operator.
-subscript-
The contents of a parameter subscript.
-tilde-
After an initial tilde (`~'), but before the first
slash in the word.
-value-
On the right hand side of an assignment.
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Default implementations are supplied for each of these con-
texts. In most cases the context -context- is implemented
by a corresponding function _context, for example the con-
text `-tilde-' and the function `_tilde').
The contexts -redirect- and -value- allow extra context-spe-
cific information. (Internally, this is handled by the
functions for each context calling the function _dispatch.)
The extra information is added separated by commas.
For the -redirect- context, the extra information is in the
form `-redirect-,op,command', where op is the redirection
operator and command is the name of the command on the line.
If there is no command on the line yet, the command field
will be empty.
For the -value- context, the form is `-value-,name,command',
where name is the name of the parameter. In the case of
elements of an associative array, for example `assoc=(key
<TAB>', name is expanded to `name-key'. In certain special
contexts, such as completing after `make CFLAGS=', the com-
mand part gives the name of the command, here make; other-
wise it is empty.
It is not necessary to define fully specific completions as
the functions provided will try to generate completions by
progressively replacing the elements with `-default-'. For
example, when completing after `foo=<TAB>', _value will try
the names `-value-,foo,' (note the empty command part),
`-value-,foo,-default-' and`-value-,-default-,-default-', in
that order, until it finds a function to handle the context.
As an example:
compdef '_files -g "*.log"' '-redirect-,2>,-default-'
completes files matching `*.log' after `2> <TAB>' for any
command with no more specific handler defined.
Also:
compdef _foo -value-,-default-,-default-
specifies that _foo provides completions for the values of
parameters for which no special function has been defined.
This is usually handled by the function _value itself.
The same lookup rules are used when looking up styles (as
described below); for example
zstyle ':completion:*:*:-redirect-,2>,*:*' file-patterns '*.log'
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is another way to make completion after `2> <TAB>' complete
files matching `*.log'.
Functions
The following function is defined by compinit and may be
called directly.
names... ] ]
compdef [ -ane ] function names... [ -[pP] patterns...
[ -N
compdef -d names...
compdef -k [ -an ] function style key-sequences...
compdef -K [ -an ] function name style key-sequences ...
The first form defines the function to call for comple-
tion in the given contexts as described for the #com-
pdef tag above.
Alternatively, all the arguments may have the form
`cmd=service'. Here service should already have been
defined by `cmd1=service' lines in #compdef files, as
described above. The argument for cmd will be com-
pleted in the same way as service.
The function argument may alternatively be a string
containing almost any shell code. If the string con-
tains an equal sign, the above will take precedence.
The option -e may be used to specify the first argument
is to be evaluated as shell code even if it contains an
equal sign. The string will be executed using the eval
builtin command to generate completions. This provides
a way of avoiding having to define a new completion
function. For example, to complete files ending in
`.h' as arguments to the command foo:
compdef '_files -g "*.h"' foo
The option -n prevents any completions already defined
for the command or context from being overwritten.
The option -d deletes any completion defined for the
command or contexts listed.
The names may also contain -p, -P and -N options as
described for the #compdef tag. The effect on the
argument list is identical, switching between defini-
tions of patterns tried initially, patterns tried
finally, and normal commands and contexts.
The parameter $_compskip may be set by any function
defined for a pattern context. If it is set to a value
containing the substring `patterns' none of the pat-
tern-functions will be called; if it is set to a value
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containing the substring `all', no other function will
be called.
The form with -k defines a widget with the same name as
the function that will be called for each of the
key-sequences; this is like the #compdef -k tag. The
function should generate the completions needed and
will otherwise behave like the builtin widget whose
name is given as the style argument. The widgets
usable for this are: complete-word,
delete-char-or-list, expand-or-complete, expand-or-com-
plete-prefix, list-choices, menu-complete,
menu-expand-or-complete, and reverse-menu-complete, as
well as menu-select if the zsh/complist module is
loaded. The option -n prevents the key being bound if
it is already to bound to something other than unde-
fined-key.
The form with -K is similar and defines multiple wid-
gets based on the same function, each of which requires
the set of three arguments name, style and
key-sequences, where the latter two are as for -k and
the first must be a unique widget name beginning with
an underscore.
Wherever applicable, the -a option makes the function
autoloadable, equivalent to autoload -U function.
The function compdef can be used to associate existing com-
pletion functions with new commands. For example,
compdef _pids foo
uses the function _pids to complete process IDs for the com-
mand foo.
Note also the _gnu_generic function described below, which
can be used to complete options for commands that understand
the `--help' option.
COMPLETION SYSTEM CONFIGURATION
This section gives a short overview of how the completion
system works, and then more detail on how users can config-
ure how and when matches are generated.
Overview
When completion is attempted somewhere on the command line
the completion system first works out the context. This
takes account of a number of things including the command
word (such as `grep' or `zsh') and options to which the cur-
rent word may be an argument (such as the `-o' option to zsh
which takes a shell option as an argument).
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This context information is condensed into a string consist-
ing of multiple fields separated by colons, referred to sim-
ply as `the context' in the remainder of the documentation.
This is used to look up styles, context-sensitive options
that can be used to configure the completion system. The
context used for lookup may vary during the same call to the
completion system.
The context string always consists of a fixed set of fields,
separated by colons and with a leading colon before the
first, in the form :completion:function:completer:com-
mand:argument:tag. These have the following meaning:
o The literal string completion, saying that this style
is used by the completion system. This distinguishes
the context from those used by, for example, zle wid-
gets and ZFTP functions.
o The function, if completion is called from a named wid-
get rather than through the normal completion system.
Typically this is blank, but it is set by special wid-
gets such as predict-on and the various functions in
the Widget directory of the distribution to the name of
that function, often in an abbreviated form.
o The completer currently active, the name of the func-
tion without the leading underscore and with other
underscores converted to hyphens. A `completer' is in
overall control of how completion is to be performed;
`complete' is the simplest, but other completers exist
to perform related tasks such as correction, or to mod-
ify the behaviour of a later completer. See the sec-
tion `Control Functions' below for more information.
o The command or a special -context-, just at it appears
following the #compdef tag or the compdef function.
Completion functions for commands that have sub-com-
mands usually modify this field to contain the name of
the command followed by a minus sign and the sub-com-
mand. For example, the completion function for the cvs
command sets this field to cvs-add when completing
arguments to the add subcommand.
o The argument; this indicates which command line or
option argument we are completing. For command argu-
ments this generally takes the form argument-n, where n
is the number of the argument, and for arguments to
options the form option-opt-n where n is the number of
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the argument to option opt. However, this is only the
case if the command line is parsed with standard
UNIX-style options and arguments, so many completions
do not set this.
o The tag. As described previously, tags are used to
discriminate between the types of matches a completion
function can generate in a certain context. Any com-
pletion function may use any tag name it likes, but a
list of the more common ones is given below.
The context is gradually put together as the functions are
executed, starting with the main entry point, which adds
:completion: and the function element if necessary. The
completer then adds the completer element. The contextual
completion adds the command and argument options. Finally,
the tag is added when the types of completion are known.
For example, the context name
:completion::complete:dvips:option-o-1:files
says that normal completion was attempted as the first argu-
ment to the option -o of the command dvips:
dvips -o ...
and the completion function will generate filenames.
Usually completion will be tried for all possible tags in an
order given by the completion function. However, this can
be altered by using the tag-order style. Completion is then
restricted to the list of given tags in the given order.
The _complete_help bindable command shows all the contexts
and tags available for completion at a particular point.
This provides an easy way of finding information for
tag-order and other styles. It is described in the section
`Bindable Commands' below.
Styles determine such things as how the matches are gener-
ated, similarly to shell options but with much more control.
They can have any number of strings as their value. They
are defined with the zstyle builtin command (see zshmod-
ules(1)).
When looking up styles the completion system uses full con-
text names, including the tag. Looking up the value of a
style therefore consists of two things: the context, which
may be matched as a pattern, and the name of the style
itself, which must be given exactly.
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For example, many completion functions can generate matches
in a simple and a verbose form and use the verbose style to
decide which form should be used. To make all such func-
tions use the verbose form, put
zstyle ':completion:*' verbose yes
in a startup file (probably .zshrc). This gives the verbose
style the value yes in every context inside the completion
system, unless that context has a more specific definition.
It is best to avoid giving the context as `*' in case the
style has some meaning outside the completion system.
Many such general purpose styles can be configured simply by
using the compinstall function.
A more specific example of the use of the verbose style is
by the completion for the kill builtin. If the style is
set, the builtin lists full job texts and process command
lines; otherwise it shows the bare job numbers and PIDs. To
turn the style off for this use only:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:kill:*' verbose no
For even more control, the style can use one of the tags
`jobs' or `processes'. To turn off verbose display only for
jobs:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:kill:*:jobs' verbose no
The -e option to zstyle even allows completion function code
to appear as the argument to a style; this requires some
understanding of the internals of completion functions (see
see zshcompwid(1))). For example,
zstyle -e ':completion:*' hosts 'reply=($myhosts)'
This forces the value of the hosts style to be read from the
variable myhosts each time a host name is needed; this is
useful if the value of myhosts can change dynamically. For
another useful example, see the example in the description
of the file-list style below. This form can be slow and
should be avoided for commonly examined styles such as menu
and list-rows-first.
Note that the order in which styles are defined does not
matter; the style mechanism uses the most specific possible
match for a particular style to determine the set of values.
More precisely, strings are preferred over patterns (for
example, `:completion::complete:foo' is more specific than
`:completion::complete:*'), and longer patterns are pre-
ferred over shorter patterns.
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Style names like those of tags are arbitrary and depend on
the completion function. However, the following two sec-
tions list some of the most common tags and styles.
Standard Tags
Some of the following are only used when looking up particu-
lar styles and do not refer to a type of match.
accounts
used to look up the users-hosts style
all-expansions
used by the _expand completer when adding the single
string containing all possible expansions
all-files
for the names of all files (as distinct from a particu-
lar subset, see the globbed-files tag).
arguments
for arguments to a command
arrays
for names of array parameters
association-keys
for keys of associative arrays; used when completing
inside a subscript to a parameter of this type
bookmarks
when completing bookmarks (e.g. for URLs and the zftp
function suite)
builtins
for names of builtin commands
characters
for single characters in arguments of commands such as
stty. Also used when completing character classes
after an opening bracket
colormapids
for X colormap ids
colors
for color names
commands
for names of external commands. Also used by complex
commands such as cvs when completing names subcommands.
contexts
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for contexts in arguments to the zstyle builtin command
corrections
used by the _approximate and _correct completers for
possible corrections
cursors
for cursor names used by X programs
default
used in some contexts to provide a way of supplying a
default when more specific tags are also valid. Note
that this tag is used when only the function field of
the context name is set
descriptions
used when looking up the value of the format style to
generate descriptions for types of matches
devices
for names of device special files
directories
for names of directories -- local-directories is used
instead when completing arguments of cd and related
builtin commands when the cdpath array is set
directory-stack
for entries in the directory stack
displays
for X display names
domains
for network domains
expansions
used by the _expand completer for individual words (as
opposed to the complete set of expansions) resulting
from the expansion of a word on the command line
extensions
for X server extensions
file-descriptors
for numbers of open file descriptors
files
the generic file-matching tag used by functions com-
pleting filenames
fonts
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for X font names
fstypes
for file system types (e.g. for the mount command)
functions
names of functions -- normally shell functions,
although certain commands may understand other kinds of
function
globbed-files
for filenames when the name has been generated by pat-
tern matching
groups
for names of user groups
history-words
for words from the history
hosts
for hostnames
indexes
for array indexes
jobs for jobs (as listed by the `jobs' builtin)
interfaces
for network interfaces
keymaps
for names of zsh keymaps
keysyms
for names of X keysyms
libraries
for names of system libraries
limits
for system limits
local-directories
for names of directories that are subdirectories of the
current working directory when completing arguments of
cd and related builtin commands (compare path-directo-
ries) -- when the cdpath array is unset, directories is
used instead
manuals
for names of manual pages
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mailboxes
for e-mail folders
maps for map names (e.g. NIS maps)
messages
used to look up the format style for messages
modifiers
for names of X modifiers
modules
for modules (e.g. zsh modules)
my-accounts
used to look up the users-hosts style
named-directories
for named directories (you wouldn't have guessed that,
would you?)
names
for all kinds of names
newsgroups
for USENET groups
nicknames
for nicknames of NIS maps
options
for command options
original
used by the _approximate, _correct and _expand com-
pleters when offering the original string as a match
other-accounts
used to look up the users-hosts style
other-files
for the names of any non-directory files. This is used
instead of all-files when the list-dirs-first style is
in effect.
packages
for packages (e.g. rpm or installed Debian packages)
parameters
for names of parameters
path-directories
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for names of directories found by searching the cdpath
array when completing arguments of cd and related
builtin commands (compare local-directories)
paths
used to look up the values of the expand, ambiguous and
special-dirs styles
pods for perl pods (documentation files)
ports
for communication ports
prefixes
for prefixes (like those of a URL)
printers
for print queue names
processes
for process identifiers
processes-names
used to look up the command style when generating the
names of processes for killall
sequences
for sequences (e.g. mh sequences)
sessions
for sessions in the zftp function suite
signals
for signal names
strings
for strings (e.g. the replacement strings for the cd
builtin command)
styles
for styles used by the zstyle builtin command
suffixes
for filename extensions
tags for tags (e.g. rpm tags)
targets
for makefile targets
time-zones
for time zones (e.g. when setting the TZ parameter)
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types
for types of whatever (e.g. address types for the xhost
command)
urls used to look up the urls and local styles when complet-
ing URLs
users
for usernames
values
for one of a set of values in certain lists
variant
used by _pick_variant to look up the command to run
when determining what program is installed for a par-
ticular command name.
visuals
for X visuals
warnings
used to look up the format style for warnings
widgets
for zsh widget names
windows
for IDs of X windows
zsh-options
for shell options
Standard Styles
Note that the values of several of these styles represent
boolean values. Any of the strings `true', `on', `yes', and
`1' can be used for the value `true' and any of the strings
`false', `off', `no', and `0' for the value `false'. The
behavior for any other value is undefined except where
explicitly mentioned. The default value may be either true
or false if the style is not set.
Some of these styles are tested first for every possible tag
corresponding to a type of match, and if no style was found,
for the default tag. The most notable styles of this type
are menu, list-colors and styles controlling completion
listing such as list-packed and last-prompt. When tested
for the default tag, only the function field of the context
will be set so that a style using the default tag will nor-
mally be defined along the lines of:
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zstyle ':completion:*:default' menu ...
accept-exact
This is tested for the default tag in addition to the
tags valid for the current context. If it is set to
`true' and any of the trial matches is the same as the
string on the command line, this match will immediately
be accepted (even if it would otherwise be considered
ambiguous).
When completing pathnames (where the tag used is
`paths') this style accepts any number of patterns as
the value in addition to the boolean values. Pathnames
matching one of these patterns will be accepted immedi-
ately even if the command line contains some more par-
tially typed pathname components and these match no
file under the directory accepted.
This style is also used by the _expand completer to
decide if words beginning with a tilde or parameter
expansion should be expanded. For example, if there
are parameters foo and foobar, the string `$foo' will
only be expanded if accept-exact is set to `true'; oth-
erwise the completion system will be allowed to com-
plete $foo to $foobar. If the style is set to `con-
tinue', _expand will add the expansion as a match and
the completion system will also be allowed to continue.
accept-exact-dirs
This is used by filename completion. Unlike
accept-exact it is a boolean. By default, filename
completion examines all components of a path to see if
there are completions of that component, even if the
component matches an existing directory. For example,
when completion after /usr/bin/, the function examines
possible completions to /usr.
When this style is true, any prefix of a path that
matches an existing directory is accepted without any
attempt to complete it further. Hence, in the given
example, the path /usr/bin/ is accepted immediately and
completion tried in that directory.
If you wish to inhibit this behaviour entirely, set the
path-completion style (see below) to false.
add-space
This style is used by the _expand completer. If it is
true (the default), a space will be inserted after all
words resulting from the expansion, or a slash in the
case of directory names. If the value is `file', the
completer will only add a space to names of existing
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files. Either a boolean true or the value `file' may
be combined with `subst', in which case the completer
will not add a space to words generated from the expan-
sion of a substitution of the form `$(...)' or
`${...}'.
The _prefix completer uses this style as a simple
boolean value to decide if a space should be inserted
before the suffix.
ambiguous
This applies when completing non-final components of
filename paths, in other words those with a trailing
slash. If it is set, the cursor is left after the
first ambiguous component, even if menu completion is
in use. The style is always tested with the paths tag.
assign-list
When completing after an equals sign that is being
treated as an assignment, the completion system nor-
mally completes only one filename. In some cases the
value may be a list of filenames separated by colons,
as with PATH and similar parameters. This style can be
set to a list of patterns matching the names of such
parameters.
The default is to complete lists when the word on the
line already contains a colon.
auto-description
If set, this style's value will be used as the descrip-
tion for options that are not described by the comple-
tion functions, but that have exactly one argument.
The sequence `%d' in the value will be replaced by the
description for this argument. Depending on personal
preferences, it may be useful to set this style to
something like `specify: %d'. Note that this may not
work for some commands.
avoid-completer
This is used by the _all_matches completer to decide if
the string consisting of all matches should be added to
the list currently being generated. Its value is a
list of names of completers. If any of these is the
name of the completer that generated the matches in
this completion, the string will not be added.
The default value for this style is `_expand _old_list
_correct _approximate', i.e. it contains the completers
for which a string with all matches will almost never
be wanted.
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cache-path
This style defines the path where any cache files con-
taining dumped completion data are stored. It defaults
to `$ZDOTDIR/.zcompcache', or `$HOME/.zcompcache' if
$ZDOTDIR is not defined. The completion cache will not
be used unless the use-cache style is set.
cache-policy
This style defines the function that will be used to
determine whether a cache needs rebuilding. See the
section on the _cache_invalid function below.
call-command
This style is used in the function for commands such as
make and ant where calling the command directly to gen-
erate matches suffers problems such as being slow or,
as in the case of make can potentially cause actions in
the makefile to be executed. If it is set to `true' the
command is called to generate matches. The default
value of this style is `false'.
command
In many places, completion functions need to call
external commands to generate the list of completions.
This style can be used to override the command that is
called in some such cases. The elements of the value
are joined with spaces to form a command line to exe-
cute. The value can also start with a hyphen, in which
case the usual command will be added to the end; this
is most useful for putting `builtin' or `command' in
front to make sure the appropriate version of a command
is called, for example to avoid calling a shell func-
tion with the same name as an external command.
As an example, the completion function for process IDs
uses this style with the processes tag to generate the
IDs to complete and the list of processes to display
(if the verbose style is `true'). The list produced by
the command should look like the output of the ps com-
mand. The first line is not displayed, but is searched
for the string `PID' (or `pid') to find the position of
the process IDs in the following lines. If the line
does not contain `PID', the first numbers in each of
the other lines are taken as the process IDs to com-
plete.
Note that the completion function generally has to call
the specified command for each attempt to generate the
completion list. Hence care should be taken to specify
only commands that take a short time to run, and in
particular to avoid any that may never terminate.
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command-path
This is a list of directories to search for commands to
complete. The default for this style is the value of
the special parameter path.
commands
This is used by the function completing sub-commands
for the system initialisation scripts (residing in
/etc/init.d or somewhere not too far away from that).
Its values give the default commands to complete for
those commands for which the completion function isn't
able to find them out automatically. The default for
this style are the two strings `start' and `stop'.
complete
This is used by the _expand_alias function when invoked
as a bindable command. If set to `true' and the word
on the command line is not the name of an alias, match-
ing alias names will be completed.
complete-options
This is used by the completer for cd, chdir and pushd.
For these commands a - is used to introduce a directory
stack entry and completion of these is far more common
than completing options. Hence unless the value of
this style is true options will not be completed, even
after an initial -. If it is true, options will be
completed after an initial - unless there is a preced-
ing -- on the command line.
completer
The strings given as the value of this style provide
the names of the completer functions to use. The avail-
able completer functions are described in the section
`Control Functions' below.
Each string may be either the name of a completer func-
tion or a string of the form `function:name'. In the
first case the completer field of the context will con-
tain the name of the completer without the leading
underscore and with all other underscores replaced by
hyphens. In the second case the function is the name
of the completer to call, but the context will contain
the user-defined name in the completer field of the
context. If the name starts with a hyphen, the string
for the context will be build from the name of the com-
pleter function as in the first case with the name
appended to it. For example:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete _complete:-foo
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Here, completion will call the _complete completer
twice, once using `complete' and once using `com-
plete-foo' in the completer field of the context. Nor-
mally, using the same completer more than once only
makes sense when used with the `functions:name' form,
because otherwise the context name will be the same in
all calls to the completer; possible exceptions to this
rule are the _ignored and _prefix completers.
The default value for this style is `_complete
_ignored': only completion will be done, first using
the ignored-patterns style and the $fignore array and
then without ignoring matches.
condition
This style is used by the _list completer function to
decide if insertion of matches should be delayed uncon-
ditionally. The default is `true'.
delimiters
This style is used when adding a delimiter for use with
history modifiers or glob qualifiers that have delim-
ited arguments. It is an array of preferred delimiters
to add. Non-special characters are preferred as the
completion system may otherwise become confused. The
default list is :, +, /, -, %. The list may be empty
to force a delimiter to be typed.
disabled
If this is set to `true', the _expand_alias completer
and bindable command will try to expand disabled
aliases, too. The default is `false'.
domains
A list of names of network domains for completion. If
this is not set, domain names will be taken from the
file /etc/resolv.conf.
environ
The environ style is used when completing for `sudo'.
It is set to an array of `VAR=value' assignments to be
exported into the local environment before the comple-
tion for the target command is invoked.
zstyle ':completion:*:sudo::' environ \
PATH="/sbin:/usr/sbin:$PATH" HOME="/root"
expand
This style is used when completing strings consisting
of multiple parts, such as path names.
If one of its values is the string `prefix', the par-
tially typed word from the line will be expanded as far
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as possible even if trailing parts cannot be completed.
If one of its values is the string `suffix', matching
names for components after the first ambiguous one will
also be added. This means that the resulting string is
the longest unambiguous string possible. However, menu
completion can be used to cycle through all matches.
fake This style may be set for any completion context. It
specifies additional strings that will always be com-
pleted in that context. The form of each string is
`value:description'; the colon and description may be
omitted, but any literal colons in value must be quoted
with a backslash. Any description provided is shown
alongside the value in completion listings.
It is important to use a sufficiently restrictive con-
text when specifying fake strings. Note that the
styles fake-files and fake-parameters provide addi-
tional features when completing files or parameters.
fake-always
This works identically to the fake style except that
the ignored-patterns style is not applied to it. This
makes it possible to override a set of matches com-
pletely by setting the ignored patterns to `*'.
The following shows a way of supplementing any tag with
arbitrary data, but having it behave for display pur-
poses like a separate tag. In this example we use the
features of the tag-order style to divide the
named-directories tag into two when performing comple-
tion with the standard completer complete for arguments
of cd. The tag named-directories-normal behaves as
normal, but the tag named-directories-mine contains a
fixed set of directories. This has the effect of
adding the match group `extra directories' with the
given completions.
zstyle ':completion::complete:cd:*' tag-order \
'named-directories:-mine:extra\ directories
named-directories:-normal:named\ directories *'
zstyle ':completion::complete:cd:*:named-directories-mine' \
fake-always mydir1 mydir2
zstyle ':completion::complete:cd:*:named-directories-mine' \
ignored-patterns '*'
fake-files
This style is used when completing files and looked up
without a tag. Its values are of the form
`dir:names...'. This will add the names (strings sepa-
rated by spaces) as possible matches when completing in
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the directory dir, even if no such files really exist.
The dir may be a pattern; pattern characters or colons
in dir should be quoted with a backslash to be treated
literally.
This can be useful on systems that support special file
systems whose top-level pathnames can not be listed or
generated with glob patterns. It can also be used for
directories for which one does not have read permis-
sion.
The pattern form can be used to add a certain `magic'
entry to all directories on a particular file system.
fake-parameters
This is used by the completion function for parameter
names. Its values are names of parameters that might
not yet be set but should be completed nonetheless.
Each name may also be followed by a colon and a string
specifying the type of the parameter (like `scalar',
`array' or `integer'). If the type is given, the name
will only be completed if parameters of that type are
required in the particular context. Names for which no
type is specified will always be completed.
file-list
This style controls whether files completed using the
standard builtin mechanism are to be listed with a long
list similar to ls -l. Note that this feature uses the
shell module zsh/stat for file information; this loads
the builtin stat which will replace any external stat
executable. To avoid this the following code can be
included in an initialization file:
zmodload -i zsh/stat
disable stat
The style may either be set to a true value (or `all'),
or one of the values `insert' or `list', indicating
that files are to be listed in long format in all cir-
cumstances, or when attempting to insert a file name,
or when listing file names without attempting to insert
one.
More generally, the value may be an array of any of the
above values, optionally followed by =num. If num is
present it gives the maximum number of matches for
which long listing style will be used. For example,
zstyle ':completion:*' file-list list=20 insert=10
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specifies that long format will be used when listing up
to 20 files or inserting a file with up to 10 matches
(assuming a listing is to be shown at all, for example
on an ambiguous completion), else short format will be
used.
zstyle -e ':completion:*' file-list '(( ${+NUMERIC} )) && reply=(true)'
specifies that long format will be used any time a
numeric argument is supplied, else short format.
file-patterns
This is used by the standard function for completing
filenames, _files. If the style is unset up to three
tags are offered, `globbed-files',`directories' and
`all-files', depending on the types of files expected
by the caller of _files. The first two
(`globbed-files' and `directories') are normally
offered together to make it easier to complete files in
sub-directories.
The file-patterns style provides alternatives to the
default tags, which are not used. Its value consists
of elements of the form `pattern:tag'; each string may
contain any number of such specifications separated by
spaces.
The pattern is a pattern that is to be used to generate
filenames. Any occurrence of the sequence `%p' is
replaced by any pattern(s) passed by the function call-
ing _files. Colons in the pattern must be preceded by
a backslash to make them distinguishable from the colon
before the tag. If more than one pattern is needed,
the patterns can be given inside braces, separated by
commas.
The tags of all strings in the value will be offered by
_files and used when looking up other styles. Any tags
in the same word will be offered at the same time and
before later words. If no `:tag' is given the `files'
tag will be used.
The tag may also be followed by an optional second
colon and a description, which will be used for the
`%d' in the value of the format style (if that is set)
instead of the default description supplied by the com-
pletion function. If the description given here con-
tains itself a `%d', that is replaced with the descrip-
tion supplied by the completion function.
For example, to make the rm command first complete only
names of object files and then the names of all files
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if there is no matching object file:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:rm:*' file-patterns \
'*.o:object-files' '%p:all-files'
To alter the default behaviour of file completion --
offer files matching a pattern and directories on the
first attempt, then all files -- to offer only matching
files on the first attempt, then directories, and
finally all files:
zstyle ':completion:*' file-patterns \
'%p:globbed-files' '*(-/):directories' '*:all-files'
This works even where there is no special pattern:
_files matches all files using the pattern `*' at the
first step and stops when it sees this pattern. Note
also it will never try a pattern more than once for a
single completion attempt.
During the execution of completion functions, the
EXTENDED_GLOB option is in effect, so the characters
`#', `~' and `^' have special meanings in the patterns.
file-sort
The standard filename completion function uses this
style without a tag to determine in which order the
names should be listed; menu completion will cycle
through them in the same order. The possible values
are: `size' to sort by the size of the file; `links' to
sort by the number of links to the file; `modification'
(or `time' or `date') to sort by the last modification
time; `access' to sort by the last access time; and
`inode' (or `change') to sort by the last inode change
time. If the style is set to any other value, or is
unset, files will be sorted alphabetically by name. If
the value contains the string `reverse', sorting is
done in the opposite order. If the value contains the
string `follow', timestamps are associated with the
targets of symbolic links; the default is to use the
timestamps of the links themselves.
filter
This is used by the LDAP plugin for e-mail address com-
pletion to specify the attributes to match against when
filtering entries. So for example, if the style is set
to `sn', matching is done against surnames. Standard
LDAP filtering is used so normal completion matching is
bypassed. If this style is not set, the LDAP plugin is
skipped. You may also need to set the command style to
specify how to connect to your LDAP server.
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force-list
This forces a list of completions to be shown at any
point where listing is done, even in cases where the
list would usually be suppressed. For example, nor-
mally the list is only shown if there are at least two
different matches. By setting this style to `always',
the list will always be shown, even if there is only a
single match that will immediately be accepted. The
style may also be set to a number. In this case the
list will be shown if there are at least that many
matches, even if they would all insert the same string.
This style is tested for the default tag as well as for
each tag valid for the current completion. Hence the
listing can be forced only for certain types of match.
format
If this is set for the descriptions tag, its value is
used as a string to display above matches in completion
lists. The sequence `%d' in this string will be
replaced with a short description of what these matches
are. This string may also contain the following
sequences to specify output attributes, as described in
the section EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in zsh-
misc(1): `%B', `%S', `%U', `%F', `%K' and their lower
case counterparts, as well as `%{...%}'. `%F', `%K'
and `%{...%}' take arguments in the same form as prompt
expansion. Note that the %G sequence is not available;
an argument to `%{' should be used instead.
The style is tested with each tag valid for the current
completion before it is tested for the descriptions
tag. Hence different format strings can be defined for
different types of match.
Note also that some completer functions define addi-
tional `%'-sequences. These are described for the com-
pleter functions that make use of them.
Some completion functions display messages that may be
customised by setting this style for the messages tag.
Here, the `%d' is replaced with a message given by the
completion function.
Finally, the format string is looked up with the warn-
ings tag, for use when no matches could be generated at
all. In this case the `%d' is replaced with the
descriptions for the matches that were expected sepa-
rated by spaces. The sequence `%D' is replaced with
the same descriptions separated by newlines.
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It is possible to use printf-style field width speci-
fiers with `%d' and similar escape sequences. This is
handled by the zformat builtin command from the
zsh/zutil module, see zshmodules(1).
glob This is used by the _expand completer. If it is set to
`true' (the default), globbing will be attempted on the
words resulting from a previous substitution (see the
substitute style) or else the original string from the
line.
global
If this is set to `true' (the default), the
_expand_alias completer and bindable command will try
to expand global aliases.
group-name
The completion system can group different types of
matches, which appear in separate lists. This style
can be used to give the names of groups for particular
tags. For example, in command position the completion
system generates names of builtin and external com-
mands, names of aliases, shell functions and parameters
and reserved words as possible completions. To have
the external commands and shell functions listed sepa-
rately:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:-command-:*:commands' group-name commands
zstyle ':completion:*:*:-command-:*:functions' group-name functions
As a consequence, any match with the same tag will be
displayed in the same group.
If the name given is the empty string the name of the
tag for the matches will be used as the name of the
group. So, to have all different types of matches dis-
played separately, one can just set:
zstyle ':completion:*' group-name ''
All matches for which no group name is defined will be
put in a group named -default-.
group-order
This style is additional to the group-name style to
specify the order for display of the groups defined by
that style (compare tag-order, which determines which
completions appear at all). The groups named are shown
in the given order; any other groups are shown in the
order defined by the completion function.
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For example, to have names of builtin commands, shell
functions and external commands appear in that order
when completing in command position:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:-command-:*' group-order \
builtins functions commands
groups
A list of names of UNIX groups. If this is not set,
group names are taken from the YP database or the file
`/etc/group'.
hidden
If this is set to true, matches for the given context
will not be listed, although any description for the
matches set with the format style will be shown. If it
is set to `all', not even the description will be dis-
played.
Note that the matches will still be completed; they are
just not shown in the list. To avoid having matches
considered as possible completions at all, the
tag-order style can be modified as described below.
hosts
A list of names of hosts that should be completed. If
this is not set, hostnames are taken from the file
`/etc/hosts'.
hosts-ports
This style is used by commands that need or accept
hostnames and network ports. The strings in the value
should be of the form `host:port'. Valid ports are
determined by the presence of hostnames; multiple ports
for the same host may appear.
ignore-line
This is tested for each tag valid for the current com-
pletion. If it is set to `true', none of the words
that are already on the line will be considered as pos-
sible completions. If it is set to `current', the word
the cursor is on will not be considered as a possible
completion. The value `current-shown' is similar but
only applies if the list of completions is currently
shown on the screen. Finally, if the style is set to
`other', all words on the line except for the current
one will be excluded from the possible completions.
The values `current' and `current-shown' are a bit like
the opposite of the accept-exact style: only strings
with missing characters will be completed.
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Note that you almost certainly don't want to set this
to `true' or `other' for a general context such as
`:completion:*'. This is because it would disallow
completion of, for example, options multiple times even
if the command in question accepts the option more than
once.
ignore-parents
The style is tested without a tag by the function com-
pleting pathnames in order to determine whether to
ignore the names of directories already mentioned in
the current word, or the name of the current working
directory. The value must include one or both of the
following strings:
parent
The name of any directory whose path is already
contained in the word on the line is ignored. For
example, when completing after foo/../, the direc-
tory foo will not be considered a valid comple-
tion.
pwd The name of the current working directory will not
be completed; hence, for example, completion after
../ will not use the name of the current direc-
tory.
In addition, the value may include one or both of:
.. Ignore the specified directories only when the
word on the line contains the substring `../'.
directory
Ignore the specified directories only when names
of directories are completed, not when completing
names of files.
Excluded values act in a similar fashion to values of
the ignored-patterns style, so they can be restored to
consideration by the _ignored completer.
extra-verbose
If set, the completion listing is more verbose at the
cost of a probable decrease in completion speed. Com-
pletion performance will suffer if this style is set to
`true'.
ignored-patterns
A list of patterns; any trial completion matching one
of the patterns will be excluded from consideration.
The _ignored completer can appear in the list of com-
pleters to restore the ignored matches. This is a more
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configurable version of the shell parameter $fignore.
Note that the EXTENDED_GLOB option is set during the
execution of completion functions, so the characters
`#', `~' and `^' have special meanings in the patterns.
insert
This style is used by the _all_matches completer to
decide whether to insert the list of all matches uncon-
ditionally instead of adding the list as another match.
insert-ids
When completing process IDs, for example as arguments
to the kill and wait builtins the name of a command may
be converted to the appropriate process ID. A problem
arises when the process name typed is not unique. By
default (or if this style is set explicitly to `menu')
the name will be converted immediately to a set of pos-
sible IDs, and menu completion will be started to cycle
through them.
If the value of the style is `single', the shell will
wait until the user has typed enough to make the com-
mand unique before converting the name to an ID;
attempts at completion will be unsuccessful until that
point. If the value is any other string, menu comple-
tion will be started when the string typed by the user
is longer than the common prefix to the corresponding
IDs.
insert-tab
If this is set to `true', the completion system will
insert a TAB character (assuming that was used to start
completion) instead of performing completion when there
is no non-blank character to the left of the cursor.
If it is set to `false', completion will be done even
there.
The value may also contain the substrings `pending' or
`pending=val'. In this case, the typed character will
be inserted instead of starting completion when there
is unprocessed input pending. If a val is given, com-
pletion will not be done if there are at least that
many characters of unprocessed input. This is often
useful when pasting characters into a terminal. Note
however, that it relies on the $PENDING special parame-
ter from the zsh/zle module being set properly which is
not guaranteed on all platforms.
The default value of this style is `true' except for
completion within vared builtin command where it is
`false'.
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insert-unambiguous
This is used by the _match and _approximate completers.
These completers are often used with menu completion
since the word typed may bear little resemblance to the
final completion. However, if this style is `true',
the completer will start menu completion only if it
could find no unambiguous initial string at least as
long as the original string typed by the user.
In the case of the _approximate completer, the com-
pleter field in the context will already have been set
to one of correct-num or approximate-num, where num is
the number of errors that were accepted.
In the case of the _match completer, the style may also
be set to the string `pattern'. Then the pattern on
the line is left unchanged if it does not match unam-
biguously.
keep-prefix
This style is used by the _expand completer. If it is
`true', the completer will try to keep a prefix con-
taining a tilde or parameter expansion. Hence, for
example, the string `~/f*' would be expanded to `~/foo'
instead of `/home/user/foo'. If the style is set to
`changed' (the default), the prefix will only be left
unchanged if there were other changes between the
expanded words and the original word from the command
line. Any other value forces the prefix to be expanded
unconditionally.
The behaviour of expand when this style is true is to
cause _expand to give up when a single expansion with
the restored prefix is the same as the original; hence
any remaining completers may be called.
last-prompt
This is a more flexible form of the ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT
option. If it is true, the completion system will try
to return the cursor to the previous command line after
displaying a completion list. It is tested for all
tags valid for the current completion, then the default
tag. The cursor will be moved back to the previous
line if this style is `true' for all types of match.
Note that unlike the ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT option this is
independent of the numeric prefix argument.
known-hosts-files
This style should contain a list of files to search for
host names and (if the use-ip style is set) IP
addresses in a format compatible with ssh known_hosts
files. If it is not set, the files
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/etc/ssh/ssh_known_hosts and ~/.ssh/known_hosts are
used.
list This style is used by the _history_complete_word bind-
able command. If it is set to `true' it has no effect.
If it is set to `false' matches will not be listed.
This overrides the setting of the options controlling
listing behaviour, in particular AUTO_LIST. The con-
text always starts with `:completion:history-words'.
list-colors
If the zsh/complist module is loaded, this style can be
used to set color specifications. This mechanism
replaces the use of the ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS
parameters described in the section `The zsh/complist
Module' in zshmodules(1), but the syntax is the same.
If this style is set for the default tag, the strings
in the value are taken as specifications that are to be
used everywhere. If it is set for other tags, the
specifications are used only for matches of the type
described by the tag. For this to work best, the
group-name style must be set to an empty string.
In addition to setting styles for specific tags, it is
also possible to use group names specified explicitly
by the group-name tag together with the `(group)' syn-
tax allowed by the ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS parame-
ters and simply using the default tag.
It is possible to use any color specifications already
set up for the GNU version of the ls command:
zstyle ':completion:*:default' list-colors ${(s.:.)LS_COLORS}
The default colors are the same as for the GNU ls com-
mand and can be obtained by setting the style to an
empty string (i.e. '').
list-dirs-first
This is used by file completion. If set, directories
to be completed are listed separately from and before
completion for other files, regardless of tag ordering.
In addition, the tag other-files is used in place of
all-files for the remaining files, to indicate that no
directories are presented with that tag.
list-grouped
If this style is `true' (the default), the completion
system will try to make certain completion listings
more compact by grouping matches. For example, options
for commands that have the same description (shown when
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the verbose style is set to `true') will appear as a
single entry. However, menu selection can be used to
cycle through all the matches.
list-packed
This is tested for each tag valid in the current con-
text as well as the default tag. If it is set to
`true', the corresponding matches appear in listings as
if the LIST_PACKED option were set. If it is set to
`false', they are listed normally.
list-prompt
If this style is set for the default tag, completion
lists that don't fit on the screen can be scrolled (see
the description of the zsh/complist module in zshmod-
ules(1)). The value, if not the empty string, will be
displayed after every screenful and the shell will
prompt for a key press; if the style is set to the
empty string, a default prompt will be used.
The value may contain the escape sequences: `%l' or
`%L', which will be replaced by the number of the last
line displayed and the total number of lines; `%m' or
`%M', the number of the last match shown and the total
number of matches; and `%p' and `%P', `Top' when at the
beginning of the list, `Bottom' when at the end and the
position shown as a percentage of the total length oth-
erwise. In each case the form with the uppercase let-
ter will be replaced by a string of fixed width, padded
to the right with spaces, while the lowercase form
will be replaced by a variable width string. As in
other prompt strings, the escape sequences `%S', `%s',
`%B', `%b', `%U', `%u' for entering and leaving the
display modes standout, bold and underline, and `%F',
`%f', `%K', `%k' for changing the foreground background
colour, are also available, as is the form `%{...%}'
for enclosing escape sequences which display with zero
(or, with a numeric argument, some other) width.
After deleting this prompt the variable LISTPROMPT
should be unset for the removal to take effect.
list-rows-first
This style is tested in the same way as the list-packed
style and determines whether matches are to be listed
in a rows-first fashion as if the LIST_ROWS_FIRST
option were set.
list-suffixes
This style is used by the function that completes file-
names. If it is true, and completion is attempted on a
string containing multiple partially typed pathname
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components, all ambiguous components will be shown.
Otherwise, completion stops at the first ambiguous com-
ponent.
list-separator
The value of this style is used in completion listing
to separate the string to complete from a description
when possible (e.g. when completing options). It
defaults to `--' (two hyphens).
local
This is for use with functions that complete URLs for
which the corresponding files are available directly
from the file system. Its value should consist of
three strings: a hostname, the path to the default web
pages for the server, and the directory name used by a
user placing web pages within their home area.
For example:
zstyle ':completion:*' local toast \
/var/http/public/toast public_html
Completion after `http://toast/stuff/' will look for
files in the directory /var/http/public/toast/stuff,
while completion after `http://toast/~yousir/' will
look for files in the directory ~yousir/public_html.
mail-directory
If set, zsh will assume that mailbox files can be found
in the directory specified. It defaults to `~/Mail'.
match-original
This is used by the _match completer. If it is set to
only, _match will try to generate matches without
inserting a `*' at the cursor position. If set to any
other non-empty value, it will first try to generate
matches without inserting the `*' and if that yields no
matches, it will try again with the `*' inserted. If
it is unset or set to the empty string, matching will
only be performed with the `*' inserted.
matcher
This style is tested separately for each tag valid in
the current context. Its value is added to any match
specifications given by the matcher-list style. It
should be in the form described in the section `Comple-
tion Matching Control' in zshcompwid(1).
matcher-list
This style can be set to a list of match specifications
that are to be applied everywhere. Match specifications
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are described in the section `Completion Matching Con-
trol' in zshcompwid(1). The completion system will try
them one after another for each completer selected.
For example, to try first simple completion and, if
that generates no matches, case-insensitive completion:
zstyle ':completion:*' matcher-list '' 'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z}'
By default each specification replaces the previous
one; however, if a specification is prefixed with +, it
is added to the existing list. Hence it is possible to
create increasingly general specifications without rep-
etition:
zstyle ':completion:*' matcher-list '' '+m{a-z}={A-Z}' '+m{A-Z}={a-z}'
It is possible to create match specifications valid for
particular completers by using the third field of the
context. For example, to use the completers _complete
and _prefix but only allow case-insensitive completion
with _complete:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete _prefix
zstyle ':completion:*:complete:*' matcher-list \
'' 'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z}'
User-defined names, as explained for the completer
style, are available. This makes it possible to try
the same completer more than once with different match
specifications each time. For example, to try normal
completion without a match specification, then normal
completion with case-insensitive matching, then correc-
tion, and finally partial-word completion:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete _correct _complete:foo
zstyle ':completion:*:complete:*' matcher-list \
'' 'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z}'
zstyle ':completion:*:foo:*' matcher-list \
'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z} r:|[-_./]=* r:|=*'
If the style is unset in any context no match specifi-
cation is applied. Note also that some completers such
as _correct and _approximate do not use the match spec-
ifications at all, though these completers will only
ever be called once even if the matcher-list contains
more than one element.
Where multiple specifications are useful, note that the
entire completion is done for each element of
matcher-list, which can quickly reduce the shell's per-
formance. As a rough rule of thumb, one to three
strings will give acceptable performance. On the other
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hand, putting multiple space-separated values into the
same string does not have an appreciable impact on per-
formance.
If there is no current matcher or it is empty, and the
option NO_CASE_GLOB is in effect, the matching for
files is performed case-insensitively in any case.
However, any matcher must explicitly specify
case-insensitive matching if that is required.
max-errors
This is used by the _approximate and _correct completer
functions to determine the maximum number of errors to
allow. The completer will try to generate completions
by first allowing one error, then two errors, and so
on, until either a match or matches were found or the
maximum number of errors given by this style has been
reached.
If the value for this style contains the string
`numeric', the completer function will take any numeric
argument as the maximum number of errors allowed. For
example, with
zstyle ':completion:*:approximate:::' max-errors 2 numeric
two errors are allowed if no numeric argument is given,
but with a numeric argument of six (as in `ESC-6 TAB'),
up to six errors are accepted. Hence with a value of
`0 numeric', no correcting completion will be attempted
unless a numeric argument is given.
If the value contains the string `not-numeric', the
completer will not try to generate corrected comple-
tions when given a numeric argument, so in this case
the number given should be greater than zero. For
example, `2 not-numeric' specifies that correcting com-
pletion with two errors will usually be performed, but
if a numeric argument is given, correcting completion
will not be performed.
The default value for this style is `2 numeric'.
max-matches-width
This style is used to determine the trade off between
the width of the display used for matches and the width
used for their descriptions when the verbose style is
in effect. The value gives the number of display col-
umns to reserve for the matches. The default is half
the width of the screen.
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This has the most impact when several matches have the
same description and so will be grouped together.
Increasing the style will allow more matches to be
grouped together; decreasing it will allow more of the
description to be visible.
menu If this is true in the context of any of the tags
defined for the current completion menu completion will
be used. The value for a specific tag will take prece-
dence over that for the `default' tag.
If none of the values found in this way is true but at
least one is set to `auto', the shell behaves as if the
AUTO_MENU option is set.
If one of the values is explicitly set to false, menu
completion will be explicitly turned off, overriding
the MENU_COMPLETE option and other settings.
In the form `yes=num', where `yes' may be any of the
true values (`yes', `true', `on' and `1'), menu comple-
tion will be turned on if there are at least num
matches. In the form `yes=long', menu completion will
be turned on if the list does not fit on the screen.
This does not activate menu completion if the widget
normally only lists completions, but menu completion
can be activated in that case with the value
`yes=long-list' (Typically, the value
`select=long-list' described later is more useful as it
provides control over scrolling.)
Similarly, with any of the `false' values (as in
`no=10'), menu completion will not be used if there are
num or more matches.
The value of this widget also controls menu selection,
as implemented by the zsh/complist module. The follow-
ing values may appear either alongside or instead of
the values above.
If the value contains the string `select', menu selec-
tion will be started unconditionally.
In the form `select=num', menu selection will only be
started if there are at least num matches. If the val-
ues for more than one tag provide a number, the small-
est number is taken.
Menu selection can be turned off explicitly by defining
a value containing the string`no-select'.
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It is also possible to start menu selection only if the
list of matches does not fit on the screen by using the
value `select=long'. To start menu selection even if
the current widget only performs listing, use the value
`select=long-list'.
To turn on menu completion or menu selection when a
there are a certain number of matches or the list of
matches does not fit on the screen, both of `yes=' and
`select=' may be given twice, once with a number and
once with `long' or `long-list'.
Finally, it is possible to activate two special modes
of menu selection. The word `interactive' in the value
causes interactive mode to be entered immediately when
menu selection is started; see the description of the
zsh/complist module in zshmodules(1) for a description
of interactive mode. Including the string `search'
does the same for incremental search mode. To select
backward incremental search, include the string
`search-backward'.
muttrc
If set, gives the location of the mutt configuration
file. It defaults to `~/.muttrc'.
numbers
This is used with the jobs tag. If it is `true', the
shell will complete job numbers instead of the shortest
unambiguous prefix of the job command text. If the
value is a number, job numbers will only be used if
that many words from the job descriptions are required
to resolve ambiguities. For example, if the value is
`1', strings will only be used if all jobs differ in
the first word on their command lines.
old-list
This is used by the _oldlist completer. If it is set
to `always', then standard widgets which perform list-
ing will retain the current list of matches, however
they were generated; this can be turned off explicitly
with the value `never', giving the behaviour without
the _oldlist completer. If the style is unset, or any
other value, then the existing list of completions is
displayed if it is not already; otherwise, the standard
completion list is generated; this is the default be-
haviour of _oldlist. However, if there is an old list
and this style contains the name of the completer func-
tion that generated the list, then the old list will be
used even if it was generated by a widget which does
not do listing.
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For example, suppose you type ^Xc to use the _cor-
rect_word widget, which generates a list of corrections
for the word under the cursor. Usually, typing ^D
would generate a standard list of completions for the
word on the command line, and show that. With
_oldlist, it will instead show the list of corrections
already generated.
As another example consider the _match completer: with
the insert-unambiguous style set to `true' it inserts
only a common prefix string, if there is any. However,
this may remove parts of the original pattern, so that
further completion could produce more matches than on
the first attempt. By using the _oldlist completer and
setting this style to _match, the list of matches gen-
erated on the first attempt will be used again.
old-matches
This is used by the _all_matches completer to decide if
an old list of matches should be used if one exists.
This is selected by one of the `true' values or by the
string `only'. If the value is `only', _all_matches
will only use an old list and won't have any effect on
the list of matches currently being generated.
If this style is set it is generally unwise to call the
_all_matches completer unconditionally. One possible
use is for either this style or the completer style to
be defined with the -e option to zstyle to make the
style conditional.
old-menu
This is used by the _oldlist completer. It controls
how menu completion behaves when a completion has
already been inserted and the user types a standard
completion key such as TAB. The default behaviour of
_oldlist is that menu completion always continues with
the existing list of completions. If this style is set
to `false', however, a new completion is started if the
old list was generated by a different completion com-
mand; this is the behaviour without the _oldlist com-
pleter.
For example, suppose you type ^Xc to generate a list of
corrections, and menu completion is started in one of
the usual ways. Usually, or with this style set to
false, typing TAB at this point would start trying to
complete the line as it now appears. With _oldlist, it
instead continues to cycle through the list of correc-
tions.
original
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This is used by the _approximate and _correct com-
pleters to decide if the original string should be
added as a possible completion. Normally, this is done
only if there are at least two possible corrections,
but if this style is set to `true', it is always added.
Note that the style will be examined with the completer
field in the context name set to correct-num or approx-
imate-num, where num is the number of errors that were
accepted.
packageset
This style is used when completing arguments of the
Debian `dpkg' program. It contains an override for the
default package set for a given context. For example,
zstyle ':completion:*:complete:dpkg:option--status-1:*' \
packageset avail
causes available packages, rather than only installed
packages, to be completed for `dpkg --status'.
path The function that completes color names uses this style
with the colors tag. The value should be the pathname
of a file containing color names in the format of an
X11 rgb.txt file. If the style is not set but this
file is found in one of various standard locations it
will be used as the default.
path-completion
This is used by filename completion. By default, file-
name completion examines all components of a path to
see if there are completions of that component. For
example, /u/b/z can be completed to /usr/bin/zsh.
Explicitly setting this style to false inhibits this
behaviour for path components up to the / before the
cursor; this overrides the setting of
accept-exact-dirs.
Even with the style set to false, it is still possible
to complete multiple paths by setting the option COM-
PLETE_IN_WORD and moving the cursor back to the first
component in the path to be completed. For example,
/u/b/z can be completed to /usr/bin/zsh if the cursor
is after the /u.
pine-directory
If set, specifies the directory containing PINE mailbox
files. There is no default, since recursively search-
ing this directory is inconvenient for anyone who
doesn't use PINE.
ports
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A list of Internet service names (network ports) to
complete. If this is not set, service names are taken
from the file `/etc/services'.
prefix-hidden
This is used for certain completions which share a com-
mon prefix, for example command options beginning with
dashes. If it is `true', the prefix will not be shown
in the list of matches.
The default value for this style is `false'.
prefix-needed
This style is also relevant for matches with a common
prefix. If it is set to `true' this common prefix must
be typed by the user to generate the matches.
The style is applicable to the options, signals, jobs,
functions, and parameters completion tags.
For command options, this means that the initial `-',
`+', or `--' must be typed explicitly before option
names will be completed.
For signals, an initial `-' is required before signal
names will be completed.
For jobs, an initial `%' is required before job names
will be completed.
For function and parameter names, an initial `_' or `.'
is required before function or parameter names starting
with those characters will be completed.
The default value for this style is `false' for func-
tion and parameter completions, and `true' otherwise.
preserve-prefix
This style is used when completing path names. Its
value should be a pattern matching an initial prefix of
the word to complete that should be left unchanged
under all circumstances. For example, on some Unices
an initial `//' (double slash) has a special meaning;
setting this style to the string `//' will preserve it.
As another example, setting this style to `?:/' under
Cygwin would allow completion after `a:/...' and so on.
range
This is used by the _history completer and the _his-
tory_complete_word bindable command to decide which
words should be completed.
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If it is a singe number, only the last N words from the
history will be completed.
If it is a range of the form `max:slice', the last
slice words will be completed; then if that yields no
matches, the slice words before those will be tried and
so on. This process stops either when at least one
match was been found, or max words have been tried.
The default is to complete all words from the history
at once.
recursive-files
If this style is set, its value is an array of patterns
to be tested against `$PWD/': note the trailing slash,
which allows directories in the pattern to be delimited
unambiguously by including slashes on both sides. If
an ordinary file completion fails and the word on the
command line does not yet have a directory part to its
name, the style is retrieved using the same tag as for
the completion just attempted, then the elements tested
against $PWD/ in turn. If one matches, then the shell
reattempts completion by prepending the word on the
command line with each directory in the expansion of
**/*(/) in turn. Typically the elements of the style
will be set to restrict the number of directories
beneath the current one to a manageable number, for
example `*/.git/*'.
For example,
zstyle ':completion:*' recursive-files '*/zsh/*'
If the current directory is /home/pws/zsh/Src, then
zle_trTAB can be completed to Zle/zle_tricky.c.
regular
This style is used by the _expand_alias completer and
bindable command. If set to `true' (the default), reg-
ular aliases will be expanded but only in command posi-
tion. If it is set to `false', regular aliases will
never be expanded. If it is set to `always', regular
aliases will be expanded even if not in command posi-
tion.
rehash
If this is set when completing external commands, the
internal list (hash) of commands will be updated for
each search by issuing the rehash command. There is a
speed penalty for this which is only likely to be
noticeable when directories in the path have slow file
access.
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remote-access
If set to false, certain commands will be prevented
from making Internet connections to retrieve remote
information. This includes the completion for the CVS
command.
It is not always possible to know if connections are in
fact to a remote site, so some may be prevented unnec-
essarily.
remove-all-dups
The _history_complete_word bindable command and the
_history completer use this to decide if all duplicate
matches should be removed, rather than just consecutive
duplicates.
select-prompt
If this is set for the default tag, its value will be
displayed during menu selection (see the menu style
above) when the completion list does not fit on the
screen as a whole. The same escapes as for the
list-prompt style are understood, except that the num-
bers refer to the match or line the mark is on. A
default prompt is used when the value is the empty
string.
select-scroll
This style is tested for the default tag and determines
how a completion list is scrolled during a menu selec-
tion (see the menu style above) when the completion
list does not fit on the screen as a whole. If the
value is `0' (zero), the list is scrolled by
half-screenfuls; if it is a positive integer, the list
is scrolled by the given number of lines; if it is a
negative number, the list is scrolled by a screenful
minus the absolute value of the given number of lines.
The default is to scroll by single lines.
separate-sections
This style is used with the manuals tag when completing
names of manual pages. If it is `true', entries for
different sections are added separately using tag names
of the form `manual.X', where X is the section number.
When the group-name style is also in effect, pages from
different sections will appear separately. This style
is also used similarly with the words style when com-
pleting words for the dict command. It allows words
from different dictionary databases to be added sepa-
rately. The default for this style is `false'.
show-completer
Tested whenever a new completer is tried. If it is
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true, the completion system outputs a progress message
in the listing area showing what completer is being
tried. The message will be overwritten by any output
when completions are found and is removed after comple-
tion is finished.
single-ignored
This is used by the _ignored completer when there is
only one match. If its value is `show', the single
match will be displayed but not inserted. If the value
is `menu', then the single match and the original
string are both added as matches and menu completion is
started, making it easy to select either of them.
sort Many completion widgets call _description at some point
which decides whether the matches are added sorted or
unsorted (often indirectly via _wanted or _requested).
This style can be set explicitly to one of the usual
true or false values as an override. If it is not set
for the context, the standard behaviour of the calling
widget is used.
The style is tested first against the full context
including the tag, and if that fails to produce a value
against the context without the tag.
If the calling widget explicitly requests unsorted
matches, this is usually honoured. However, the
default (unsorted) behaviour of completion for the com-
mand history may be overridden by setting the style to
true.
In the _expand completer, if it is set to `true', the
expansions generated will always be sorted. If it is
set to `menu', then the expansions are only sorted when
they are offered as single strings but not in the
string containing all possible expansions.
special-dirs
Normally, the completion code will not produce the
directory names `.' and `..' as possible completions.
If this style is set to `true', it will add both `.'
and `..' as possible completions; if it is set to `..',
only `..' will be added.
The following example sets special-dirs to `..' when
the current prefix is empty, is a single `.', or con-
sists only of a path beginning with `../'. Otherwise
the value is `false'.
zstyle -e ':completion:*' special-dirs \
'[[ $PREFIX = (../)#(|.|..) ]] && reply=(..)'
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squeeze-slashes
If set to `true', sequences of slashes in filename
paths (for example in `foo//bar') will be treated as a
single slash. This is the usual behaviour of UNIX
paths. However, by default the file completion func-
tion behaves as if there were a `*' between the
slashes.
stop If set to `true', the _history_complete_word bindable
command will stop once when reaching the beginning or
end of the history. Invoking _history_complete_word
will then wrap around to the opposite end of the his-
tory. If this style is set to `false' (the default),
_history_complete_word will loop immediately as in a
menu completion.
strip-comments
If set to `true', this style causes non-essential com-
ment text to be removed from completion matches. Cur-
rently it is only used when completing e-mail addresses
where it removes any display name from the addresses,
cutting them down to plain user@host form.
subst-globs-only
This is used by the _expand completer. If it is set to
`true', the expansion will only be used if it resulted
from globbing; hence, if expansions resulted from the
use of the substitute style described below, but these
were not further changed by globbing, the expansions
will be rejected.
The default for this style is `false'.
substitute
This boolean style controls whether the _expand com-
pleter will first try to expand all substitutions in
the string (such as `$(...)' and `${...}').
The default is `true'.
suffix
This is used by the _expand completer if the word
starts with a tilde or contains a parameter expansion.
If it is set to `true', the word will only be expanded
if it doesn't have a suffix, i.e. if it is something
like `~foo' or `$foo' rather than `~foo/' or
`$foo/bar', unless that suffix itself contains charac-
ters eligible for expansion. The default for this
style is `true'.
tag-order
This provides a mechanism for sorting how the tags
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available in a particular context will be used.
The values for the style are sets of space-separated
lists of tags. The tags in each value will be tried at
the same time; if no match is found, the next value is
used. (See the file-patterns style for an exception to
this behavior.)
For example:
zstyle ':completion:*:complete:-command-:*' tag-order \
'commands functions'
specifies that completion in command position first
offers external commands and shell functions. Remain-
ing tags will be tried if no completions are found.
In addition to tag names, each string in the value may
take one of the following forms:
- If any value consists of only a hyphen, then only
the tags specified in the other values are gener-
ated. Normally all tags not explicitly selected
are tried last if the specified tags fail to gen-
erate any matches. This means that a single value
consisting only of a single hyphen turns off com-
pletion.
! tags...
A string starting with an exclamation mark speci-
fies names of tags that are not to be used. The
effect is the same as if all other possible tags
for the context had been listed.
tag:label ...
Here, tag is one of the standard tags and label is
an arbitrary name. Matches are generated as nor-
mal but the name label is used in contexts instead
of tag. This is not useful in words starting with
!.
If the label starts with a hyphen, the tag is
prepended to the label to form the name used for
lookup. This can be used to make the completion
system try a certain tag more than once, supplying
different style settings for each attempt; see
below for an example.
tag:label:description
As before, but description will replace the `%d'
in the value of the format style instead of the
default description supplied by the completion
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function. Spaces in the description must be
quoted with a backslash. A `%d' appearing in
description is replaced with the description given
by the completion function.
In any of the forms above the tag may be a pattern or
several patterns in the form `{pat1,pat2...}'. In this
case all matching tags will be used except for any
given explicitly in the same string.
One use of these features is to try one tag more than
once, setting other styles differently on each attempt,
but still to use all the other tags without having to
repeat them all. For example, to make completion of
function names in command position ignore all the com-
pletion functions starting with an underscore the first
time completion is tried:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:-command-:*' tag-order \
'functions:-non-comp *' functions
zstyle ':completion:*:functions-non-comp' ignored-patterns '_*'
On the first attempt, all tags will be offered but the
functions tag will be replaced by functions-non-comp.
The ignored-patterns style is set for this tag to
exclude functions starting with an underscore. If
there are no matches, the second value of the tag-order
style is used which completes functions using the
default tag, this time presumably including all func-
tion names.
The matches for one tag can be split into different
groups. For example:
zstyle ':completion:*' tag-order \
'options:-long:long\ options
options:-short:short\ options
options:-single-letter:single\ letter\ options'
zstyle ':completion:*:options-long' ignored-patterns '[-+](|-|[^-]*)'
zstyle ':completion:*:options-short' ignored-patterns '--*' '[-+]?'
zstyle ':completion:*:options-single-letter' ignored-patterns '???*'
With the group-names style set, options beginning with
`--', options beginning with a single `-' or `+' but
containing multiple characters, and single-letter
options will be displayed in separate groups with dif-
ferent descriptions.
Another use of patterns is to try multiple match speci-
fications one after another. The matcher-list style
offers something similar, but it is tested very early
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in the completion system and hence can't be set for
single commands nor for more specific contexts. Here
is how to try normal completion without any match spec-
ification and, if that generates no matches, try again
with case-insensitive matching, restricting the effect
to arguments of the command foo:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:foo:*' tag-order '*' '*:-case'
zstyle ':completion:*-case' matcher 'm:{a-z}={A-Z}'
First, all the tags offered when completing after foo
are tried using the normal tag name. If that generates
no matches, the second value of tag-order is used,
which tries all tags again except that this time each
has -case appended to its name for lookup of styles.
Hence this time the value for the matcher style from
the second call to zstyle in the example is used to
make completion case-insensitive.
It is possible to use the -e option of the zstyle
builtin command to specify conditions for the use of
particular tags. For example:
zstyle -e '*:-command-:*' tag-order '
if [[ -n $PREFIX$SUFFIX ]]; then
reply=( )
else
reply=( - )
fi'
Completion in command position will be attempted only
if the string typed so far is not empty. This is
tested using the PREFIX special parameter; see zshcomp-
wid for a description of parameters which are special
inside completion widgets. Setting reply to an empty
array provides the default behaviour of trying all tags
at once; setting it to an array containing only a
hyphen disables the use of all tags and hence of all
completions.
If no tag-order style has been defined for a context,
the strings `(|*-)argument-* (|*-)option-* values' and
`options' plus all tags offered by the completion func-
tion will be used to provide a sensible default behav-
ior that causes arguments (whether normal command argu-
ments or arguments of options) to be completed before
option names for most commands.
urls This is used together with the urls tag by functions
completing URLs.
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If the value consists of more than one string, or if
the only string does not name a file or directory, the
strings are used as the URLs to complete.
If the value contains only one string which is the name
of a normal file the URLs are taken from that file
(where the URLs may be separated by white space or new-
lines).
Finally, if the only string in the value names a direc-
tory, the directory hierarchy rooted at this directory
gives the completions. The top level directory should
be the file access method, such as `http', `ftp',
`bookmark' and so on. In many cases the next level of
directories will be a filename. The directory hierar-
chy can descend as deep as necessary.
For example,
zstyle ':completion:*' urls ~/.urls
mkdir -p ~/.urls/ftp/ftp.zsh.org/pub
allows completion of all the components of the URL
ftp://ftp.zsh.org/pub after suitable commands such as
`netscape' or `lynx'. Note, however, that access meth-
ods and files are completed separately, so if the hosts
style is set hosts can be completed without reference
to the urls style.
See the description in the function _urls itself for
more information (e.g. `more $^fpath/_urls(N)').
use-cache
If this is set, the completion caching layer is acti-
vated for any completions which use it (via the
_store_cache, _retrieve_cache, and _cache_invalid func-
tions). The directory containing the cache files can
be changed with the cache-path style.
use-compctl
If this style is set to a string not equal to false, 0,
no, and off, the completion system may use any comple-
tion specifications defined with the compctl builtin
command. If the style is unset, this is done only if
the zsh/compctl module is loaded. The string may also
contain the substring `first' to use completions
defined with `compctl -T', and the substring `default'
to use the completion defined with `compctl -D'.
Note that this is only intended to smooth the transi-
tion from compctl to the new completion system and may
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disappear in the future.
Note also that the definitions from compctl will only
be used if there is no specific completion function for
the command in question. For example, if there is a
function _foo to complete arguments to the command foo,
compctl will never be invoked for foo. However, the
compctl version will be tried if foo only uses default
completion.
use-ip
By default, the function _hosts that completes host
names strips IP addresses from entries read from host
databases such as NIS and ssh files. If this style is
true, the corresponding IP addresses can be completed
as well. This style is not use in any context where
the hosts style is set; note also it must be set before
the cache of host names is generated (typically the
first completion attempt).
users
This may be set to a list of usernames to be completed.
If it is not set all usernames will be completed. Note
that if it is set only that list of users will be com-
pleted; this is because on some systems querying all
users can take a prohibitive amount of time.
users-hosts
The values of this style should be of the form
`user@host' or `user:host'. It is used for commands
that need pairs of user- and hostnames. These commands
will complete usernames from this style (only), and
will restrict subsequent hostname completion to hosts
paired with that user in one of the values of the
style.
It is possible to group values for sets of commands
which allow a remote login, such as rlogin and ssh, by
using the my-accounts tag. Similarly, values for sets
of commands which usually refer to the accounts of
other people, such as talk and finger, can be grouped
by using the other-accounts tag. More ambivalent com-
mands may use the accounts tag.
users-hosts-ports
Like users-hosts but used for commands like telnet and
containing strings of the form `user@host:port'.
verbose
If set, as it is by default, the completion listing is
more verbose. In particular many commands show
descriptions for options if this style is `true'.
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word This is used by the _list completer, which prevents the
insertion of completions until a second completion
attempt when the line has not changed. The normal way
of finding out if the line has changed is to compare
its entire contents between the two occasions. If this
style is true, the comparison is instead performed only
on the current word. Hence if completion is performed
on another word with the same contents, completion will
not be delayed.
CONTROL FUNCTIONS
The initialization script compinit redefines all the widgets
which perform completion to call the supplied widget func-
tion _main_complete. This function acts as a wrapper call-
ing the so-called `completer' functions that generate
matches. If _main_complete is called with arguments, these
are taken as the names of completer functions to be called
in the order given. If no arguments are given, the set of
functions to try is taken from the completer style. For
example, to use normal completion and correction if that
doesn't generate any matches:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete _correct
after calling compinit. The default value for this style is
`_complete _ignored', i.e. normally only ordinary completion
is tried, first with the effect of the ignored-patterns
style and then without it. The _main_complete function uses
the return status of the completer functions to decide if
other completers should be called. If the return status is
zero, no other completers are tried and the _main_complete
function returns.
If the first argument to _main_complete is a single hyphen,
the arguments will not be taken as names of completers.
Instead, the second argument gives a name to use in the com-
pleter field of the context and the other arguments give a
command name and arguments to call to generate the matches.
The following completer functions are contained in the dis-
tribution, although users may write their own. Note that in
contexts the leading underscore is stripped, for example
basic completion is performed in the context `:comple-
tion::complete:...'.
_all_matches
This completer can be used to add a string consisting
of all other matches. As it influences later com-
pleters it must appear as the first completer in the
list. The list of all matches is affected by the
avoid-completer and old-matches styles described above.
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It may be useful to use the _generic function described
below to bind _all_matches to its own keystroke, for
example:
zle -C all-matches complete-word _generic
bindkey '^Xa' all-matches
zstyle ':completion:all-matches:*' old-matches only
zstyle ':completion:all-matches::::' completer _all_matches
Note that this does not generate completions by itself:
first use any of the standard ways of generating a list
of completions, then use ^Xa to show all matches. It
is possible instead to add a standard completer to the
list and request that the list of all matches should be
directly inserted:
zstyle ':completion:all-matches::::' completer _all_matches _complete
zstyle ':completion:all-matches:*' insert true
In this case the old-matches style should not be set.
_approximate
This is similar to the basic _complete completer but
allows the completions to undergo corrections. The
maximum number of errors can be specified by the
max-errors style; see the description of approximate
matching in zshexpn(1) for how errors are counted.
Normally this completer will only be tried after the
normal _complete completer:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete _approximate
This will give correcting completion if and only if
normal completion yields no possible completions. When
corrected completions are found, the completer will
normally start menu completion allowing you to cycle
through these strings.
This completer uses the tags corrections and original
when generating the possible corrections and the origi-
nal string. The format style for the former may con-
tain the additional sequences `%e' and `%o' which will
be replaced by the number of errors accepted to gener-
ate the corrections and the original string, respec-
tively.
The completer progressively increases the number of
errors allowed up to the limit by the max-errors style,
hence if a completion is found with one error, no com-
pletions with two errors will be shown, and so on. It
modifies the completer name in the context to indicate
the number of errors being tried: on the first try the
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completer field contains `approximate-1', on the second
try `approximate-2', and so on.
When _approximate is called from another function, the
number of errors to accept may be passed with the -a
option. The argument is in the same format as the
max-errors style, all in one string.
Note that this completer (and the _correct completer
mentioned below) can be quite expensive to call, espe-
cially when a large number of errors are allowed. One
way to avoid this is to set up the completer style
using the -e option to zstyle so that some completers
are only used when completion is attempted a second
time on the same string, e.g.:
zstyle -e ':completion:*' completer '
if [[ $_last_try != "$HISTNO$BUFFER$CURSOR" ]]; then
_last_try="$HISTNO$BUFFER$CURSOR"
reply=(_complete _match _prefix)
else
reply=(_ignored _correct _approximate)
fi'
This uses the HISTNO parameter and the BUFFER and CUR-
SOR special parameters that are available inside zle
and completion widgets to find out if the command line
hasn't changed since the last time completion was
tried. Only then are the _ignored, _correct and
_approximate completers called.
_complete
This completer generates all possible completions in a
context-sensitive manner, i.e. using the settings
defined with the compdef function explained above and
the current settings of all special parameters. This
gives the normal completion behaviour.
To complete arguments of commands, _complete uses the
utility function _normal, which is in turn responsible
for finding the particular function; it is described
below. Various contexts of the form -context- are han-
dled specifically. These are all mentioned above as
possible arguments to the #compdef tag.
Before trying to find a function for a specific con-
text, _complete checks if the parameter `compcontext'
is set. Setting `compcontext' allows the usual comple-
tion dispatching to be overridden which is useful in
places such as a function that uses vared for input. If
it is set to an array, the elements are taken to be the
possible matches which will be completed using the tag
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`values' and the description `value'. If it is set to
an associative array, the keys are used as the possible
completions and the values (if non-empty) are used as
descriptions for the matches. If `compcontext' is set
to a string containing colons, it should be of the form
`tag:descr:action'. In this case the tag and descr
give the tag and description to use and the action
indicates what should be completed in one of the forms
accepted by the _arguments utility function described
below.
Finally, if `compcontext' is set to a string without
colons, the value is taken as the name of the context
to use and the function defined for that context will
be called. For this purpose, there is a special con-
text named -command-line- that completes whole command
lines (commands and their arguments). This is not used
by the completion system itself but is nonetheless han-
dled when explicitly called.
_correct
Generate corrections, but not completions, for the cur-
rent word; this is similar to _approximate but will not
allow any number of extra characters at the cursor as
that completer does. The effect is similar to
spell-checking. It is based on _approximate, but the
completer field in the context name is correct.
For example, with:
zstyle ':completion:::::' completer _complete _correct _approximate
zstyle ':completion:*:correct:::' max-errors 2 not-numeric
zstyle ':completion:*:approximate:::' max-errors 3 numeric
correction will accept up to two errors. If a numeric
argument is given, correction will not be performed,
but correcting completion will be, and will accept as
many errors as given by the numeric argument. Without
a numeric argument, first correction and then correct-
ing completion will be tried, with the first one
accepting two errors and the second one accepting three
errors.
When _correct is called as a function, the number of
errors to accept may be given following the -a option.
The argument is in the same form a values to the accept
style, all in one string.
This completer function is intended to be used without
the _approximate completer or, as in the example, just
before it. Using it after the _approximate completer
is useless since _approximate will at least generate
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the corrected strings generated by the _correct com-
pleter -- and probably more.
_expand
This completer function does not really perform comple-
tion, but instead checks if the word on the command
line is eligible for expansion and, if it is, gives
detailed control over how this expansion is done. For
this to happen, the completion system needs to be
invoked with complete-word, not expand-or-complete (the
default binding for TAB), as otherwise the string will
be expanded by the shell's internal mechanism before
the completion system is started. Note also this com-
pleter should be called before the _complete completer
function.
The tags used when generating expansions are all-expan-
sions for the string containing all possible expan-
sions, expansions when adding the possible expansions
as single matches and original when adding the original
string from the line. The order in which these strings
are generated, if at all, can be controlled by the
group-order and tag-order styles, as usual.
The format string for all-expansions and for expansions
may contain the sequence `%o' which will be replaced by
the original string from the line.
The kind of expansion to be tried is controlled by the
substitute, glob and subst-globs-only styles.
It is also possible to call _expand as a function, in
which case the different modes may be selected with
options: -s for substitute, -g for glob and -o for
subst-globs-only.
_expand_alias
If the word the cursor is on is an alias, it is
expanded and no other completers are called. The types
of aliases which are to be expanded can be controlled
with the styles regular, global and disabled.
This function is also a bindable command, see the sec-
tion `Bindable Commands' below.
_history
Complete words from the shell's command history. This
completer can be controlled by the remove-all-dups, and
sort styles as for the _history_complete_word bindable
command, see the section `Bindable Commands' below and
the section `Completion System Configuration' above.
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_ignored
The ignored-patterns style can be set to a list of pat-
terns which are compared against possible completions;
matching ones are removed. With this completer those
matches can be reinstated, as if no ignored-patterns
style were set. The completer actually generates its
own list of matches; which completers are invoked is
determined in the same way as for the _prefix com-
pleter. The single-ignored style is also available as
described above.
_list
This completer allows the insertion of matches to be
delayed until completion is attempted a second time
without the word on the line being changed. On the
first attempt, only the list of matches will be shown.
It is affected by the styles condition and word, see
the section `Completion System Configuration' above.
_match
This completer is intended to be used after the _com-
plete completer. It behaves similarly but the string
on the command line may be a pattern to match against
trial completions. This gives the effect of the
GLOB_COMPLETE option.
Normally completion will be performed by taking the
pattern from the line, inserting a `*' at the cursor
position and comparing the resulting pattern with the
possible completions generated. This can be modified
with the match-original style described above.
The generated matches will be offered in a menu comple-
tion unless the insert-unambiguous style is set to
`true'; see the description above for other options for
this style.
Note that matcher specifications defined globally or
used by the completion functions (the styles
matcher-list and matcher) will not be used.
_menu
This completer was written as simple example function
to show how menu completion can be enabled in shell
code. However, it has the notable effect of disabling
menu selection which can be useful with _generic based
widgets. It should be used as the first completer in
the list. Note that this is independent of the setting
of the MENU_COMPLETE option and does not work with the
other menu completion widgets such as reverse-menu-com-
plete, or accept-and-menu-complete.
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_oldlist
This completer controls how the standard completion
widgets behave when there is an existing list of com-
pletions which may have been generated by a special
completion (i.e. a separately-bound completion com-
mand). It allows the ordinary completion keys to con-
tinue to use the list of completions thus generated,
instead of producing a new list of ordinary contextual
completions. It should appear in the list of com-
pleters before any of the widgets which generate
matches. It uses two styles: old-list and old-menu,
see the section `Completion System Configuration'
above.
_prefix
This completer can be used to try completion with the
suffix (everything after the cursor) ignored. In other
words, the suffix will not be considered to be part of
the word to complete. The effect is similar to the
expand-or-complete-prefix command.
The completer style is used to decide which other com-
pleters are to be called to generate matches. If this
style is unset, the list of completers set for the cur-
rent context is used -- except, of course, the _prefix
completer itself. Furthermore, if this completer
appears more than once in the list of completers only
those completers not already tried by the last invoca-
tion of _prefix will be called.
For example, consider this global completer style:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer \
_complete _prefix _correct _prefix:foo
Here, the _prefix completer tries normal completion but
ignoring the suffix. If that doesn't generate any
matches, and neither does the call to the _correct com-
pleter after it, _prefix will be called a second time
and, now only trying correction with the suffix
ignored. On the second invocation the completer part
of the context appears as `foo'.
To use _prefix as the last resort and try only normal
completion when it is invoked:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer _complete ... _prefix
zstyle ':completion::prefix:*' completer _complete
The add-space style is also respected. If it is set to
`true' then _prefix will insert a space between the
matches generated (if any) and the suffix.
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Note that this completer is only useful if the COM-
PLETE_IN_WORD option is set; otherwise, the cursor will
be moved to the end of the current word before the com-
pletion code is called and hence there will be no suf-
fix.
_user_expand
This completer behaves similarly to the _expand com-
pleter but instead performs expansions defined by
users. The styles add-space and sort styles specific
to the _expand completer are usable with _user_expand
in addition to other styles handled more generally by
the completion system. The tag all-expansions is also
available.
The expansion depends on the array style user-expand
being defined for the current context; remember that
the context for completers is less specific than that
for contextual completion as the full context has not
yet been determined. Elements of the array may have
one of the following forms:
$hash
hash is the name of an associative array. Note
this is not a full parameter expression, merely a
$, suitably quoted to prevent immediate expansion,
followed by the name of an associative array. If
the trial expansion word matches a key in hash,
the resulting expansion is the corresponding
value.
_func
_func is the name of a shell function whose name
must begin with _ but is not otherwise special to
the completion system. The function is called
with the trial word as an argument. If the word
is to be expanded, the function should set the
array reply to a list of expansions. Optionally,
it can set REPLY to a word that will be used as a
description for the set of expansions. The return
status of the function is irrelevant.
BINDABLE COMMANDS
In addition to the context-dependent completions provided,
which are expected to work in an intuitively obvious way,
there are a few widgets implementing special behaviour which
can be bound separately to keys. The following is a list of
these and their default bindings.
_bash_completions
This function is used by two widgets, _bash_com-
plete-word and _bash_list-choices. It exists to pro-
vide compatibility with completion bindings in bash.
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The last character of the binding determines what is
completed: `!', command names; `$', environment vari-
ables; `@', host names; `/', file names; `~' user
names. In bash, the binding preceded by `\e' gives
completion, and preceded by `^X' lists options. As
some of these bindings clash with standard zsh bind-
ings, only `\e~' and `^X~' are bound by default. To
add the rest, the following should be added to .zshrc
after compinit has been run:
for key in '!' '$' '@' '/' '~'; do
bindkey "\e$key" _bash_complete-word
bindkey "^X$key" _bash_list-choices
done
This includes the bindings for `~' in case they were
already bound to something else; the completion code
does not override user bindings.
_correct_filename (^XC)
Correct the filename path at the cursor position.
Allows up to six errors in the name. Can also be
called with an argument to correct a filename path,
independently of zle; the correction is printed on
standard output.
_correct_word (^Xc)
Performs correction of the current argument using the
usual contextual completions as possible choices. This
stores the string `correct-word' in the function field
of the context name and then calls the _correct com-
pleter.
_expand_alias (^Xa)
This function can be used as a completer and as a bind-
able command. It expands the word the cursor is on if
it is an alias. The types of alias expanded can be
controlled with the styles regular, global and dis-
abled.
When used as a bindable command there is one additional
feature that can be selected by setting the complete
style to `true'. In this case, if the word is not the
name of an alias, _expand_alias tries to complete the
word to a full alias name without expanding it. It
leaves the cursor directly after the completed word so
that invoking _expand_alias once more will expand the
now-complete alias name.
_expand_word (^Xe)
Performs expansion on the current word: equivalent to
the standard expand-word command, but using the _expand
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completer. Before calling it, the function field of
the context is set to `expand-word'.
_generic
This function is not defined as a widget and not bound
by default. However, it can be used to define a widget
and will then store the name of the widget in the func-
tion field of the context and call the completion sys-
tem. This allows custom completion widgets with their
own set of style settings to be defined easily. For
example, to define a widget that performs normal com-
pletion and starts menu selection:
zle -C foo complete-word _generic
bindkey '...' foo
zstyle ':completion:foo:*' menu yes select=1
Note in particular that the completer style may be set
for the context in order to change the set of functions
used to generate possible matches. If _generic is
called with arguments, those are passed through to
_main_complete as the list of completers in place of
those defined by the completer style.
_history_complete_word (\e/)
Complete words from the shell's command history. This
uses the list, remove-all-dups, sort, and stop styles.
_most_recent_file (^Xm)
Complete the name of the most recently modified file
matching the pattern on the command line (which may be
blank). If given a numeric argument N, complete the
Nth most recently modified file. Note the completion,
if any, is always unique.
_next_tags (^Xn)
This command alters the set of matches used to that for
the next tag, or set of tags, either as given by the
tag-order style or as set by default; these matches
would otherwise not be available. Successive invoca-
tions of the command cycle through all possible sets of
tags.
_read_comp (^X^R)
Prompt the user for a string, and use that to perform
completion on the current word. There are two possi-
bilities for the string. First, it can be a set of
words beginning `_', for example `_files -/', in which
case the function with any arguments will be called to
generate the completions. Unambiguous parts of the
function name will be completed automatically (normal
completion is not available at this point) until a
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space is typed.
Second, any other string will be passed as a set of
arguments to compadd and should hence be an expression
specifying what should be completed.
A very restricted set of editing commands is available
when reading the string: `DEL' and `^H' delete the
last character; `^U' deletes the line, and `^C' and
`^G' abort the function, while `RET' accepts the com-
pletion. Note the string is used verbatim as a command
line, so arguments must be quoted in accordance with
standard shell rules.
Once a string has been read, the next call to
_read_comp will use the existing string instead of
reading a new one. To force a new string to be read,
call _read_comp with a numeric argument.
_complete_debug (^X?)
This widget performs ordinary completion, but captures
in a temporary file a trace of the shell commands exe-
cuted by the completion system. Each completion
attempt gets its own file. A command to view each of
these files is pushed onto the editor buffer stack.
_complete_help (^Xh)
This widget displays information about the context
names, the tags, and the completion functions used when
completing at the current cursor position. If given a
numeric argument other than 1 (as in `ESC-2 ^Xh'), then
the styles used and the contexts for which they are
used will be shown, too.
Note that the information about styles may be incom-
plete; it depends on the information available from the
completion functions called, which in turn is deter-
mined by the user's own styles and other settings.
_complete_help_generic
Unlike other commands listed here, this must be created
as a normal ZLE widget rather than a completion widget
(i.e. with zle -N). It is used for generating help
with a widget bound to the _generic widget that is
described above.
If this widget is created using the name of the func-
tion, as it is by default, then when executed it will
read a key sequence. This is expected to be bound to a
call to a completion function that uses the _generic
widget. That widget will be executed, and information
provided in the same format that the _complete_help
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widget displays for contextual completion.
If the widget's name contains debug, for example if it
is created as `zle -N _complete_debug_generic _com-
plete_help_generic', it will read and execute the
keystring for a generic widget as before, but then gen-
erate debugging information as done by _complete_debug
for contextual completion.
If the widget's name contains noread, it will not read
a keystring but instead arrange that the next use of a
generic widget run in the same shell will have the
effect as described above.
The widget works by setting the shell parameter
ZSH_TRACE_GENERIC_WIDGET which is read by _generic.
Unsetting the parameter cancels any pending effect of
the noread form.
For example, after executing the following:
zle -N _complete_debug_generic _complete_help_generic
bindkey '^x:' _complete_debug_generic
typing `C-x :' followed by the key sequence for a
generic widget will cause trace output for that widget
to be saved to a file.
_complete_tag (^Xt)
This widget completes symbol tags created by the etags
or ctags programmes (note there is no connection with
the completion system's tags) stored in a file TAGS, in
the format used by etags, or tags, in the format cre-
ated by ctags. It will look back up the path hierarchy
for the first occurrence of either file; if both exist,
the file TAGS is preferred. You can specify the full
path to a TAGS or tags file by setting the parameter
$TAGSFILE or $tagsfile respectively. The corresponding
completion tags used are etags and vtags, after emacs
and vi respectively.
UTILITY FUNCTIONS
Descriptions follow for utility functions that may be useful
when writing completion functions. If functions are
installed in subdirectories, most of these reside in the
Base subdirectory. Like the example functions for commands
in the distribution, the utility functions generating
matches all follow the convention of returning status zero
if they generated completions and non-zero if no matching
completions could be added.
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Two more features are offered by the _main_complete func-
tion. The arrays compprefuncs and comppostfuncs may contain
names of functions that are to be called immediately before
or after completion has been tried. A function will only be
called once unless it explicitly reinserts itself into the
array.
_all_labels [ -x ] [ -12VJ ] tag name descr [ command args
... ]
This is a convenient interface to the _next_label func-
tion below, implementing the loop shown in the
_next_label example. The command and its arguments are
called to generate the matches. The options stored in
the parameter name will automatically be inserted into
the args passed to the command. Normally, they are put
directly after the command, but if one of the args is a
single hyphen, they are inserted directly before that.
If the hyphen is the last argument, it will be removed
from the argument list before the command is called.
This allows _all_labels to be used in almost all cases
where the matches can be generated by a single call to
the compadd builtin command or by a call to one of the
utility functions.
For example:
local expl
...
if _requested foo; then
...
_all_labels foo expl '...' compadd ... - $matches
fi
Will complete the strings from the matches parameter,
using compadd with additional options which will take
precedence over those generated by _all_labels.
_alternative [ -O name ] [ -C name ] spec ...
This function is useful in simple cases where multiple
tags are available. Essentially it implements a loop
like the one described for the _tags function below.
The tags to use and the action to perform if a tag is
requested are described using the specs which are of
the form: `tag:descr:action'. The tags are offered
using _tags and if the tag is requested, the action is
executed with the given description descr. The actions
are those accepted by the _arguments function
(described below), excluding the `->state' and `=...'
forms.
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For example, the action may be a simple function call:
_alternative \
'users:user:_users' \
'hosts:host:_hosts'
offers usernames and hostnames as possible matches,
generated by the _users and _hosts functions respec-
tively.
Like _arguments, this function uses _all_labels to exe-
cute the actions, which will loop over all sets of
tags. Special handling is only required if there is an
additional valid tag, for example inside a function
called from _alternative.
The option `-O name' is used in the same way as by the
_arguments function. In other words, the elements of
the name array will be passed to compadd when executing
an action.
Like _tags this function supports the -C option to give
a different name for the argument context field.
: ] spec...
_arguments [ -nswWCRS ] [ -A pat ] [ -O name ] [ -M match-
spec ] [
_arguments [ opts... ] -- [ -i pats ] [ -s pair ] [ help-
spec... ]
This function can be used to give a complete specifica-
tion for completion for a command whose arguments fol-
low standard UNIX option and argument conventions.
Options to _arguments itself must be in separate words,
i.e. -s -w, not -sw.
When calling _arguments, all specs that describe
options of the analyzed command line must precede all
specs that describe non-option (aka "normal") arguments
of the analyzed line. To avoid ambiguity, all options
to _arguments itself may be separated from the spec
forms by a single colon.
The -s -w -W -A and -S options describe how parsing of
the command line should proceed, and are discussed in
context below. The `--' form is used to intuit spec
forms from the help output of the command being ana-
lyzed, and is described in detail below. The opts for
the `--' form are otherwise the same options as the
first form. Note that `-s' following `--' has a dis-
tinct meaning from `-s' preceding `--', and both may
appear.
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With the option -n, _arguments sets the parameter NOR-
MARG to the position of the first normal argument in
the $words array, i.e. the position after the end of
the options. If that argument has not been reached,
NORMARG is set to -1. The caller should declare `inte-
ger NORMARG' if the -n option is passed; otherwise the
parameter is not used.
The option `-M matchspec' sets a match specification to
use to completion option names and values. The default
matchspec is:
r:|[_-]=* r:|=*
This allows partial word completion after `_' and `-',
for example `-f-b' can be completed to `-foo-bar'.
Each of the following forms is a spec describing indi-
vidual sets of options or arguments on the command line
being analyzed.
n:message:action
n::message:action
This describes the n'th normal argument. The mes-
sage will be printed above the matches generated
and the action indicates what can be completed in
this position (see below). If there are two
colons before the message the argument is
optional. If the message contains only white
space, nothing will be printed above the matches
unless the action adds an explanation string
itself.
:message:action
::message:action
Similar, but describes the next argument, whatever
number that happens to be. If all arguments are
specified in this form in the correct order the
numbers are unnecessary.
*:message:action
*::message:action
*:::message:action
This describes how arguments (usually non-option
arguments, those not beginning with - or +) are to
be completed when neither of the first two forms
was provided. Any number of arguments can be com-
pleted in this fashion.
With two colons before the message, the words spe-
cial array and the CURRENT special parameter are
modified to refer only to the normal arguments
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when the action is executed or evaluated. With
three colons before the message they are modified
to refer only to the normal arguments covered by
this description.
optspec
optspec:...
This describes an option. The colon indicates
handling for one or more arguments to the option;
if it is not present, the option is assumed to
take no arguments.
By default, options are multi-character name, one
`-word' per option. With -s, options may be sin-
gle characters, with more than one option per
word, although words starting with two hyphens,
such as `--prefix', are still considered complete
option names. This is suitable for standard GNU
options.
The combination of -s with -w allows single-letter
options to be combined in a single word even if
one or more of the options take arguments. For
example, if -x takes an argument, with no -s `-xy'
is considered as a single (unhandled) option; with
-s -xy is an option with the argument `y'; with
both -s and -w, -xy may be the option -x and the
option -y with arguments still to come.
The option -W takes this a stage further: it is
possible to complete single-letter options even
after an argument that occurs in the same word.
However, it depends on the action performed
whether options will really be completed at this
point. For more control, use a utility function
like _guard as part of the action.
The following forms are available for the initial
optspec, whether or not the option has arguments.
*optspec
Here optspec is one of the remaining forms
below. This indicates the following optspec
may be repeated. Otherwise if the corre-
sponding option is already present on the
command line to the left of the cursor it
will not be offered again.
-optname
+optname
In the simplest form the optspec is just the
option name beginning with a minus or a plus
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sign, such as `-foo'. The first argument for
the option (if any) must follow as a separate
word directly after the option.
Either of `-+optname' and `+-optname' can be
used to specify that -optname and +optname
are both valid.
In all the remaining forms, the leading `-'
may be replaced by or paired with `+' in this
way.
-optname-
The first argument of the option must come
directly after the option name in the same
word. For example, `-foo-:...' specifies
that the completed option and argument will
look like `-fooarg'.
-optname+
The first argument may appear immediately
after optname in the same word, or may appear
as a separate word after the option. For
example, `-foo+:...' specifies that the com-
pleted option and argument will look like
either `-fooarg' or `-foo arg'.
-optname=
The argument may appear as the next word, or
in same word as the option name provided that
it is separated from it by an equals sign,
for example `-foo=arg' or `-foo arg'.
-optname=-
The argument to the option must appear after
an equals sign in the same word, and may not
be given in the next argument.
optspec[explanation]
An explanation string may be appended to any
of the preceding forms of optspec by enclos-
ing it in brackets, as in `-q[query opera-
tion]'.
The verbose style is used to decide whether
the explanation strings are displayed with
the option in a completion listing.
If no bracketed explanation string is given
but the auto-description style is set and
only one argument is described for this opt-
spec, the value of the style is displayed,
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with any appearance of the sequence `%d' in
it replaced by the message of the first
optarg that follows the optspec; see below.
It is possible for options with a literal `+' or `=' to
appear, but that character must be quoted, for example
`-\+'.
The options -S and -A are available to simplify the
specifications for commands with standard option pars-
ing. With -S, no option will be completed after a `--'
appearing on its own on the line; this argument will
otherwise be ignored; hence in the line
foobar -x -- -y
the `-x' is considered an option but the `-y' is con-
sidered an argument, while the `--' is considered to be
neither.
With -A, no options will be completed after the first
non-option argument on the line. The -A must be fol-
lowed by a pattern matching all strings which are not
to be taken as arguments. For example, to make _argu-
ments stop completing options after the first normal
argument, but ignoring all strings starting with a
hyphen even if they are not described by one of the
optspecs, the form is `-A "-*"'.
Each optarg following an optspec must take one of the
following forms:
:message:action
::message:action
An argument to the option; message and action are
treated as for ordinary arguments. In the first
form, the argument is mandatory, and in the second
form it is optional.
This group may be repeated for options which take
multiple arguments. In other words, :mes-
sage1:action1:message2:action2 specifies that the
option takes two arguments.
:*pattern:message:action
:*pattern::message:action
:*pattern:::message:action
This describes multiple arguments. Only the last
optarg for an option taking multiple arguments may
be given in this form. If the pattern is empty
(i.e., :*:), all the remaining words on the line
are to be completed as described by the action;
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otherwise, all the words up to and including a
word matching the pattern are to be completed
using the action.
Multiple colons are treated as for the `*:...'
forms for ordinary arguments: when the message is
preceded by two colons, the words special array
and the CURRENT special parameter are modified
during the execution or evaluation of the action
to refer only to the words after the option. When
preceded by three colons, they are modified to
refer only to the words covered by this descrip-
tion.
Any literal colon in an optname, message, or action must be
preceded by a backslash, `\:'.
Each of the forms above may be preceded by a list in paren-
theses of option names and argument numbers. If the given
option is on the command line, the options and arguments
indicated in parentheses will not be offered. For example,
`(-two -three 1)-one:...' completes the option `-one'; if
this appears on the command line, the options -two and
-three and the first ordinary argument will not be completed
after it. `(-foo):...' specifies an ordinary argument com-
pletion; -foo will not be completed if that argument is
already present.
Other items may appear in the list of excluded options to
indicate various other items that should not be applied when
the current specification is matched: a single star (*) for
the rest arguments (i.e. a specification of the form
`*:...'); a colon (:) for all normal (non-option-) argu-
ments; and a hyphen (-) for all options. For example, if
`(*)' appears before an option and the option appears on the
command line, the list of remaining arguments (those shown
in the above table beginning with `*:') will not be com-
pleted.
To aid in reuse of specifications, it is possible to precede
any of the forms above with `!'; then the form will no
longer be completed, although if the option or argument
appears on the command line they will be skipped as normal.
The main use for this is when the arguments are given by an
array, and _arguments is called repeatedly for more specific
contexts: on the first call `_arguments $global_options' is
used, and on subsequent calls `_arguments
!$^global_options'.
In each of the forms above the action determines how comple-
tions should be generated. Except for the `->string' form
below, the action will be executed by calling the
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_all_labels function to process all tag labels. No special
handling of tags is needed unless a function call introduces
a new one.
The option `-O name' specifies the name of an array whose
elements will be passed as arguments to functions called to
execute actions. For example, this can be used to pass the
same set of options for the compadd builtin to all actions.
The forms for action are as follows.
(single unquoted space)
This is useful where an argument is required but it is
not possible or desirable to generate matches for it.
The message will be displayed but no completions
listed. Note that even in this case the colon at the
end of the message is needed; it may only be omitted
when neither a message nor an action is given.
(item1 item2 ...)
One of a list of possible matches, for example:
:foo:(foo bar baz)
((item1\:desc1 ...))
Similar to the above, but with descriptions for each
possible match. Note the backslash before the colon.
For example,
:foo:((a\:bar b\:baz))
The matches will be listed together with their descrip-
tions if the description style is set with the values
tag in the context.
->string
In this form, _arguments processes the arguments and
options and then returns control to the calling func-
tion with parameters set to indicate the state of pro-
cessing; the calling function then makes its own
arrangements for generating completions. For example,
functions that implement a state machine can use this
type of action.
Where _arguments encounters action in the `->string'
format, it will strip all leading and trailing white-
space from string and set the array state to the set of
all strings for which an action is to be performed.
The elements of the array state_descr are assigned the
corresponding message field from each optarg containing
such an action.
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By default and in common with all other well behaved
completion functions, _arguments returns status zero if
it was able to add matches and non-zero otherwise. How-
ever, if the -R option is given, _arguments will
instead return a status of 300 to indicate that $state
is to be handled.
In addition to $state and $state_descr, _arguments also
sets the global parameters `context', `line' and
`opt_args' as described below, and does not reset any
changes made to the special parameters such as PREFIX
and words. This gives the calling function the choice
of resetting these parameters or propagating changes in
them.
A function calling _arguments with at least one action
containing a `->string' must therefore declare appro-
priate local parameters:
local context state state_descr line
typeset -A opt_args
to prevent _arguments from altering the global environ-
ment.
{eval-string}
A string in braces is evaluated as shell code to gener-
ate matches. If the eval-string itself does not begin
with an opening parenthesis or brace it is split into
separate words before execution.
= action
If the action starts with `= ' (an equals sign followed
by a space), _arguments will insert the contents of the
argument field of the current context as the new first
element in the words special array and increment the
value of the CURRENT special parameter. This has the
effect of inserting a dummy word onto the completion
command line while not changing the point at which com-
pletion is taking place.
This is most useful with one of the specifiers that
restrict the words on the command line on which the
action is to operate (the two- and three-colon forms
above). One particular use is when an action itself
causes _arguments on a restricted range; it is neces-
sary to use this trick to insert an appropriate command
name into the range for the second call to _arguments
to be able to parse the line.
word...
word...
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This covers all forms other than those above. If the
action starts with a space, the remaining list of words
will be invoked unchanged.
Otherwise it will be invoked with some extra strings
placed after the first word; these are to be passed
down as options to the compadd builtin. They ensure
that the state specified by _arguments, in particular
the descriptions of options and arguments, is correctly
passed to the completion command. These additional
arguments are taken from the array parameter `expl';
this will be set up before executing the action and
hence may be referred to inside it, typically in an
expansion of the form `$expl[@]' which preserves empty
elements of the array.
During the performance of the action the array `line' will
be set to the normal arguments from the command line, i.e.
the words from the command line after the command name
excluding all options and their arguments. Options are
stored in the associative array `opt_args' with option names
as keys and their arguments as the values. For options that
have more than one argument these are given as one string,
separated by colons. All colons in the original arguments
are preceded with backslashes.
The parameter `context' is set when returning to the calling
function to perform an action of the form `->string'. It is
set to an array of elements corresponding to the elements of
$state. Each element is a suitable name for the argument
field of the context: either a string of the form
`option-opt-n' for the n'th argument of the option -opt, or
a string of the form `argument-n' for the n'th argument.
For `rest' arguments, that is those in the list at the end
not handled by position, n is the string `rest'. For exam-
ple, when completing the argument of the -o option, the name
is `option-o-1', while for the second normal (non-option-)
argument it is `argument-2'.
Furthermore, during the evaluation of the action the context
name in the curcontext parameter is altered to append the
same string that is stored in the context parameter.
The option -C tells _arguments to modify the curcontext
parameter for an action of the form `->state'. This is the
standard parameter used to keep track of the current con-
text. Here it (and not the context array) should be made
local to the calling function to avoid passing back the mod-
ified value and should be initialised to the current value
at the start of the function:
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local curcontext="$curcontext"
This is useful where it is not possible for multiple states
to be valid together.
It is possible to specify multiple sets of options and argu-
ments with the sets separated by single hyphens. The speci-
fications before the first hyphen (if any) are shared by all
the remaining sets. The first word in every other set pro-
vides a name for the set which may appear in exclusion lists
in specifications, either alone or before one of the possi-
ble values described above. In the second case a `-' should
appear between this name and the remainder.
For example:
_arguments \
-a \
- set1 \
-c \
- set2 \
-d \
':arg:(x2 y2)'
This defines two sets. When the command line contains the
option `-c', the `-d' option and the argument will not be
considered possible completions. When it contains `-d' or
an argument, the option `-c' will not be considered. How-
ever, after `-a' both sets will still be considered valid.
If the name given for one of the mutually exclusive sets is
of the form `(name)' then only one value from each set will
ever be completed; more formally, all specifications are
mutually exclusive to all other specifications in the same
set. This is useful for defining multiple sets of options
which are mutually exclusive and in which the options are
aliases for each other. For example:
_arguments \
-a -b \
- '(compress)' \
{-c,--compress}'[compress]' \
- '(uncompress)' \
{-d,--decompress}'[decompress]'
As the completion code has to parse the command line sepa-
rately for each set this form of argument is slow and should
only be used when necessary. A useful alternative is often
an option specification with rest-arguments (as in
`-foo:*:...'); here the option -foo swallows up all remain-
ing arguments as described by the optarg definitions.
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The option `--' allows _arguments to work out the names of
long options that support the `--help' option which is stan-
dard in many GNU commands. The command word is called with
the argument `--help' and the output examined for option
names. Clearly, it can be dangerous to pass this to com-
mands which may not support this option as the behaviour of
the command is unspecified.
In addition to options, `_arguments --' will try to deduce
the types of arguments available for options when the form
`--opt=val' is valid. It is also possible to provide hints
by examining the help text of the command and adding help-
spec of the form `pattern:message:action'; note that other
_arguments spec forms are not used. The pattern is matched
against the help text for an option, and if it matches the
message and action are used as for other argument speci-
fiers. The special case of `*:' means both message and
action are empty, which has the effect of causing options
having no description in the help output to be ordered in
listings ahead of options that have a description.
For example:
_arguments -- '*\*:toggle:(yes no)' \
'*=FILE*:file:_files' \
'*=DIR*:directory:_files -/' \
'*=PATH*:directory:_files -/'
Here, `yes' and `no' will be completed as the argument of
options whose description ends in a star; file names will be
completed for options that contain the substring `=FILE' in
the description; and directories will be completed for
options whose description contains `=DIR' or `=PATH'. The
last three are in fact the default and so need not be given
explicitly, although it is possible to override the use of
these patterns. A typical help text which uses this feature
is:
-C, --directory=DIR change to directory DIR
so that the above specifications will cause directories to
be completed after `--directory', though not after `-C'.
Note also that _arguments tries to find out automatically if
the argument for an option is optional. This can be speci-
fied explicitly by doubling the colon before the message.
If the pattern ends in `(-)', this will be removed from the
pattern and the action will be used only directly after the
`=', not in the next word. This is the behaviour of a nor-
mal specification defined with the form `=-'.
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The `_arguments --' can be followed by the option `-i pat-
terns' to give patterns for options which are not to be com-
pleted. The patterns can be given as the name of an array
parameter or as a literal list in parentheses. For example,
_arguments -- -i \
"(--(en|dis)able-FEATURE*)"
will cause completion to ignore the options `--enable-FEA-
TURE' and `--disable-FEATURE' (this example is useful with
GNU configure).
The `_arguments --' form can also be followed by the option
`-s pair' to describe option aliases. The pair consists of
a list of alternating patterns and corresponding replace-
ments, enclosed in parens and quoted so that it forms a sin-
gle argument word in the _arguments call.
For example, some configure-script help output describes
options only as `--enable-foo', but the script also accepts
the negated form `--disable-foo'. To allow completion of
the second form:
_arguments -- -s "(#--enable- --disable-)"
Finally, note that _arguments generally expects to be the
primary function handling any completion for which it is
used. It may have side effects which change the treatment
of any matches added by other functions called after it. To
combine _arguments with other functions, those functions
should be called either before _arguments, as an action
within a spec, or in handlers for `->state' actions.
Here is a more general example of the use of _arguments:
_arguments '-l+:left border:' \
'-format:paper size:(letter A4)' \
'*-copy:output file:_files::resolution:(300 600)' \
':postscript file:_files -g \*.\(ps\|eps\)' \
'*:page number:'
This describes three options: `-l', `-format', and `-copy'.
The first takes one argument described as `left border' for
which no completion will be offered because of the empty
action. Its argument may come directly after the `-l' or it
may be given as the next word on the line.
The `-format' option takes one argument in the next word,
described as `paper size' for which only the strings `let-
ter' and `A4' will be completed.
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The `-copy' option may appear more than once on the command
line and takes two arguments. The first is mandatory and
will be completed as a filename. The second is optional
(because of the second colon before the description `resolu-
tion') and will be completed from the strings `300' and
`600'.
The last two descriptions say what should be completed as
arguments. The first describes the first argument as a
`postscript file' and makes files ending in `ps' or `eps' be
completed. The last description gives all other arguments
the description `page numbers' but does not offer comple-
tions.
_cache_invalid cache_identifier
This function returns status zero if the completions cache
corresponding to the given cache identifier needs rebuild-
ing. It determines this by looking up the cache-policy
style for the current context. This should provide a func-
tion name which is run with the full path to the relevant
cache file as the only argument.
Example:
_example_caching_policy () {
# rebuild if cache is more than a week old
local -a oldp
oldp=( "$1"(Nm+7) )
(( $#oldp ))
}
_call_function return name [ args ... ]
If a function name exists, it is called with the arguments
args. The return argument gives the name of a parameter in
which the return status from the function name should be
stored; if return is empty or a single hyphen it is ignored.
The return status of _call_function itself is zero if the
function name exists and was called and non-zero otherwise.
_call_program tag string ...
This function provides a mechanism for the user to override
the use of an external command. It looks up the command
style with the supplied tag. If the style is set, its value
is used as the command to execute. The strings from the
call to _call_program, or from the style if set, are con-
catenated with spaces between them and the resulting string
is evaluated. The return status is the return status of the
command called.
_combination [ -s pattern ] tag style spec ... field opts
...
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This function is used to complete combinations of values,
for example pairs of hostnames and usernames. The style
argument gives the style which defines the pairs; it is
looked up in a context with the tag specified.
The style name consists of field names separated by hyphens,
for example `users-hosts-ports'. For each field for a value
is already known, a spec of the form `field=pattern' is
given. For example, if the command line so far specifies a
user `pws', the argument `users=pws' should appear.
The next argument with no equals sign is taken as the name
of the field for which completions should be generated (pre-
sumably not one of the fields for which the value is known).
The matches generated will be taken from the value of the
style. These should contain the possible values for the
combinations in the appropriate order (users, hosts, ports
in the example above). The different fields the values for
the different fields are separated by colons. This can be
altered with the option -s to _combination which specifies a
pattern. Typically this is a character class, as for exam-
ple `-s "[:@]"' in the case of the users-hosts style.
Each `field=pattern' specification restricts the completions
which apply to elements of the style with appropriately
matching fields.
If no style with the given name is defined for the given
tag, or if none of the strings in style's value match, but a
function name of the required field preceded by an under-
score is defined, that function will be called to generate
the matches. For example, if there is no
`users-hosts-ports' or no matching hostname when a host is
required, the function `_hosts' will automatically be
called.
If the same name is used for more than one field, in both
the `field=pattern' and the argument that gives the name of
the field to be completed, the number of the field (starting
with one) may be given after the fieldname, separated from
it by a colon.
All arguments after the required field name are passed to
compadd when generating matches from the style value, or to
the functions for the fields if they are called.
_describe [ -oO | -t tag ] descr name1 [ name2 ] opts ... --
...
This function associates completions with descriptions.
Multiple groups separated by -- can be supplied, potentially
with different completion options opts.
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The descr is taken as a string to display above the matches
if the format style for the descriptions tag is set. This
is followed by one or two names of arrays followed by
options to pass to compadd. The first array contains the
possible completions with their descriptions in the form
`completion:description'. Any literal colons in completion
must be quoted with a backslash. If a second array is
given, it should have the same number of elements as the
first; in this case the corresponding elements are added as
possible completions instead of the completion strings from
the first array. The completion list will retain the
descriptions from the first array. Finally, a set of com-
pletion options can appear.
If the option `-o' appears before the first argument, the
matches added will be treated as names of command options
(N.B. not shell options), typically following a `-', `--' or
`+' on the command line. In this case _describe uses the
prefix-hidden, prefix-needed and verbose styles to find out
if the strings should be added as completions and if the
descriptions should be shown. Without the `-o' option, only
the verbose style is used to decide how descriptions are
shown. If `-O' is used instead of `-o', command options are
completed as above but _describe will not handle the pre-
fix-needed style.
With the -t option a tag can be specified. The default is
`values' or, if the -o option is given, `options'.
If selected by the list-grouped style, strings with the same
description will appear together in the list.
_describe uses the _all_labels function to generate the
matches, so it does not need to appear inside a loop over
tag labels.
_description [ -x ] [ -12VJ ] tag name descr [ spec ... ]
This function is not to be confused with the previous one;
it is used as a helper function for creating options to com-
padd. It is buried inside many of the higher level comple-
tion functions and so often does not need to be called
directly.
The styles listed below are tested in the current context
using the given tag. The resulting options for compadd are
put into the array named name (this is traditionally `expl',
but this convention is not enforced). The description for
the corresponding set of matches is passed to the function
in descr.
The styles tested are: format, hidden, matcher, ignored-pat-
terns and group-name. The format style is first tested for
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the given tag and then for the descriptions tag if no value
was found, while the remainder are only tested for the tag
given as the first argument. The function also calls _setup
which tests some more styles.
The string returned by the format style (if any) will be
modified so that the sequence `%d' is replaced by the descr
given as the third argument without any leading or trailing
white space. If, after removing the white space, the descr
is the empty string, the format style will not be used and
the options put into the name array will not contain an
explanation string to be displayed above the matches.
If _description is called with more than three arguments,
the additional specs should be of the form `char:str'.
These supply escape sequence replacements for the format
style: every appearance of `%char' will be replaced by
string.
If the -x option is given, the description will be passed to
compadd using the -x option instead of the default -X. This
means that the description will be displayed even if there
are no corresponding matches.
The options placed in the array name take account of the
group-name style, so matches are placed in a separate group
where necessary. The group normally has its elements sorted
(by passing the option -J to compadd), but if an option
starting with `-V', `-J', `-1', or `-2' is passed to
_description, that option will be included in the array.
Hence it is possible for the completion group to be unsorted
by giving the option `-V', `-1V', or `-2V'.
In most cases, the function will be used like this:
local expl
_description files expl file
compadd "$expl[@]" - "$files[@]"
Note the use of the parameter expl, the hyphen, and the list
of matches. Almost all calls to compadd within the comple-
tion system use a similar format; this ensures that
user-specified styles are correctly passed down to the
builtins which implement the internals of completion.
_dispatch context string ...
This sets the current context to context and looks for com-
pletion functions to handle this context by hunting through
the list of command names or special contexts (as described
above for compdef) given as string .... The first comple-
tion function to be defined for one of the contexts in the
list is used to generate matches. Typically, the last
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string is -default- to cause the function for default com-
pletion to be used as a fallback.
The function sets the parameter $service to the string being
tried, and sets the context/command field (the fourth) of
the $curcontext parameter to the context given as the first
argument.
_files
The function _files calls _path_files with all the arguments
it was passed except for -g and -/. The use of these two
options depends on the setting of the file-patterns style.
This function accepts the full set of options allowed by
_path_files, described below.
_gnu_generic
This function is a simple wrapper around the _arguments
function described above. It can be used to determine auto-
matically the long options understood by commands that pro-
duce a list when passed the option `--help'. It is intended
to be used as a top-level completion function in its own
right. For example, to enable option completion for the
commands foo and bar, use
compdef _gnu_generic foo bar
after the call to compinit.
The completion system as supplied is conservative in its use
of this function, since it is important to be sure the com-
mand understands the option `--help'.
_guard [ options ] pattern descr
This function is intended to be used in the action for the
specifications passed to _arguments and similar functions.
It returns immediately with a non-zero return status if the
string to be completed does not match the pattern. If the
pattern matches, the descr is displayed; the function then
returns status zero if the word to complete is not empty,
non-zero otherwise.
The pattern may be preceded by any of the options understood
by compadd that are passed down from _description, namely
-M, -J, -V, -1, -2, -n, -F and -X. All of these options
will be ignored. This fits in conveniently with the argu-
ment-passing conventions of actions for _arguments.
As an example, consider a command taking the options -n and
-none, where -n must be followed by a numeric value in the
same word. By using:
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_arguments '-n-: :_guard "[0-9]#" "numeric value"' '-none'
_arguments can be made to both display the message `numeric
value' and complete options after `-n<TAB>'. If the `-n' is
already followed by one or more digits (the pattern passed
to _guard) only the message will be displayed; if the `-n'
is followed by another character, only options are com-
pleted.
_message [ -r12 ] [ -VJ group ] descr
_message -e [ tag ] descr
The descr is used in the same way as the third argument to
the _description function, except that the resulting string
will always be shown whether or not matches were generated.
This is useful for displaying a help message in places where
no completions can be generated.
The format style is examined with the messages tag to find a
message; the usual tag, descriptions, is used only if the
style is not set with the former.
If the -r option is given, no style is used; the descr is
taken literally as the string to display. This is most use-
ful when the descr comes from a pre-processed argument list
which already contains an expanded description.
The -12VJ options and the group are passed to compadd and
hence determine the group the message string is added to.
The second -e form gives a description for completions with
the tag tag to be shown even if there are no matches for
that tag. This form is called by _arguments in the event
that there is no action for an option specification. The
tag can be omitted and if so the tag is taken from the
parameter $curtag; this is maintained by the completion sys-
tem and so is usually correct. Note that if there are no
matches at the time this function is called, comp-
state[insert] is cleared, so additional matches generated
later are not inserted on the command line.
_multi_parts sep array
The argument sep is a separator character. The array may be
either the name of an array parameter or a literal array in
the form `(foo bar)', a parenthesised list of words sepa-
rated by whitespace. The possible completions are the
strings from the array. However, each chunk delimited by
sep will be completed separately. For example, the _tar
function uses `_multi_parts / patharray' to complete partial
file paths from the given array of complete file paths.
The -i option causes _multi_parts to insert a unique match
even if that requires multiple separators to be inserted.
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This is not usually the expected behaviour with filenames,
but certain other types of completion, for example those
with a fixed set of possibilities, may be more suited to
this form.
Like other utility functions, this function accepts the
`-V', `-J', `-1', `-2', `-n', `-f', `-X', `-M', `-P', `-S',
`-r', `-R', and `-q' options and passes them to the compadd
builtin.
_next_label [ -x ] [ -12VJ ] tag name descr [ options ... ]
This function is used to implement the loop over different
tag labels for a particular tag as described above for the
tag-order style. On each call it checks to see if there are
any more tag labels; if there is it returns status zero,
otherwise non-zero. As this function requires a current tag
to be set, it must always follow a call to _tags or
_requested.
The -x12VJ options and the first three arguments are passed
to the _description function. Where appropriate the tag
will be replaced by a tag label in this call. Any descrip-
tion given in the tag-order style is preferred to the descr
passed to _next_label.
The options given after the descr are set in the parameter
given by name, and hence are to be passed to compadd or
whatever function is called to add the matches.
Here is a typical use of this function for the tag foo. The
call to _requested determines if tag foo is required at all;
the loop over _next_label handles any labels defined for the
tag in the tag-order style.
local expl ret=1
...
if _requested foo; then
...
while _next_label foo expl '...'; do
compadd "$expl[@]" ... && ret=0
done
...
fi
return ret
_normal
This is the standard function called to handle completion
outside any special -context-. It is called both to com-
plete the command word and also the arguments for a command.
In the second case, _normal looks for a special completion
for that command, and if there is none it uses the comple-
tion for the -default- context.
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A second use is to reexamine the command line specified by
the $words array and the $CURRENT parameter after those have
been modified. For example, the function _precommand, which
completes after pre-command specifiers such as nohup,
removes the first word from the words array, decrements the
CURRENT parameter, then calls _normal again. The effect is
that `nohup cmd ...' is treated in the same way as `cmd
...'.
If the command name matches one of the patterns given by one
of the options -p or -P to compdef, the corresponding com-
pletion function is called and then the parameter _compskip
is checked. If it is set completion is terminated at that
point even if no matches have been found. This is the same
effect as in the -first- context.
_options
This can be used to complete the names of shell options. It
provides a matcher specification that ignores a leading
`no', ignores underscores and allows upper-case letters to
match their lower-case counterparts (for example, `glob',
`noglob', `NO_GLOB' are all completed). Any arguments are
propagated to the compadd builtin.
_options_set and _options_unset
These functions complete only set or unset options, with the
same matching specification used in the _options function.
Note that you need to uncomment a few lines in the
_main_complete function for these functions to work prop-
erly. The lines in question are used to store the option
settings in effect before the completion widget locally sets
the options it needs. Hence these functions are not gener-
ally used by the completion system.
_parameters
This is used to complete the names of shell parameters.
The option `-g pattern' limits the completion to parameters
whose type matches the pattern. The type of a parameter is
that shown by `print ${(t)param}', hence judicious use of
`*' in pattern is probably necessary.
All other arguments are passed to the compadd builtin.
_path_files
This function is used throughout the completion system to
complete filenames. It allows completion of partial paths.
For example, the string `/u/i/s/sig' may be completed to
`/usr/include/sys/signal.h'.
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The options accepted by both _path_files and _files are:
-f Complete all filenames. This is the default.
-/ Specifies that only directories should be completed.
-g pattern
Specifies that only files matching the pattern should
be completed.
-W paths
Specifies path prefixes that are to be prepended to the
string from the command line to generate the filenames
but that should not be inserted as completions nor
shown in completion listings. Here, paths may be the
name of an array parameter, a literal list of paths
enclosed in parentheses or an absolute pathname.
-F ignored-files
This behaves as for the corresponding option to the
compadd builtin. It gives direct control over which
filenames should be ignored. If the option is not
present, the ignored-patterns style is used.
Both _path_files and _files also accept the following
options which are passed to compadd: `-J', `-V', `-1', `-2',
`-n', `-X', `-M', `-P', `-S', `-q', `-r', and `-R'.
Finally, the _path_files function uses the styles expand,
ambiguous, special-dirs, list-suffixes and file-sort
described above.
_pick_variant [ -b builtin-label ] [ -c command ] [ -r name
]
label=pattern ... label [ args ... ]
This function is used to resolve situations where a single
command name requires more than one type of handling, either
because it has more than one variant or because there is a
name clash between two different commands.
The command to run is taken from the first element of the
array words unless this is overridden by the option -c.
This command is run and its output is compared with a series
of patterns. Arguments to be passed to the command can be
specified at the end after all the other arguments. The
patterns to try in order are given by the arguments
label=pattern; if the output of `command args ...' contains
pattern, then label is selected as the label for the command
variant. If none of the patterns match, the final command
label is selected and status 1 is returned.
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If the `-b builtin-label' is given, the command is tested to
see if it is provided as a shell builtin, possibly
autoloaded; if so, the label builtin-label is selected as
the label for the variant.
If the `-r name' is given, the label picked is stored in the
parameter named name.
The results are also cached in the _cmd_variant associative
array indexed by the name of the command run.
_regex_arguments name spec ...
This function generates a completion function name which
matches the specifications spec ..., a set of regular
expressions as described below. After running _regex_argu-
ments, the function name should be called as a normal com-
pletion function. The pattern to be matched is given by the
contents of the words array up to the current cursor posi-
tion joined together with null characters; no quotation is
applied.
The arguments are grouped as sets of alternatives separated
by `|', which are tried one after the other until one
matches. Each alternative consists of a one or more speci-
fications which are tried left to right, with each pattern
matched being stripped in turn from the command line being
tested, until all of the group succeeds or until one fails;
in the latter case, the next alternative is tried. This
structure can be repeated to arbitrary depth by using paren-
theses; matching proceeds from inside to outside.
A special procedure is applied if no test succeeds but the
remaining command line string contains no null character
(implying the remaining word is the one for which comple-
tions are to be generated). The completion target is
restricted to the remaining word and any actions for the
corresponding patterns are executed. In this case, nothing
is stripped from the command line string. The order of
evaluation of the actions can be determined by the tag-order
style; the various formats supported by _alternative can be
used in action. The descr is used for setting up the array
parameter expl.
Specification arguments take one of following forms, in
which metacharacters such as `(', `)', `#' and `|' should be
quoted.
/pattern/ [%lookahead%] [-guard] [:tag:descr:action]
This is a single primitive component. The function
tests whether the combined pattern `(#b)((#B)pat-
tern)lookahead*' matches the command line string. If
so, `guard' is evaluated and its return status is
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examined to determine if the test has succeeded. The
pattern string `[]' is guaranteed never to match. The
lookahead is not stripped from the command line before
the next pattern is examined.
The argument starting with : is used in the same manner
as an argument to _alternative.
A component is used as follows: pattern is tested to
see if the component already exists on the command
line. If it does, any following specifications are
examined to find something to complete. If a component
is reached but no such pattern exists yet on the com-
mand line, the string containing the action is used to
generate matches to insert at that point.
/pattern/+ [%lookahead%] [-guard] [:tag:descr:action]
This is similar to `/pattern/ ...' but the left part of
the command line string (i.e. the part already matched
by previous patterns) is also considered part of the
completion target.
/pattern/- [%lookahead%] [-guard] [:tag:descr:action]
This is similar to `/pattern/ ...' but the actions of
the current and previously matched patterns are ignored
even if the following `pattern' matches the empty
string.
( spec )
Parentheses may be used to groups specs; note each
parenthesis is a single argument to _regex_arguments.
spec #
This allows any number of repetitions of spec.
spec spec
The two specs are to be matched one after the other as
described above.
spec | spec
Either of the two specs can be matched.
The function _regex_words can be used as a helper function
to generate matches for a set of alternative words possibly
with their own arguments as a command line argument.
Examples:
_regex_arguments _tst /$'[^\0]#\0'/ \
/$'[^\0]#\0'/ :'compadd aaa'
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This generates a function _tst that completes aaa as its
only argument. The tag and description for the action have
been omitted for brevity (this works but is not recommended
in normal use). The first component matches the command
word, which is arbitrary; the second matches any argument.
As the argument is also arbitrary, any following component
would not depend on aaa being present.
_regex_arguments _tst /$'[^\0]#\0'/ \
/$'aaa\0'/ :'compadd aaa'
This is a more typical use; it is similar, but any following
patterns would only match if aaa was present as the first
argument.
_regex_arguments _tst /$'[^\0]#\0'/ \( \
/$'aaa\0'/ :'compadd aaa' \
/$'bbb\0'/ :'compadd bbb' \) \#
In this example, an indefinite number of command arguments
may be completed. Odd arguments are completed as aaa and
even arguments as bbb. Completion fails unless the set of
aaa and bbb arguments before the current one is matched cor-
rectly.
_regex_arguments _tst /$'[^\0]#\0'/ \
\( /$'aaa\0'/ :'compadd aaa' \| \
/$'bbb\0'/ :'compadd bbb' \) \#
This is similar, but either aaa or bbb may be completed for
any argument. In this case _regex_words could be used to
generate a suitable expression for the arguments.
_regex_words tag description spec ...
This function can be used to generate arguments for the
_regex_arguments command which may be inserted at any point
where a set of rules is expected. The tag and description
give a standard tag and description pertaining to the cur-
rent context. Each spec contains two or three arguments
separated by a colon: note that there is no leading colon in
this case.
Each spec gives one of a set of words that may be completed
at this point, together with arguments. It is thus roughly
equivalent to the _arguments function when used in normal
(non-regex) completion.
The part of the spec before the first colon is the word to
be completed. This may contain a *; the entire word, before
and after the * is completed, but only the text before the *
is required for the context to be matched, so that further
arguments may be completed after the abbreviated form.
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The second part of spec is a description for the word being
completed.
The optional third part of the spec describes how words fol-
lowing the one being completed are themselves to be com-
pleted. It will be evaluated in order to avoid problems
with quoting. This means that typically it contains a ref-
erence to an array containing previously generated regex
arguments.
The option -t term specifies a terminator for the word
instead of the usual space. This is handled as an
auto-removable suffix in the manner of the option -s sep to
_values.
The result of the processing by _regex_words is placed in
the array reply, which should be made local to the calling
function. If the set of words and arguments may be matched
repeatedly, a # should be appended to the generated array at
that point.
For example:
local -a reply
_regex_words mydb-commands 'mydb commands' \
'add:add an entry to mydb:$mydb_add_cmds' \
'show:show entries in mydb'
_regex_arguments _mydb "$reply[@]"
_mydb "$@"
This shows a completion function for a command mydb which
takes two command arguments, add and show. show takes no
arguments, while the arguments for add have already been
prepared in an array mydb_add_cmds, quite possibly by a pre-
vious call to _regex_words.
]
_requested [ -x ] [ -12VJ ] tag [ name descr [ command args
... ]
This function is called to decide whether a tag already reg-
istered by a call to _tags (see below) has been requested by
the user and hence completion should be performed for it.
It returns status zero if the tag is requested and non-zero
otherwise. The function is typically used as part of a loop
over different tags as follows:
_tags foo bar baz
while _tags; do
if _requested foo; then
... # perform completion for foo
fi
... # test the tags bar and baz in the same way
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... # exit loop if matches were generated
done
Note that the test for whether matches were generated is not
performed until the end of the _tags loop. This is so that
the user can set the tag-order style to specify a set of
tags to be completed at the same time.
If name and descr are given, _requested calls the _descrip-
tion function with these arguments together with the options
passed to _requested.
If command is given, the _all_labels function will be called
immediately with the same arguments. In simple cases this
makes it possible to perform the test for the tag and the
matching in one go. For example:
local expl ret=1
_tags foo bar baz
while _tags; do
_requested foo expl 'description' \
compadd foobar foobaz && ret=0
...
(( ret )) || break
done
If the command is not compadd, it must nevertheless be pre-
pared to handle the same options.
_retrieve_cache cache_identifier
This function retrieves completion information from the file
given by cache_identifier, stored in a directory specified
by the cache-path style which defaults to ~/.zcompcache.
The return status is zero if retrieval was successful. It
will only attempt retrieval if the use-cache style is set,
so you can call this function without worrying about whether
the user wanted to use the caching layer.
See _store_cache below for more details.
_sep_parts
This function is passed alternating arrays and separators as
arguments. The arrays specify completions for parts of
strings to be separated by the separators. The arrays may
be the names of array parameters or a quoted list of words
in parentheses. For example, with the array `hosts=(ftp
news)' the call `_sep_parts '(foo bar)' @ hosts' will com-
plete the string `f' to `foo' and the string `b@n' to
`bar@news'.
This function accepts the compadd options `-V', `-J', `-1',
`-2', `-n', `-X', `-M', `-P', `-S', `-r', `-R', and `-q' and
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passes them on to the compadd builtin used to add the
matches.
_setup tag [ group ]
This function sets up the special parameters used by the
completion system appropriately for the tag given as the
first argument. It uses the styles list-colors,
list-packed, list-rows-first, last-prompt, accept-exact,
menu and force-list.
The optional group supplies the name of the group in which
the matches will be placed. If it is not given, the tag is
used as the group name.
This function is called automatically from _description and
hence is not normally called explicitly.
_store_cache cache_identifier params ...
This function, together with _retrieve_cache and
_cache_invalid, implements a caching layer which can be used
in any completion function. Data obtained by costly opera-
tions are stored in parameters; this function then dumps the
values of those parameters to a file. The data can then be
retrieved quickly from that file via _retrieve_cache, even
in different instances of the shell.
The cache_identifier specifies the file which the data
should be dumped to. The file is stored in a directory
specified by the cache-path style which defaults to ~/.zcom-
pcache. The remaining params arguments are the parameters
to dump to the file.
The return status is zero if storage was successful. The
function will only attempt storage if the use-cache style is
set, so you can call this function without worrying about
whether the user wanted to use the caching layer.
The completion function may avoid calling _retrieve_cache
when it already has the completion data available as parame-
ters. However, in that case it should call _cache_invalid
to check whether the data in the parameters and in the cache
are still valid.
See the _perl_modules completion function for a simple exam-
ple of the usage of the caching layer.
_tags [ [ -C name ] tags ... ]
If called with arguments, these are taken to be the names of
tags valid for completions in the current context. These
tags are stored internally and sorted by using the tag-order
style.
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Next, _tags is called repeatedly without arguments from the
same completion function. This successively selects the
first, second, etc. set of tags requested by the user. The
return status is zero if at least one of the tags is
requested and non-zero otherwise. To test if a particular
tag is to be tried, the _requested function should be called
(see above).
If `-C name' is given, name is temporarily stored in the
argument field (the fifth) of the context in the curcontext
parameter during the call to _tags; the field is restored on
exit. This allows _tags to use a more specific context
without having to change and reset the curcontext parameter
(which has the same effect).
_values [ -O name ] [ -s sep ] [ -S sep ] [ -wC ] desc spec
...
This is used to complete arbitrary keywords (values) and
their arguments, or lists of such combinations.
If the first argument is the option `-O name', it will be
used in the same way as by the _arguments function. In
other words, the elements of the name array will be passed
to compadd when executing an action.
If the first argument (or the first argument after `-O
name') is `-s', the next argument is used as the character
that separates multiple values. This character is automati-
cally added after each value in an auto-removable fashion
(see below); all values completed by `_values -s' appear in
the same word on the command line, unlike completion using
_arguments. If this option is not present, only a single
value will be completed per word.
Normally, _values will only use the current word to deter-
mine which values are already present on the command line
and hence are not to be completed again. If the -w option
is given, other arguments are examined as well.
The first non-option argument is used as a string to print
as a description before listing the values.
All other arguments describe the possible values and their
arguments in the same format used for the description of
options by the _arguments function (see above). The only
differences are that no minus or plus sign is required at
the beginning, values can have only one argument, and the
forms of action beginning with an equal sign are not sup-
ported.
The character separating a value from its argument can be
set using the option -S (like -s, followed by the character
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to use as the separator in the next argument). By default
the equals sign will be used as the separator between values
and arguments.
Example:
_values -s , 'description' \
'*foo[bar]' \
'(two)*one[number]:first count:' \
'two[another number]::second count:(1 2 3)'
This describes three possible values: `foo', `one', and
`two'. The first is described as `bar', takes no argument
and may appear more than once. The second is described as
`number', may appear more than once, and takes one mandatory
argument described as `first count'; no action is specified,
so it will not be completed. The `(two)' at the beginning
says that if the value `one' is on the line, the value `two'
will no longer be considered a possible completion.
Finally, the last value (`two') is described as `another
number' and takes an optional argument described as `second
count' for which the completions (to appear after an `=')
are `1', `2', and `3'. The _values function will complete
lists of these values separated by commas.
Like _arguments, this function temporarily adds another con-
text name component to the arguments element (the fifth) of
the current context while executing the action. Here this
name is just the name of the value for which the argument is
completed.
The style verbose is used to decide if the descriptions for
the values (but not those for the arguments) should be
printed.
The associative array val_args is used to report values and
their arguments; this works similarly to the opt_args asso-
ciative array used by _arguments. Hence the function call-
ing _values should declare the local parameters state,
state_descr, line, context and val_args:
local context state state_descr line
typeset -A val_args
when using an action of the form `->string'. With this
function the context parameter will be set to the name of
the value whose argument is to be completed. Note that for
_values, the state and state_descr are scalars rather than
arrays. Only a single matching state is returned.
Note also that _values normally adds the character used as
the separator between values as an auto-removable suffix
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(similar to a `/' after a directory). However, this is not
possible for a `->string' action as the matches for the
argument are generated by the calling function. To get the
usual behaviour, the calling function can add the separator
x as a suffix by passing the options `-qS x' either directly
or indirectly to compadd.
The option -C is treated in the same way as it is by _argu-
ments. In that case the parameter curcontext should be made
local instead of context (as described above).
...
_wanted [ -x ] [ -C name ] [ -12VJ ] tag name descr command
args
In many contexts, completion can only generate one particu-
lar set of matches, usually corresponding to a single tag.
However, it is still necessary to decide whether the user
requires matches of this type. This function is useful in
such a case.
The arguments to _wanted are the same as those to
_requested, i.e. arguments to be passed to _description.
However, in this case the command is not optional; all the
processing of tags, including the loop over both tags and
tag labels and the generation of matches, is carried out
automatically by _wanted.
Hence to offer only one tag and immediately add the corre-
sponding matches with the given description:
local expl
_wanted tag expl 'description' \
compadd matches...
Note that, as for _requested, the command must be able to
accept options to be passed down to compadd.
Like _tags this function supports the -C option to give a
different name for the argument context field. The -x
option has the same meaning as for _description.
COMPLETION DIRECTORIES
In the source distribution, the files are contained in vari-
ous subdirectories of the Completion directory. They may
have been installed in the same structure, or into one sin-
gle function directory. The following is a description of
the files found in the original directory structure. If you
wish to alter an installed file, you will need to copy it to
some directory which appears earlier in your fpath than the
standard directory where it appears.
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Base The core functions and special completion widgets auto-
matically bound to keys. You will certainly need most
of these, though will probably not need to alter them.
Many of these are documented above.
Zsh Functions for completing arguments of shell builtin
commands and utility functions for this. Some of these
are also used by functions from the Unix directory.
Unix Functions for completing arguments of external commands
and suites of commands. They may need modifying for
your system, although in many cases some attempt is
made to decide which version of a command is present.
For example, completion for the mount command tries to
determine the system it is running on, while completion
for many other utilities try to decide whether the GNU
version of the command is in use, and hence whether the
--help option is supported.
X, AIX, BSD, ...
Completion and utility function for commands available
only on some systems. These are not arranged hierar-
chically, so, for example, both the Linux and Debian
directories, as well as the X directory, may be useful
on your system.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 97
User Commands ZSHCOMPCTL(1)
NAME
zshcompctl - zsh programmable completion
DESCRIPTION
This version of zsh has two ways of performing completion of
words on the command line. New users of the shell may pre-
fer to use the newer and more powerful system based on shell
functions; this is described in zshcompsys(1), and the basic
shell mechanisms which support it are described in zshcomp-
wid(1). This manual entry describes the older compctl com-
mand.
compctl [ -CDT ] options [ command ... ]
options [ -x ... -- ] ... [+] ] [ command ... ]
compctl [ -CDT ] options [ -x pattern options - ... --
] [ +
compctl -M match-specs ...
compctl -L [ -CDTM ] [ command ... ]
compctl + command ...
Control the editor's completion behavior according to the
supplied set of options. Various editing commands, notably
expand-or-complete-word, usually bound to tab, will attempt
to complete a word typed by the user, while others, notably
delete-char-or-list, usually bound to ^D in EMACS editing
mode, list the possibilities; compctl controls what those
possibilities are. They may for example be filenames (the
most common case, and hence the default), shell variables,
or words from a user-specified list.
COMMAND FLAGS
Completion of the arguments of a command may be different
for each command or may use the default. The behavior when
completing the command word itself may also be separately
specified. These correspond to the following flags and
arguments, all of which (except for -L) may be combined with
any combination of the options described subsequently in the
section `Option Flags':
command ...
controls completion for the named commands, which must
be listed last on the command line. If completion is
attempted for a command with a pathname containing
slashes and no completion definition is found, the
search is retried with the last pathname component. If
the command starts with a =, completion is tried with
the pathname of the command.
Any of the command strings may be patterns of the form
normally used for filename generation. These should be
quoted to protect them from immediate expansion; for
example the command string 'foo*' arranges for comple-
tion of the words of any command beginning with foo.
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When completion is attempted, all pattern completions
are tried in the reverse order of their definition
until one matches. By default, completion then pro-
ceeds as normal, i.e. the shell will try to generate
more matches for the specific command on the command
line; this can be overridden by including -tn in the
flags for the pattern completion.
Note that aliases are expanded before the command name
is determined unless the COMPLETE_ALIASES option is
set. Commands may not be combined with the -C, -D or
-T flags.
-C controls completion when the command word itself is
being completed. If no compctl -C command has been
issued, the names of any executable command (whether
in the path or specific to the shell, such as aliases
or functions) are completed.
-D controls default completion behavior for the arguments
of commands not assigned any special behavior. If no
compctl -D command has been issued, filenames are com-
pleted.
-T supplies completion flags to be used before any other
processing is done, even before processing for compctls
defined for specific commands. This is especially use-
ful when combined with extended completion (the -x
flag, see the section `Extended Completion' below).
Using this flag you can define default behavior which
will apply to all commands without exception, or you
can alter the standard behavior for all commands. For
example, if your access to the user database is too
slow and/or it contains too many users (so that comple-
tion after `~' is too slow to be usable), you can use
compctl -T -x 's[~] C[0,[^/]#]' -k friends -S/ -tn
to complete the strings in the array friends after a
`~'. The C[...] argument is necessary so that this
form of ~-completion is not tried after the directory
name is finished.
-L lists the existing completion behavior in a manner
suitable for putting into a start-up script; the exist-
ing behavior is not changed. Any combination of the
above forms, or the -M flag (which must follow the -L
flag), may be specified, otherwise all defined comple-
tions are listed. Any other flags supplied are
ignored.
no argument
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If no argument is given, compctl lists all defined com-
pletions in an abbreviated form; with a list of
options, all completions with those flags set (not
counting extended completion) are listed.
If the + flag is alone and followed immediately by the com-
mand list, the completion behavior for all the commands in
the list is reset to the default. In other words, comple-
tion will subsequently use the options specified by the -D
flag.
The form with -M as the first and only option defines global
matching specifications (see zshcompwid). The match specifi-
cations given will be used for every completion attempt
(only when using compctl, not with the new completion sys-
tem) and are tried in the order in which they are defined
until one generates at least one match. E.g.:
compctl -M '' 'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z}'
This will first try completion without any global match
specifications (the empty string) and, if that generates no
matches, will try case insensitive completion.
OPTION FLAGS
[ -fcFBdeaRGovNAIOPZEnbjrzu/12 ]
[ -k array ] [ -g globstring ] [ -s subststring ]
[ -K function ]
[ -Q ] [ -P prefix ] [ -S suffix ]
[ -W file-prefix ] [ -H num pattern ]
[ -q ] [ -X explanation ] [ -Y explanation ]
[ -y func-or-var ] [ -l cmd ] [ -h cmd ] [ -U ]
[ -t continue ] [ -J name ] [ -V name ]
[ -M match-spec ]
The remaining options specify the type of command arguments
to look for during completion. Any combination of these
flags may be specified; the result is a sorted list of all
the possibilities. The options are as follows.
Simple Flags
These produce completion lists made up by the shell itself:
-f Filenames and file system paths.
-/ Just file system paths.
-c Command names, including aliases, shell functions,
builtins and reserved words.
-F Function names.
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-B Names of builtin commands.
-m Names of external commands.
-w Reserved words.
-a Alias names.
-R Names of regular (non-global) aliases.
-G Names of global aliases.
-d This can be combined with -F, -B, -w, -a, -R and -G to
get names of disabled functions, builtins, reserved
words or aliases.
-e This option (to show enabled commands) is in effect by
default, but may be combined with -d; -de in combina-
tion with -F, -B, -w, -a, -R and -G will complete names
of functions, builtins, reserved words or aliases
whether or not they are disabled.
-o Names of shell options (see zshoptions(1)).
-v Names of any variable defined in the shell.
-N Names of scalar (non-array) parameters.
-A Array names.
-I Names of integer variables.
-O Names of read-only variables.
-p Names of parameters used by the shell (including spe-
cial parameters).
-Z Names of shell special parameters.
-E Names of environment variables.
-n Named directories.
-b Key binding names.
-j Job names: the first word of the job leader's command
line. This is useful with the kill builtin.
-r Names of running jobs.
-z Names of suspended jobs.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 4
User Commands ZSHCOMPCTL(1)
-u User names.
Flags with Arguments
These have user supplied arguments to determine how the list
of completions is to be made up:
-k array
Names taken from the elements of $array (note that the
`$' does not appear on the command line). Alterna-
tively, the argument array itself may be a set of
space- or comma-separated values in parentheses, in
which any delimiter may be escaped with a backslash; in
this case the argument should be quoted. For example,
compctl -k "(cputime filesize datasize stacksize
coredumpsize resident descriptors)" limit
-g globstring
The globstring is expanded using filename globbing; it
should be quoted to protect it from immediate expan-
sion. The resulting filenames are taken as the possible
completions. Use `*(/)' instead of `*/' for directo-
ries. The fignore special parameter is not applied to
the resulting files. More than one pattern may be
given separated by blanks. (Note that brace expansion
is not part of globbing. Use the syntax `(either|or)'
to match alternatives.)
-s subststring
The subststring is split into words and these words are
than expanded using all shell expansion mechanisms (see
zshexpn(1)). The resulting words are taken as possible
completions. The fignore special parameter is not
applied to the resulting files. Note that -g is faster
for filenames.
-K function
Call the given function to get the completions. Unless
the name starts with an underscore, the function is
passed two arguments: the prefix and the suffix of the
word on which completion is to be attempted, in other
words those characters before the cursor position, and
those from the cursor position onwards. The whole com-
mand line can be accessed with the -c and -l flags of
the read builtin. The function should set the variable
reply to an array containing the completions (one com-
pletion per element); note that reply should not be
made local to the function. From such a function the
command line can be accessed with the -c and -l flags
to the read builtin. For example,
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User Commands ZSHCOMPCTL(1)
function whoson { reply=(`users`); }
compctl -K whoson talk
completes only logged-on users after `talk'. Note that
`whoson' must return an array, so `reply=`users`' would
be incorrect.
-H num pattern
The possible completions are taken from the last num
history lines. Only words matching pattern are taken.
If num is zero or negative the whole history is
searched and if pattern is the empty string all words
are taken (as with `*'). A typical use is
compctl -D -f + -H 0 ''
which forces completion to look back in the history
list for a word if no filename matches.
Control Flags
These do not directly specify types of name to be completed,
but manipulate the options that do:
-Q This instructs the shell not to quote any metacharac-
ters in the possible completions. Normally the results
of a completion are inserted into the command line with
any metacharacters quoted so that they are interpreted
as normal characters. This is appropriate for file-
names and ordinary strings. However, for special
effects, such as inserting a backquoted expression from
a completion array (-k) so that the expression will not
be evaluated until the complete line is executed, this
option must be used.
-P prefix
The prefix is inserted just before the completed
string; any initial part already typed will be com-
pleted and the whole prefix ignored for completion pur-
poses. For example,
compctl -j -P "%" kill
inserts a `%' after the kill command and then completes
job names.
-S suffix
When a completion is found the suffix is inserted after
the completed string. In the case of menu completion
the suffix is inserted immediately, but it is still
possible to cycle through the list of completions by
repeatedly hitting the same key.
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-W file-prefix
With directory file-prefix: for command, file, direc-
tory and globbing completion (options -c, -f, -/, -g),
the file prefix is implicitly added in front of the
completion. For example,
compctl -/ -W ~/Mail maildirs
completes any subdirectories to any depth beneath the
directory ~/Mail, although that prefix does not appear
on the command line. The file-prefix may also be of
the form accepted by the -k flag, i.e. the name of an
array or a literal list in parenthesis. In this case
all the directories in the list will be searched for
possible completions.
-q If used with a suffix as specified by the -S option,
this causes the suffix to be removed if the next char-
acter typed is a blank or does not insert anything or
if the suffix consists of only one character and the
next character typed is the same character; this the
same rule used for the AUTO_REMOVE_SLASH option. The
option is most useful for list separators (comma,
colon, etc.).
-l cmd
This option restricts the range of command line words
that are considered to be arguments. If combined with
one of the extended completion patterns `p[...]',
`r[...]', or `R[...]' (see the section `Extended Com-
pletion' below) the range is restricted to the range of
arguments specified in the brackets. Completion is
then performed as if these had been given as arguments
to the cmd supplied with the option. If the cmd string
is empty the first word in the range is instead taken
as the command name, and command name completion per-
formed on the first word in the range. For example,
compctl -x 'r[-exec,;]' -l '' -- find
completes arguments between `-exec' and the following
`;' (or the end of the command line if there is no such
string) as if they were a separate command line.
-h cmd
Normally zsh completes quoted strings as a whole. With
this option, completion can be done separately on dif-
ferent parts of such strings. It works like the -l
option but makes the completion code work on the parts
of the current word that are separated by spaces. These
parts are completed as if they were arguments to the
given cmd. If cmd is the empty string, the first part
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 7
User Commands ZSHCOMPCTL(1)
is completed as a command name, as with -l.
-U Use the whole list of possible completions, whether or
not they actually match the word on the command line.
The word typed so far will be deleted. This is most
useful with a function (given by the -K option) which
can examine the word components passed to it (or via
the read builtin's -c and -l flags) and use its own
criteria to decide what matches. If there is no com-
pletion, the original word is retained. Since the pro-
duced possible completions seldom have interesting com-
mon prefixes and suffixes, menu completion is started
immediately if AUTO_MENU is set and this flag is used.
-y func-or-var
The list provided by func-or-var is displayed instead
of the list of completions whenever a listing is
required; the actual completions to be inserted are not
affected. It can be provided in two ways. Firstly, if
func-or-var begins with a $ it defines a variable, or
if it begins with a left parenthesis a literal array,
which contains the list. A variable may have been set
by a call to a function using the -K option. Otherwise
it contains the name of a function which will be exe-
cuted to create the list. The function will be passed
as an argument list all matching completions, including
prefixes and suffixes expanded in full, and should set
the array reply to the result. In both cases, the dis-
play list will only be retrieved after a complete list
of matches has been created.
Note that the returned list does not have to corre-
spond, even in length, to the original set of matches,
and may be passed as a scalar instead of an array. No
special formatting of characters is performed on the
output in this case; in particular, newlines are
printed literally and if they appear output in columns
is suppressed.
-X explanation
Print explanation when trying completion on the current
set of options. A `%n' in this string is replaced by
the number of matches that were added for this explana-
tion string. The explanation only appears if comple-
tion was tried and there was no unique match, or when
listing completions. Explanation strings will be listed
together with the matches of the group specified
together with the -X option (using the -J or -V
option). If the same explanation string is given to
multiple -X options, the string appears only once (for
each group) and the number of matches shown for the
`%n' is the total number of all matches for each of
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 8
User Commands ZSHCOMPCTL(1)
these uses. In any case, the explanation string will
only be shown if there was at least one match added for
the explanation string.
The sequences %B, %b, %S, %s, %U, and %u specify output
attributes (bold, standout, and underline), %F, %f, %K,
%k specify foreground and background colours, and
%{...%} can be used to include literal escape sequences
as in prompts.
-Y explanation
Identical to -X, except that the explanation first
undergoes expansion following the usual rules for
strings in double quotes. The expansion will be car-
ried out after any functions are called for the -K or
-y options, allowing them to set variables.
-t continue
The continue-string contains a character that specifies
which set of completion flags should be used next. It
is useful:
(i) With -T, or when trying a list of pattern comple-
tions, when compctl would usually continue with ordi-
nary processing after finding matches; this can be sup-
pressed with `-tn'.
(ii) With a list of alternatives separated by +, when
compctl would normally stop when one of the alterna-
tives generates matches. It can be forced to consider
the next set of completions by adding `-t+' to the
flags of the alternative before the `+'.
(iii) In an extended completion list (see below), when
compctl would normally continue until a set of condi-
tions succeeded, then use only the immediately follow-
ing flags. With `-t-', compctl will continue trying
extended completions after the next `-'; with `-tx' it
will attempt completion with the default flags, in
other words those before the `-x'.
-J name
This gives the name of the group the matches should be
placed in. Groups are listed and sorted separately;
likewise, menu completion will offer the matches in the
groups in the order in which the groups were defined.
If no group name is explicitly given, the matches are
stored in a group named default. The first time a group
name is encountered, a group with that name is created.
After that all matches with the same group name are
stored in that group.
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This can be useful with non-exclusive alternative com-
pletions. For example, in
compctl -f -J files -t+ + -v -J variables foo
both files and variables are possible completions, as
the -t+ forces both sets of alternatives before and
after the + to be considered at once. Because of the
-J options, however, all files are listed before all
variables.
-V name
Like -J, but matches within the group will not be
sorted in listings nor in menu completion. These
unsorted groups are in a different name space from the
sorted ones, so groups defined as -J files and -V files
are distinct.
-1 If given together with the -V option, makes only con-
secutive duplicates in the group be removed. Note that
groups with and without this flag are in different name
spaces.
-2 If given together with the -J or -V option, makes all
duplicates be kept. Again, groups with and without this
flag are in different name spaces.
-M match-spec
This defines additional matching control specifications
that should be used only when testing words for the
list of flags this flag appears in. The format of the
match-spec string is described in zshcompwid.
ALTERNATIVE COMPLETION
compctl [ -CDT ] options + options [ + ... ] [ + ] command
...
The form with `+' specifies alternative options. Completion
is tried with the options before the first `+'. If this pro-
duces no matches completion is tried with the flags after
the `+' and so on. If there are no flags after the last `+'
and a match has not been found up to that point, default
completion is tried. If the list of flags contains a -t
with a + character, the next list of flags is used even if
the current list produced matches.
Additional options are available that restrict completion to
some part of the command line; this is referred to as
`extended completion'.
EXTENDED COMPLETION
compctl [ -CDT ] options -x pattern options - ... --
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[ command ... ]
compctl [ -CDT ] options [ -x pattern options - ... -- ]
[ + options [ -x ... -- ] ... [+] ] [ command ... ]
The form with `-x' specifies extended completion for the
commands given; as shown, it may be combined with alterna-
tive completion using `+'. Each pattern is examined in
turn; when a match is found, the corresponding options, as
described in the section `Option Flags' above, are used to
generate possible completions. If no pattern matches, the
options given before the -x are used.
Note that each pattern should be supplied as a single argu-
ment and should be quoted to prevent expansion of metachar-
acters by the shell.
A pattern is built of sub-patterns separated by commas; it
matches if at least one of these sub-patterns matches (they
are `or'ed). These sub-patterns are in turn composed of
other sub-patterns separated by white spaces which match if
all of the sub-patterns match (they are `and'ed). An ele-
ment of the sub-patterns is of the form `c[...][...]', where
the pairs of brackets may be repeated as often as necessary,
and matches if any of the sets of brackets match (an `or').
The example below makes this clearer.
The elements may be any of the following:
s[string]...
Matches if the current word on the command line starts
with one of the strings given in brackets. The string
is not removed and is not part of the completion.
S[string]...
Like s[string] except that the string is part of the
completion.
p[from,to]...
Matches if the number of the current word is between
one of the from and to pairs inclusive. The comma and
to are optional; to defaults to the same value as from.
The numbers may be negative: -n refers to the n'th last
word on the line.
c[offset,string]...
Matches if the string matches the word offset by offset
from the current word position. Usually offset will be
negative.
C[offset,pattern]...
Like c but using pattern matching instead.
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w[index,string]...
Matches if the word in position index is equal to the
corresponding string. Note that the word count is made
after any alias expansion.
W[index,pattern]...
Like w but using pattern matching instead.
n[index,string]...
Matches if the current word contains string. Anything
up to and including the indexth occurrence of this
string will not be considered part of the completion,
but the rest will. index may be negative to count from
the end: in most cases, index will be 1 or -1. For
example,
compctl -s '`users`' -x 'n[1,@]' -k hosts -- talk
will usually complete usernames, but if you insert an @
after the name, names from the array hosts (assumed to
contain hostnames, though you must make the array your-
self) will be completed. Other commands such as rcp
can be handled similarly.
N[index,string]...
Like n except that the string will be taken as a char-
acter class. Anything up to and including the indexth
occurrence of any of the characters in string will not
be considered part of the completion.
m[min,max]...
Matches if the total number of words lies between min
and max inclusive.
r[str1,str2]...
Matches if the cursor is after a word with prefix str1.
If there is also a word with prefix str2 on the command
line after the one matched by str1 it matches only if
the cursor is before this word. If the comma and str2
are omitted, it matches if the cursor is after a word
with prefix str1.
R[str1,str2]...
Like r but using pattern matching instead.
q[str]...
Matches the word currently being completed is in single
quotes and the str begins with the letter `s', or if
completion is done in double quotes and str starts with
the letter `d', or if completion is done in backticks
and str starts with a `b'.
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EXAMPLE
compctl -u -x 's[+] c[-1,-f],s[-f+]' \
-g '~/Mail/*(:t)' - 's[-f],c[-1,-f]' -f -- mail
This is to be interpreted as follows:
If the current command is mail, then
if ((the current word begins with + and the previous word is -f)
or (the current word begins with -f+)), then complete the
non-directory part (the `:t' glob modifier) of files in the directory
~/Mail; else
if the current word begins with -f or the previous word was -f, then
complete any file; else
complete user names.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
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NAME
zshmodules - zsh loadable modules
DESCRIPTION
Some optional parts of zsh are in modules, separate from the
core of the shell. Each of these modules may be linked in
to the shell at build time, or can be dynamically linked
while the shell is running if the installation supports this
feature. Modules are linked at runtime with the zmodload
command, see zshbuiltins(1).
The modules that are bundled with the zsh distribution are:
zsh/attr
Builtins for manipulating extended attributes (xattr).
zsh/cap
Builtins for manipulating POSIX.1e (POSIX.6) capability
(privilege) sets.
zsh/clone
A builtin that can clone a running shell onto another
terminal.
zsh/compctl
The compctl builtin for controlling completion.
zsh/complete
The basic completion code.
zsh/complist
Completion listing extensions.
zsh/computil
A module with utility builtins needed for the shell
function based completion system.
zsh/curses
curses windowing commands
zsh/datetime
Some date/time commands and parameters.
zsh/deltochar
A ZLE function duplicating EMACS' zap-to-char.
zsh/example
An example of how to write a module.
zsh/files
Some basic file manipulation commands as builtins.
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zsh/langinfo
Interface to locale information.
zsh/mapfile
Access to external files via a special associative
array.
zsh/mathfunc
Standard scientific functions for use in mathematical
evaluations.
zsh/newuser
Arrange for files for new users to be installed.
zsh/parameter
Access to internal hash tables via special associative
arrays.
zsh/pcre
Interface to the PCRE library.
zsh/regex
Interface to the POSIX regex library.
zsh/sched
A builtin that provides a timed execution facility
within the shell.
zsh/net/socket
Manipulation of Unix domain sockets
zsh/stat
A builtin command interface to the stat system call.
zsh/system
A builtin interface to various low-level system fea-
tures.
zsh/net/tcp
Manipulation of TCP sockets
zsh/termcap
Interface to the termcap database.
zsh/terminfo
Interface to the terminfo database.
zsh/zftp
A builtin FTP client.
zsh/zle
The Zsh Line Editor, including the bindkey and vared
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builtins.
zsh/zleparameter
Access to internals of the Zsh Line Editor via parame-
ters.
zsh/zprof
A module allowing profiling for shell functions.
zsh/zpty
A builtin for starting a command in a pseudo-terminal.
zsh/zselect
Block and return when file descriptors are ready.
zsh/zutil
Some utility builtins, e.g. the one for supporting con-
figuration via styles.
THE ZSH/ATTR MODULE
The zsh/attr module is used for manipulating extended
attributes. The -h option causes all commands to operate on
symbolic links instead of their targets. The builtins in
this module are:
zgetattr [ -h ] filename attribute [ parameter ]
Get the extended attribute attribute from the specified
filename. If the optional argument parameter is given,
the attribute is set on that parameter instead of being
printed to stdout.
zsetattr [ -h ] filename attribute value
Set the extended attribute attribute on the specified
filename to value.
zdelattr [ -h ] filename attribute
Remove the extended attribute attribute from the speci-
fied filename.
zlistattr [ -h ] filename [ parameter ]
List the extended attributes currently set on the spec-
ified filename. If the optional argument parameter is
given, the list of attributes is set on that parameter
instead of being printed to stdout.
zgetattr and zlistattr allocate memory dynamically. If the
attribute or list of attributes grows between the allocation
and the call to get them, they return 2. On all other
errors, 1 is returned. This allows the calling function to
check for this case and retry.
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THE ZSH/CAP MODULE
The zsh/cap module is used for manipulating POSIX.1e
(POSIX.6) capability sets. If the operating system does not
support this interface, the builtins defined by this module
will do nothing. The builtins in this module are:
cap [ capabilities ]
Change the shell's process capability sets to the spec-
ified capabilities, otherwise display the shell's cur-
rent capabilities.
getcap filename ...
This is a built-in implementation of the POSIX standard
utility. It displays the capability sets on each spec-
ified filename.
setcap capabilities filename ...
This is a built-in implementation of the POSIX standard
utility. It sets the capability sets on each specified
filename to the specified capabilities.
THE ZSH/CLONE MODULE
The zsh/clone module makes available one builtin command:
clone tty
Creates a forked instance of the current shell,
attached to the specified tty. In the new shell, the
PID, PPID and TTY special parameters are changed appro-
priately. $! is set to zero in the new shell, and to
the new shell's PID in the original shell.
The return status of the builtin is zero in both shells
if successful, and non-zero on error.
The target of clone should be an unused terminal, such
as an unused virtual console or a virtual terminal cre-
ated by
xterm -e sh -c 'trap : INT QUIT TSTP; tty; while :; do
sleep 100000000; done'
Some words of explanation are warranted about this long
xterm command line: when doing clone on a pseudo-termi-
nal, some other session ("session" meant as a unix ses-
sion group, or SID) is already owning the terminal.
Hence the cloned zsh cannot acquire the pseudo-terminal
as a controlling tty. That means two things:
the job control signals will go to the
sh-started-by-xterm process
group (that's why we disable INT QUIT and TSTP
with trap; otherwise
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the while loop could get suspended or killed)
the cloned shell will have job control disabled, and
the job
control keys (control-C, control-\ and control-Z)
will not work.
This does not apply when cloning to an unused vc.
Cloning to a used (and unprepared) terminal will result
in two processes reading simultaneously from the same
terminal, with input bytes going randomly to either
process.
clone is mostly useful as a shell built-in replacement
for openvt.
THE ZSH/COMPCTL MODULE
The zsh/compctl module makes available two builtin commands.
compctl, is the old, deprecated way to control completions
for ZLE. See zshcompctl(1). The other builtin command,
compcall can be used in user-defined completion widgets, see
zshcompwid(1).
THE ZSH/COMPLETE MODULE
The zsh/complete module makes available several builtin com-
mands which can be used in user-defined completion widgets,
see zshcompwid(1).
THE ZSH/COMPLIST MODULE
The zsh/complist module offers three extensions to comple-
tion listings: the ability to highlight matches in such a
list, the ability to scroll through long lists and a differ-
ent style of menu completion.
Colored completion listings
Whenever one of the parameters ZLS_COLORS or ZLS_COLOURS is
set and the zsh/complist module is loaded or linked into the
shell, completion lists will be colored. Note, however,
that complist will not automatically be loaded if it is not
linked in: on systems with dynamic loading, `zmodload
zsh/complist' is required.
The parameters ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS describe how
matches are highlighted. To turn on highlighting an empty
value suffices, in which case all the default values given
below will be used. The format of the value of these param-
eters is the same as used by the GNU version of the ls com-
mand: a colon-separated list of specifications of the form
`name=value'. The name may be one of the following strings,
most of which specify file types for which the value will be
used. The strings and their default values are:
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no 0 for normal text (i.e. when displaying something other
than a matched file)
fi 0 for regular files
di 32
for directories
ln 36
for symbolic links. If this has the special value tar-
get, symbolic links are dereferenced and the target
file used to determine the display format.
pi 31
for named pipes (FIFOs)
so 33
for sockets
bd 44;37
for block devices
cd 44;37
for character devices
or none
for a symlink to nonexistent file (default is the value
defined for ln)
mi none
for a non-existent file (default is the value defined
for fi); this code is currently not used
su 37;41
for files with setuid bit set
sg 30;43
for files with setgid bit set
tw 30;42
for world writable directories with sticky bit set
ow 34;43
for world writable directories without sticky bit set
sa none
for files with an associated suffix alias; this is only
tested after specific suffixes, as described below
st 37;44
for directories with sticky bit set but not world
writable
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ex 35
for executable files
lc \e[
for the left code (see below)
rc m for the right code
tc 0 for the character indicating the file type printed
after filenames if the LIST_TYPES option is set
sp 0 for the spaces printed after matches to align the next
column
ec none
for the end code
Apart from these strings, the name may also be an asterisk
(`*') followed by any string. The value given for such a
string will be used for all files whose name ends with the
string. The name may also be an equals sign (`=') followed
by a pattern; the EXTENDED_GLOB option will be turned on for
evaluation of the pattern. The value given for this pattern
will be used for all matches (not just filenames) whose dis-
play string are matched by the pattern. Definitions for the
form with the leading equal sign take precedence over the
values defined for file types, which in turn take precedence
over the form with the leading asterisk (file extensions).
The leading-equals form also allows different parts of the
displayed strings to be colored differently. For this, the
pattern has to use the `(#b)' globbing flag and pairs of
parentheses surrounding the parts of the strings that are to
be colored differently. In this case the value may consist
of more than one color code separated by equal signs. The
first code will be used for all parts for which no explicit
code is specified and the following codes will be used for
the parts matched by the sub-patterns in parentheses. For
example, the specification `=(#b)(?)*(?)=0=3=7' will be used
for all matches which are at least two characters long and
will use the code `3' for the first character, `7' for the
last character and `0' for the rest.
All three forms of name may be preceded by a pattern in
parentheses. If this is given, the value will be used only
for matches in groups whose names are matched by the pattern
given in the parentheses. For example, `(g*)m*=43' high-
lights all matches beginning with `m' in groups whose names
begin with `g' using the color code `43'. In case of the
`lc', `rc', and `ec' codes, the group pattern is ignored.
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Note also that all patterns are tried in the order in which
they appear in the parameter value until the first one
matches which is then used.
When printing a match, the code prints the value of lc, the
value for the file-type or the last matching specification
with a `*', the value of rc, the string to display for the
match itself, and then the value of ec if that is defined or
the values of lc, no, and rc if ec is not defined.
The default values are ISO 6429 (ANSI) compliant and can be
used on vt100 compatible terminals such as xterms. On mono-
chrome terminals the default values will have no visible
effect. The colors function from the contribution can be
used to get associative arrays containing the codes for ANSI
terminals (see the section `Other Functions' in zshcon-
trib(1)). For example, after loading colors, one could use
`$colors[red]' to get the code for foreground color red and
`$colors[bg-green]' for the code for background color green.
If the completion system invoked by compinit is used, these
parameters should not be set directly because the system
controls them itself. Instead, the list-colors style should
be used (see the section `Completion System Configuration'
in zshcompsys(1)).
Scrolling in completion listings
To enable scrolling through a completion list, the LIST-
PROMPT parameter must be set. Its value will be used as the
prompt; if it is the empty string, a default prompt will be
used. The value may contain escapes of the form `%x'. It
supports the escapes `%B', `%b', `%S', `%s', `%U', `%u',
`%F', `%f', `%K', `%k' and `%{...%}' used also in shell
prompts as well as three pairs of additional sequences: a
`%l' or `%L' is replaced by the number of the last line
shown and the total number of lines in the form `num-
ber/total'; a `%m' or `%M' is replaced with the number of
the last match shown and the total number of matches; and
`%p' or `%P' is replaced with `Top', `Bottom' or the posi-
tion of the first line shown in percent of the total number
of lines, respectively. In each of these cases the form
with the uppercase letter will be replaced with a string of
fixed width, padded to the right with spaces, while the low-
ercase form will not be padded.
If the parameter LISTPROMPT is set, the completion code will
not ask if the list should be shown. Instead it immediately
starts displaying the list, stopping after the first screen-
ful, showing the prompt at the bottom, waiting for a key-
press after temporarily switching to the listscroll keymap.
Some of the zle functions have a special meaning while
scrolling lists:
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send-break
stops listing discarding the key pressed
accept-line, down-history, down-line-or-history
down-line-or-search, vi-down-line-or-history
scrolls forward one line
complete-word, menu-complete, expand-or-complete
expand-or-complete-prefix, menu-complete-or-expand
scrolls forward one screenful
accept-search
stop listing but take no other action
Every other character stops listing and immediately pro-
cesses the key as usual. Any key that is not bound in the
listscroll keymap or that is bound to undefined-key is
looked up in the keymap currently selected.
As for the ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS parameters, LISTPROMPT
should not be set directly when using the shell function
based completion system. Instead, the list-prompt style
should be used.
Menu selection
The zsh/complist module also offers an alternative style of
selecting matches from a list, called menu selection, which
can be used if the shell is set up to return to the last
prompt after showing a completion list (see the
ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT option in zshoptions(1)).
Menu selection can be invoked directly by the widget
menu-select defined by this module. This is a standard ZLE
widget that can be bound to a key in the usual way as
described in zshzle(1).
Alternatively, the parameter MENUSELECT can be set to an
integer, which gives the minimum number of matches that must
be present before menu selection is automatically turned on.
This second method requires that menu completion be started,
either directly from a widget such as menu-complete, or due
to one of the options MENU_COMPLETE or AUTO_MENU being set.
If MENUSELECT is set, but is 0, 1 or empty, menu selection
will always be started during an ambiguous menu completion.
When using the completion system based on shell functions,
the MENUSELECT parameter should not be used (like the
ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS parameters described above).
Instead, the menu style should be used with the select=...
keyword.
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After menu selection is started, the matches will be listed.
If there are more matches than fit on the screen, only the
first screenful is shown. The matches to insert into the
command line can be selected from this list. In the list
one match is highlighted using the value for ma from the
ZLS_COLORS or ZLS_COLOURS parameter. The default value for
this is `7' which forces the selected match to be high-
lighted using standout mode on a vt100-compatible terminal.
If neither ZLS_COLORS nor ZLS_COLOURS is set, the same ter-
minal control sequence as for the `%S' escape in prompts is
used.
If there are more matches than fit on the screen and the
parameter MENUPROMPT is set, its value will be shown below
the matches. It supports the same escape sequences as LIST-
PROMPT, but the number of the match or line shown will be
that of the one where the mark is placed. If its value is
the empty string, a default prompt will be used.
The MENUSCROLL parameter can be used to specify how the list
is scrolled. If the parameter is unset, this is done line
by line, if it is set to `0' (zero), the list will scroll
half the number of lines of the screen. If the value is
positive, it gives the number of lines to scroll and if it
is negative, the list will be scrolled the number of lines
of the screen minus the (absolute) value.
As for the ZLS_COLORS, ZLS_COLOURS and LISTPROMPT parame-
ters, neither MENUPROMPT nor MENUSCROLL should be set
directly when using the shell function based completion sys-
tem. Instead, the select-prompt and select-scroll styles
should be used.
The completion code sometimes decides not to show all of the
matches in the list. These hidden matches are either
matches for which the completion function which added them
explicitly requested that they not appear in the list (using
the -n option of the compadd builtin command) or they are
matches which duplicate a string already in the list
(because they differ only in things like prefixes or suf-
fixes that are not displayed). In the list used for menu
selection, however, even these matches are shown so that it
is possible to select them. To highlight such matches the
hi and du capabilities in the ZLS_COLORS and ZLS_COLOURS
parameters are supported for hidden matches of the first and
second kind, respectively.
Selecting matches is done by moving the mark around using
the zle movement functions. When not all matches can be
shown on the screen at the same time, the list will scroll
up and down when crossing the top or bottom line. The fol-
lowing zle functions have special meaning during menu
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selection. Note that the following always perform the same
task within the menu selection map and cannot be replaced by
user defined widgets, nor can the set of functions be
extended:
accept-line, accept-search
accept the current match and leave menu selection (but
do not cause the command line to be accepted)
send-break
leaves menu selection and restores the previous con-
tents of the command line
redisplay, clear-screen
execute their normal function without leaving menu
selection
accept-and-hold, accept-and-menu-complete
accept the currently inserted match and continue selec-
tion allowing to select the next match to insert into
the line
accept-and-infer-next-history
accepts the current match and then tries completion
with menu selection again; in the case of files this
allows one to select a directory and immediately
attempt to complete files in it; if there are no
matches, a message is shown and one can use undo to go
back to completion on the previous level, every other
key leaves menu selection (including the other zle
functions which are otherwise special during menu
selection)
undo removes matches inserted during the menu selection by
one of the three functions before
down-history, down-line-or-history
vi-down-line-or-history, down-line-or-search
moves the mark one line down
up-history, up-line-or-history
vi-up-line-or-history, up-line-or-search
moves the mark one line up
forward-char, vi-forward-char
moves the mark one column right
backward-char, vi-backward-char
moves the mark one column left
forward-word, vi-forward-word
vi-forward-word-end, emacs-forward-word
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moves the mark one screenful down
backward-word, vi-backward-word, emacs-backward-word
moves the mark one screenful up
vi-forward-blank-word, vi-forward-blank-word-end
moves the mark to the first line of the next group of
matches
vi-backward-blank-word
moves the mark to the last line of the previous group
of matches
beginning-of-history
moves the mark to the first line
end-of-history
moves the mark to the last line
beginning-of-buffer-or-history, beginning-of-line
beginning-of-line-hist, vi-beginning-of-line
moves the mark to the leftmost column
end-of-buffer-or-history, end-of-line
end-of-line-hist, vi-end-of-line
moves the mark to the rightmost column
complete-word, menu-complete, expand-or-complete
expand-or-complete-prefix, menu-expand-or-complete
moves the mark to the next match
reverse-menu-complete
moves the mark to the previous match
vi-insert
this toggles between normal and interactive mode; in
interactive mode the keys bound to self-insert and
self-insert-unmeta insert into the command line as in
normal editing mode but without leaving menu selection;
after each character completion is tried again and the
list changes to contain only the new matches; the com-
pletion widgets make the longest unambiguous string be
inserted in the command line and undo and back-
ward-delete-char go back to the previous set of matches
history-incremental-search-forward
history-incremental-search-backward
this starts incremental searches in the list of comple-
tions displayed; in this mode, accept-line only leaves
incremental search, going back to the normal menu
selection mode
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All movement functions wrap around at the edges; any other
zle function not listed leaves menu selection and executes
that function. It is possible to make widgets in the above
list do the same by using the form of the widget with a `.'
in front. For example, the widget `.accept-line' has the
effect of leaving menu selection and accepting the entire
command line.
During this selection the widget uses the keymap menuselect.
Any key that is not defined in this keymap or that is bound
to undefined-key is looked up in the keymap currently
selected. This is used to ensure that the most important
keys used during selection (namely the cursor keys, return,
and TAB) have sensible defaults. However, keys in the
menuselect keymap can be modified directly using the bindkey
builtin command (see zshmodules(1)). For example, to make
the return key leave menu selection without accepting the
match currently selected one could call
bindkey -M menuselect '^M' send-break
after loading the zsh/complist module.
THE ZSH/COMPUTIL MODULE
The zsh/computil module adds several builtin commands that
are used by some of the completion functions in the comple-
tion system based on shell functions (see zshcompsys(1) ).
Except for compquote these builtin commands are very spe-
cialised and thus not very interesting when writing your own
completion functions. In summary, these builtin commands
are:
comparguments
This is used by the _arguments function to do the argu-
ment and command line parsing. Like compdescribe it
has an option -i to do the parsing and initialize some
internal state and various options to access the state
information to decide what should be completed.
compdescribe
This is used by the _describe function to build the
displays for the matches and to get the strings to add
as matches with their options. On the first call one
of the options -i or -I should be supplied as the first
argument. In the first case, display strings without
the descriptions will be generated, in the second case,
the string used to separate the matches from their
descriptions must be given as the second argument and
the descriptions (if any) will be shown. All other
arguments are like the definition arguments to
_describe itself.
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Once compdescribe has been called with either the -i or
the -I option, it can be repeatedly called with the -g
option and the names of five arrays as its arguments.
This will step through the different sets of matches
and store the options in the first array, the strings
with descriptions in the second, the matches for these
in the third, the strings without descriptions in the
fourth, and the matches for them in the fifth array.
These are then directly given to compadd to register
the matches with the completion code.
compfiles
Used by the _path_files function to optimize complex
recursive filename generation (globbing). It does
three things. With the -p and -P options it builds the
glob patterns to use, including the paths already han-
dled and trying to optimize the patterns with respect
to the prefix and suffix from the line and the match
specification currently used. The -i option does the
directory tests for the ignore-parents style and the -r
option tests if a component for some of the matches are
equal to the string on the line and removes all other
matches if that is true.
compgroups
Used by the _tags function to implement the internals
of the group-order style. This only takes its argu-
ments as names of completion groups and creates the
groups for it (all six types: sorted and unsorted, both
without removing duplicates, with removing all dupli-
cates and with removing consecutive duplicates).
compquote [ -p ] names ...
There may be reasons to write completion functions that
have to add the matches using the -Q option to compadd
and perform quoting themselves. Instead of interpret-
ing the first character of the all_quotes key of the
compstate special association and using the q flag for
parameter expansions, one can use this builtin command.
The arguments are the names of scalar or array parame-
ters and the values of these parameters are quoted as
needed for the innermost quoting level. If the -p
option is given, quoting is done as if there is some
prefix before the values of the parameters, so that a
leading equal sign will not be quoted.
The return status is non-zero in case of an error and
zero otherwise.
comptags
comptry
These implement the internals of the tags mechanism.
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compvalues
Like comparguments, but for the _values function.
THE ZSH/CURSES MODULE
The zsh/curses module makes available one builtin command
and various parameters.
Builtin
zcurses init
zcurses end
]
zcurses addwin targetwin nlines ncols begin_y begin_x [ par-
entwin
zcurses delwin targetwin
zcurses refresh [ targetwin ... ]
zcurses touch targetwin ...
zcurses move targetwin new_y new_x
zcurses clear targetwin [ redraw | eol | bot ]
zcurses position targetwin array
zcurses char targetwin character
zcurses string targetwin string
zcurses border targetwin border
zcurses attr targetwin [ {+/-}attribute | fg_col/bg_col ]
[...]
[...]
zcurses bg targetwin [ {+/-}attribute | fg_col/bg_col |
@char ]
zcurses scroll targetwin [ on | off | {+/-}lines ]
zcurses input targetwin [ param [ kparam [ mparam ] ] ]
zcurses mouse [ delay num | {+/-}motion ]
zcurses timeout targetwin intval
zcurses querychar targetwin [ param ]
Manipulate curses windows. All uses of this command
should be bracketed by `zcurses init' to initialise use
of curses, and `zcurses end' to end it; omitting
`zcurses end' can cause the terminal to be in an
unwanted state.
The subcommand addwin creates a window with nlines
lines and ncols columns. Its upper left corner will be
placed at row begin_y and column begin_x of the screen.
targetwin is a string and refers to the name of a win-
dow that is not currently assigned. Note in particular
the curses convention that vertical values appear
before horizontal values.
If addwin is given an existing window as the final
argument, the new window is created as a subwindow of
parentwin. This differs from an ordinary new window in
that the memory of the window contents is shared with
the parent's memory. Subwindows must be deleted before
their parent. Note that the coordinates of subwindows
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are relative to the screen, not the parent, as with
other windows.
Use the subcommand delwin to delete a window created
with addwin. Note that end does not implicitly delete
windows, and that delwin does not erase the screen
image of the window.
The window corresponding to the full visible screen is
called stdscr; it always exists after `zcurses init'
and cannot be delete with delwin.
The subcommand refresh will refresh window targetwin;
this is necessary to make any pending changes (such as
characters you have prepared for output with char) vis-
ible on the screen. refresh without an argument causes
the screen to be cleared and redrawn. If multiple win-
dows are given, the screen is updated once at the end.
The subcommand touch marks the targetwins listed as
changed. This is necessary before refreshing windows
if a window that was in front of another window (which
may be stdscr) is deleted.
The subcommand move moves the cursor position in tar-
getwin to new coordinates new_y and new_x. Note that
the subcommand string (but not the subcommand char)
advances the cursor position over the characters added.
The subcommand clear erases the contents of targetwin.
One (and no more than one) of three options may be
specified. With the option redraw, in addition the
next refresh of targetwin will cause the screen to be
cleared and repainted. With the option eol, targetwin
is only cleared to the end of the current cursor line.
With the option bot, targetwin is cleared to the end of
the window, i.e everything to the right and below the
cursor is cleared.
The subcommand position writes various positions asso-
ciated with targetwin into the array named array.
These are, in order:
- The y and x coordinates of the cursor relative to
the top left of targetwin
- The y and x coordinates of the top left of tar-
getwin on the screen
- The size of targetwin in y and x dimensions.
Outputting characters and strings are achieved by char
and string respectively.
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To draw a border around window targetwin, use border.
Note that the border is not subsequently handled spe-
cially: in other words, the border is simply a set of
characters output at the edge of the window. Hence it
can be overwritten, can scroll off the window, etc.
The subcommand attr will set targetwin's attributes or
foreground/background color pair for any successive
character output. Each attribute given on the line may
be prepended by a + to set or a - to unset that
attribute; + is assumed if absent. The attributes sup-
ported are blink, bold, dim, reverse, standout, and
underline.
Each fg_col/bg_col attribute (to be read as `fg_col on
bg_col') sets the foreground and background color for
character output. The color default is sometimes
available (in particular if the library is ncurses),
specifying the foreground or background color with
which the terminal started. The color pair
default/default is always available.
bg overrides the color and other attributes of all
characters in the window. Its usual use is to set the
background initially, but it will overwrite the
attributes of any characters at the time when it is
called. In addition to the arguments allowed with
attr, an argument @char specifies a character to be
shown in otherwise blank areas of the window. Owing to
limitations of curses this cannot be a multibyte char-
acter (use of ASCII characters only is recommended).
As the specified set of attributes override the exist-
ing background, turning attributes off in the arguments
is not useful, though this does not cause an error.
The subcommand scroll can be used with on or off to
enabled or disable scrolling of a window when the cur-
sor would otherwise move below the window due to typing
or output. It can also be used with a positive or neg-
ative integer to scroll the window up or down the given
number of lines without changing the current cursor
position (which therefore appears to move in the oppo-
site direction relative to the window). In the second
case, if scrolling is off it is temporarily turned on
to allow the window to be scrolled.
The subcommand input reads a single character from the
window without echoing it back. If param is supplied
the character is assigned to the parameter param, else
it is assigned to the parameter REPLY.
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If both param and kparam are supplied, the key is read
in `keypad' mode. In this mode special keys such as
function keys and arrow keys return the name of the key
in the parameter kparam. The key names are the macros
defined in the curses.h or ncurses.h with the prefix
`KEY_' removed; see also the description of the parame-
ter zcurses_keycodes below. Other keys cause a value
to be set in param as before. On a successful return
only one of param or kparam contains a non-empty
string; the other is set to an empty string.
If mparam is also supplied, input attempts to handle
mouse input. This is only available with the ncurses
library; mouse handling can be detected by checking for
the exit status of `zcurses mouse' with no arguments.
If a mouse button is clicked (or double- or
triple-clicked, or pressed or released with a config-
urable delay from being clicked) then kparam is set to
the string MOUSE, and mparam is set to an array con-
sisting of the following elements:
- An identifier to discriminate different input
devices; this is only rarely useful.
- The x, y and z coordinates of the mouse click rel-
ative to the full screen, as three elements in
that order (i.e. the y coordinate is, unusually,
after the x coordinate). The z coordinate is only
available for a few unusual input devices and is
otherwise set to zero.
- Any events that occurred as separate items; usu-
ally there will be just one. An event consists of
PRESSED, RELEASED, CLICKED, DOUBLE_CLICKED or
TRIPLE_CLICKED followed immediately (in the same
element) by the number of the button.
- If the shift key was pressed, the string SHIFT.
- If the control key was pressed, the string CTRL.
- If the alt key was pressed, the string ALT.
Not all mouse events may be passed through to the ter-
minal window; most terminal emulators handle some mouse
events themselves. Note that the ncurses manual
implies that using input both with and without mouse
handling may cause the mouse cursor to appear and dis-
appear.
The subcommand mouse can be used to configure the use
of the mouse. There is no window argument; mouse
options are global. `zcurses mouse' with no arguments
returns status 0 if mouse handling is possible, else
status 1. Otherwise, the possible arguments (which may
be combined on the same command line) are as follows.
delay num sets the maximum delay in milliseconds
between press and release events to be considered as a
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click; the value 0 disables click resolution, and the
default is one sixth of a second. motion proceeded by
an optional `+' (the default) or - turns on or off
reporting of mouse motion in addition to clicks,
presses and releases, which are always reported. How-
ever, it appears reports for mouse motion are not cur-
rently implemented.
The subcommand timeout specifies a timeout value for
input from targetwin. If intval is negative, `zcurses
input' waits indefinitely for a character to be typed;
this is the default. If intval is zero, `zcurses
input' returns immediately; if there is typeahead it is
returned, else no input is done and status 1 is
returned. If intval is positive, `zcurses input' waits
intval milliseconds for input and if there is none at
the end of that period returns status 1.
The subcommand querychar queries the character at the
current cursor position. The return values are stored
in the array named param if supplied, else in the array
reply. The first value is the character (which may be
a multibyte character if the system supports them); the
second is the color pair in the usual fg_col/bg_col
notation, or 0 if color is not supported. Any
attributes other than color that apply to the charac-
ter, as set with the subcommand attr, appear as addi-
tional elements.
Parameters
ZCURSES_COLORS
Readonly integer. The maximum number of colors the
terminal supports. This value is initialised by the
curses library and is not available until the first
time zcurses init is run.
ZCURSES_COLOR_PAIRS
Readonly integer. The maximum number of color pairs
fg_col/bg_col that may be defined in `zcurses attr'
commands; note this limit applies to all color pairs
that have been used whether or not they are currently
active. This value is initialised by the curses
library and is not available until the first time
zcurses init is run.
zcurses_attrs
Readonly array. The attributes supported by
zsh/curses; available as soon as the module is loaded.
zcurses_colors
Readonly array. The colors supported by zsh/curses;
available as soon as the module is loaded.
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zcurses_keycodes
Readonly array. The values that may be returned in the
second parameter supplied to `zcurses input' in the
order in which they are defined internally by curses.
Not all function keys are listed, only F0; curses
reserves space for F0 up to F63.
zcurses_windows
Readonly array. The current list of windows, i.e. all
windows that have been created with `zcurses addwin'
and not removed with `zcurses delwin'.
THE ZSH/DATETIME MODULE
The zsh/datetime module makes available one builtin command:
strftime [ -s scalar ] format epochtime
strftime -r [ -q ] [ -s scalar ] format timestring
Output the date denoted by epochtime in the format
specified.
With the option -r (reverse), use the format format to
parse the input string timestring and output the number
of seconds since the epoch at which the time occurred.
If no timezone is parsed, the current timezone is used;
other parameters are set to zero if not present. If
timestring does not match format the command returns
status 1; it will additionally print an error message
unless the option -q (quiet) is given. If timestring
matches format but not all characters in timestring
were used, the conversion succeeds; however, a warning
is issued unless the option -q is given. The matching
is implemented by the system function strptime; see
strptime(3). This means that zsh format extensions are
not available, however for reverse lookup they are not
required. If the function is not implemented, the com-
mand returns status 2 and (unless -q is given) prints a
message.
If -s scalar is given, assign the date string (or epoch
time in seconds if -r is given) to scalar instead of
printing it.
The zsh/datetime module makes available several parameters;
all are readonly:
EPOCHREALTIME
A floating point value representing the number of sec-
onds since the epoch. The notional accuracy is to
nanoseconds if the clock_gettime call is available and
to microseconds otherwise, but in practice the range of
double precision floating point and shell scheduling
latencies may be significant effects.
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EPOCHSECONDS
An integer value representing the number of seconds
since the epoch.
epochtime
An array value containing the number of seconds since
the epoch in the first element and the remainder of the
time since the epoch in nanoseconds in the second ele-
ment. To ensure the two elements are consistent the
array should be copied or otherwise referenced as a
single substitution before the values are used. The
following idiom may be used:
for secs nsecs in $epochtime; do
...
done
THE ZSH/DELTOCHAR MODULE
The zsh/deltochar module makes available two ZLE functions:
delete-to-char
Read a character from the keyboard, and delete from the
cursor position up to and including the next (or, with
repeat count n, the nth) instance of that character.
Negative repeat counts mean delete backwards.
zap-to-char
This behaves like delete-to-char, except that the final
occurrence of the character itself is not deleted.
THE ZSH/EXAMPLE MODULE
The zsh/example module makes available one builtin command:
example [ -flags ] [ args ... ]
Displays the flags and arguments it is invoked with.
The purpose of the module is to serve as an example of how
to write a module.
THE ZSH/FILES MODULE
The zsh/files module makes available some common commands
for file manipulation as builtins; these commands are proba-
bly not needed for many normal situations but can be useful
in emergency recovery situations with constrained resources.
The commands do not implement all features now required by
relevant standards committees.
For all commands, a variant beginning zf_ is also available
and loaded automatically. Using the features capability of
zmodload will let you load only those names you want.
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The commands loaded by default are:
chgrp [ -hRs ] group filename ...
Changes group of files specified. This is equivalent
to chown with a user-spec argument of `:group'.
chown [ -hRs ] user-spec filename ...
Changes ownership and group of files specified.
The user-spec can be in four forms:
user change owner to user; do not change group
user::
change owner to user; do not change group
user:
change owner to user; change group to user's pri-
mary group
user:group
change owner to user; change group to group
:group
do not change owner; change group to group
In each case, the `:' may instead be a `.'. The rule
is that if there is a `:' then the separator is `:',
otherwise if there is a `.' then the separator is `.',
otherwise there is no separator.
Each of user and group may be either a username (or
group name, as appropriate) or a decimal user ID (group
ID). Interpretation as a name takes precedence, if
there is an all-numeric username (or group name).
If the target is a symbolic link, the -h option causes
chown to set the ownership of the link instead of its
target.
The -R option causes chown to recursively descend into
directories, changing the ownership of all files in the
directory after changing the ownership of the directory
itself.
The -s option is a zsh extension to chown functional-
ity. It enables paranoid behaviour, intended to avoid
security problems involving a chown being tricked into
affecting files other than the ones intended. It will
refuse to follow symbolic links, so that (for example)
``chown luser /tmp/foo/passwd'' can't accidentally
chown /etc/passwd if /tmp/foo happens to be a link to
/etc. It will also check where it is after leaving
directories, so that a recursive chown of a deep direc-
tory tree can't end up recursively chowning /usr as a
result of directories being moved up the tree.
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ln [ -dfhins ] filename dest
ln [ -dfhins ] filename ... dir
Creates hard (or, with -s, symbolic) links. In the
first form, the specified destination is created, as a
link to the specified filename. In the second form,
each of the filenames is taken in turn, and linked to a
pathname in the specified directory that has the same
last pathname component.
Normally, ln will not attempt to create hard links to
directories. This check can be overridden using the -d
option. Typically only the super-user can actually
succeed in creating hard links to directories. This
does not apply to symbolic links in any case.
By default, existing files cannot be replaced by links.
The -i option causes the user to be queried about
replacing existing files. The -f option causes exist-
ing files to be silently deleted, without querying. -f
takes precedence.
The -h and -n options are identical and both exist for
compatibility; either one indicates that if the target
is a symlink then it should not be dereferenced. Typi-
cally this is used in combination with -sf so that if
an existing link points to a directory then it will be
removed, instead of followed. If this option is used
with multiple filenames and the target is a symbolic
link pointing to a directory then the result is an
error.
mkdir [ -p ] [ -m mode ] dir ...
Creates directories. With the -p option, non-existing
parent directories are first created if necessary, and
there will be no complaint if the directory already
exists. The -m option can be used to specify (in
octal) a set of file permissions for the created direc-
tories, otherwise mode 777 modified by the current
umask (see umask(2)) is used.
mv [ -fi ] filename dest
mv [ -fi ] filename ... dir
Moves files. In the first form, the specified filename
is moved to the specified destination. In the second
form, each of the filenames is taken in turn, and moved
to a pathname in the specified directory that has the
same last pathname component.
By default, the user will be queried before replacing
any file that the user cannot write to, but writable
files will be silently removed. The -i option causes
the user to be queried about replacing any existing
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files. The -f option causes any existing files to be
silently deleted, without querying. -f takes prece-
dence.
Note that this mv will not move files across devices.
Historical versions of mv, when actual renaming is
impossible, fall back on copying and removing files; if
this behaviour is desired, use cp and rm manually.
This may change in a future version.
rm [ -dfirs ] filename ...
Removes files and directories specified.
Normally, rm will not remove directories (except with
the -r option). The -d option causes rm to try remov-
ing directories with unlink (see unlink(2)), the same
method used for files. Typically only the super-user
can actually succeed in unlinking directories in this
way. -d takes precedence over -r.
By default, the user will be queried before removing
any file that the user cannot write to, but writable
files will be silently removed. The -i option causes
the user to be queried about removing any files. The
-f option causes files to be silently deleted, without
querying, and suppresses all error indications. -f
takes precedence.
The -r option causes rm to recursively descend into
directories, deleting all files in the directory before
removing the directory with the rmdir system call (see
rmdir(2)).
The -s option is a zsh extension to rm functionality.
It enables paranoid behaviour, intended to avoid common
security problems involving a root-run rm being tricked
into removing files other than the ones intended. It
will refuse to follow symbolic links, so that (for
example) ``rm /tmp/foo/passwd'' can't accidentally
remove /etc/passwd if /tmp/foo happens to be a link to
/etc. It will also check where it is after leaving
directories, so that a recursive removal of a deep
directory tree can't end up recursively removing /usr
as a result of directories being moved up the tree.
rmdir dir ...
Removes empty directories specified.
sync Calls the system call of the same name (see sync(2)),
which flushes dirty buffers to disk. It might return
before the I/O has actually been completed.
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THE ZSH/LANGINFO MODULE
The zsh/langinfo module makes available one parameter:
langinfo
An associative array that maps langinfo elements to
their values.
Your implementation may support a number of the follow-
ing keys:
CODESET, D_T_FMT, D_FMT, T_FMT, RADIXCHAR, THOUSEP,
YESEXPR, NOEXPR, CRNCYSTR, ABDAY_{1..7}, DAY_{1..7},
ABMON_{1..12}, MON_{1..12}, T_FMT_AMPM, AM_STR, PM_STR,
ERA, ERA_D_FMT, ERA_D_T_FMT, ERA_T_FMT, ALT_DIGITS
THE ZSH/MAPFILE MODULE
The zsh/mapfile module provides one special associative
array parameter of the same name.
mapfile
This associative array takes as keys the names of
files; the resulting value is the content of the file.
The value is treated identically to any other text com-
ing from a parameter. The value may also be assigned
to, in which case the file in question is written
(whether or not it originally existed); or an element
may be unset, which will delete the file in question.
For example, `vared mapfile[myfile]' works as expected,
editing the file `myfile'.
When the array is accessed as a whole, the keys are the
names of files in the current directory, and the values
are empty (to save a huge overhead in memory). Thus
${(k)mapfile} has the same affect as the glob operator
*(D), since files beginning with a dot are not special.
Care must be taken with expressions such as rm
${(k)mapfile}, which will delete every file in the cur-
rent directory without the usual `rm *' test.
The parameter mapfile may be made read-only; in that
case, files referenced may not be written or deleted.
A file may conveniently be read into an array as one
line per element with the form `array=("${(f@)map-
file[filename]}")'. The double quotes and the `@' are
necessary to prevent empty lines from being removed.
Note that if the file ends with a newline, the shell
will split on the final newline, generating an addi-
tional empty field; this can be suppressed by using
`array=("${(f@)${mapfile[filename]%$'\n'}}")'.
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Limitations
Although reading and writing of the file in question is
efficiently handled, zsh's internal memory management may be
arbitrarily baroque; however, mapfile is usually very much
more efficient than anything involving a loop. Note in par-
ticular that the whole contents of the file will always
reside physically in memory when accessed (possibly multiple
times, due to standard parameter substitution operations).
In particular, this means handling of sufficiently long
files (greater than the machine's swap space, or than the
range of the pointer type) will be incorrect.
No errors are printed or flagged for non-existent, unread-
able, or unwritable files, as the parameter mechanism is too
low in the shell execution hierarchy to make this conve-
nient.
It is unfortunate that the mechanism for loading modules
does not yet allow the user to specify the name of the shell
parameter to be given the special behaviour.
THE ZSH/MATHFUNC MODULE
The zsh/mathfunc module provides standard mathematical func-
tions for use when evaluating mathematical formulae. The
syntax agrees with normal C and FORTRAN conventions, for
example,
(( f = sin(0.3) ))
assigns the sine of 0.3 to the parameter f.
Most functions take floating point arguments and return a
floating point value. However, any necessary conversions
from or to integer type will be performed automatically by
the shell. Apart from atan with a second argument and the
abs, int and float functions, all functions behave as noted
in the manual page for the corresponding C function, except
that any arguments out of range for the function in question
will be detected by the shell and an error reported.
The following functions take a single floating point argu-
ment: acos, acosh, asin, asinh, atan, atanh, cbrt, ceil,
cos, cosh, erf, erfc, exp, expm1, fabs, floor, gamma, j0,
j1, lgamma, log, log10, log1p, logb, sin, sinh, sqrt, tan,
tanh, y0, y1. The atan function can optionally take a sec-
ond argument, in which case it behaves like the C function
atan2. The ilogb function takes a single floating point
argument, but returns an integer.
The function signgam takes no arguments, and returns an
integer, which is the C variable of the same name, as
described in gamma(3). Note that it is therefore only
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useful immediately after a call to gamma or lgamma. Note
also that `signgam()' and `signgam' are distinct expres-
sions.
The following functions take two floating point arguments:
copysign, fmod, hypot, nextafter.
The following take an integer first argument and a floating
point second argument: jn, yn.
The following take a floating point first argument and an
integer second argument: ldexp, scalb.
The function abs does not convert the type of its single
argument; it returns the absolute value of either a floating
point number or an integer. The functions float and int
convert their arguments into a floating point or integer
value (by truncation) respectively.
Note that the C pow function is available in ordinary math
evaluation as the `**' operator and is not provided here.
The function rand48 is available if your system's mathemati-
cal library has the function erand48(3). It returns a
pseudo-random floating point number between 0 and 1. It
takes a single string optional argument.
If the argument is not present, the random number seed is
initialised by three calls to the rand(3) function --- this
produces the same random numbers as the next three values of
$RANDOM.
If the argument is present, it gives the name of a scalar
parameter where the current random number seed will be
stored. On the first call, the value must contain at least
twelve hexadecimal digits (the remainder of the string is
ignored), or the seed will be initialised in the same manner
as for a call to rand48 with no argument. Subsequent calls
to rand48(param) will then maintain the seed in the parame-
ter param as a string of twelve hexadecimal digits, with no
base signifier. The random number sequences for different
parameters are completely independent, and are also indepen-
dent from that used by calls to rand48 with no argument.
For example, consider
print $(( rand48(seed) ))
print $(( rand48() ))
print $(( rand48(seed) ))
Assuming $seed does not exist, it will be initialised by the
first call. In the second call, the default seed is
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initialised; note, however, that because of the properties
of rand() there is a correlation between the seeds used for
the two initialisations, so for more secure uses, you should
generate your own 12-byte seed. The third call returns to
the same sequence of random numbers used in the first call,
unaffected by the intervening rand48().
THE ZSH/NEWUSER MODULE
The zsh/newuser module is loaded at boot if it is available,
the RCS option is set, and the PRIVILEGED option is not set
(all three are true by default). This takes place immedi-
ately after commands in the global zshenv file (typically
/etc/zshenv), if any, have been executed. If the module is
not available it is silently ignored by the shell; the mod-
ule may safely be removed from $MODULE_PATH by the adminis-
trator if it is not required.
On loading, the module tests if any of the start-up files
.zshenv, .zprofile, .zshrc or .zlogin exist in the directory
given by the environment variable ZDOTDIR, or the user's
home directory if that is not set. The test is not per-
formed and the module halts processing if the shell was in
an emulation mode (i.e. had been invoked as some other shell
than zsh).
If none of the start-up files were found, the module then
looks for the file newuser first in a sitewide directory,
usually the parent directory of the site-functions direc-
tory, and if that is not found the module searches in a ver-
sion-specific directory, usually the parent of the functions
directory containing version-specific functions. (These
directories can be configured when zsh is built using the
--enable-site-scriptdir=dir and --enable-scriptdir=dir flags
to configure, respectively; the defaults are pre-
fix/share/zsh and prefix/share/zsh/$ZSH_VERSION where the
default prefix is /usr/local.)
If the file newuser is found, it is then sourced in the same
manner as a start-up file. The file is expected to contain
code to install start-up files for the user, however any
valid shell code will be executed.
The zsh/newuser module is then unconditionally unloaded.
Note that it is possible to achieve exactly the same effect
as the zsh/newuser module by adding code to /etc/zshenv.
The module exists simply to allow the shell to make arrange-
ments for new users without the need for intervention by
package maintainers and system administrators.
The script supplied with the module invokes the shell func-
tion zsh-newuser-install. This may be invoked directly by
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the user even if the zsh/newuser module is disabled. Note,
however, that if the module is not installed the function
will not be installed either. The function is documented in
the section User Configuration Functions in zshcontrib(1).
THE ZSH/PARAMETER MODULE
The zsh/parameter module gives access to some of the inter-
nal hash tables used by the shell by defining some special
parameters.
options
The keys for this associative array are the names of
the options that can be set and unset using the setopt
and unsetopt builtins. The value of each key is either
the string on if the option is currently set, or the
string off if the option is unset. Setting a key to
one of these strings is like setting or unsetting the
option, respectively. Unsetting a key in this array is
like setting it to the value off.
commands
This array gives access to the command hash table. The
keys are the names of external commands, the values are
the pathnames of the files that would be executed when
the command would be invoked. Setting a key in this
array defines a new entry in this table in the same way
as with the hash builtin. Unsetting a key as in `unset
"commands[foo]"' removes the entry for the given key
from the command hash table.
functions
This associative array maps names of enabled functions
to their definitions. Setting a key in it is like
defining a function with the name given by the key and
the body given by the value. Unsetting a key removes
the definition for the function named by the key.
dis_functions
Like functions but for disabled functions.
builtins
This associative array gives information about the
builtin commands currently enabled. The keys are the
names of the builtin commands and the values are either
`undefined' for builtin commands that will automati-
cally be loaded from a module if invoked or `defined'
for builtin commands that are already loaded.
dis_builtins
Like builtins but for disabled builtin commands.
reswords
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This array contains the enabled reserved words.
dis_reswords
Like reswords but for disabled reserved words.
patchars
This array contains the enabled pattern characters.
dis_patchars
Like patchars but for disabled pattern characters.
aliases
This maps the names of the regular aliases currently
enabled to their expansions.
dis_aliases
Like aliases but for disabled regular aliases.
galiases
Like aliases, but for global aliases.
dis_galiases
Like galiases but for disabled global aliases.
saliases
Like raliases, but for suffix aliases.
dis_saliases
Like saliases but for disabled suffix aliases.
parameters
The keys in this associative array are the names of the
parameters currently defined. The values are strings
describing the type of the parameter, in the same for-
mat used by the t parameter flag, see zshexpn(1) .
Setting or unsetting keys in this array is not possi-
ble.
modules
An associative array giving information about modules.
The keys are the names of the modules loaded, regis-
tered to be autoloaded, or aliased. The value says
which state the named module is in and is one of the
strings `loaded', `autoloaded', or `alias:name', where
name is the name the module is aliased to.
Setting or unsetting keys in this array is not possi-
ble.
dirstack
A normal array holding the elements of the directory
stack. Note that the output of the dirs builtin command
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includes one more directory, the current working direc-
tory.
history
This associative array maps history event numbers to
the full history lines.
historywords
A special array containing the words stored in the his-
tory.
jobdirs
This associative array maps job numbers to the directo-
ries from which the job was started (which may not be
the current directory of the job).
The keys of the associative arrays are usually valid
job numbers, and these are the values output with, for
example, ${(k)jobdirs}. Non-numeric job references may
be used when looking up a value; for example, ${job-
dirs[%+]} refers to the current job.
jobtexts
This associative array maps job numbers to the texts of
the command lines that were used to start the jobs.
Handling of the keys of the associative array is as
described for jobdirs above.
jobstates
This associative array gives information about the
states of the jobs currently known. The keys are the
job numbers and the values are strings of the form
`job-state:mark:pid=state...'. The job-state gives the
state the whole job is currently in, one of `running',
`suspended', or `done'. The mark is `+' for the current
job, `-' for the previous job and empty otherwise. This
is followed by one `pid=state' for every process in the
job. The pids are, of course, the process IDs and the
state describes the state of that process.
Handling of the keys of the associative array is as
described for jobdirs above.
nameddirs
This associative array maps the names of named directo-
ries to the pathnames they stand for.
userdirs
This associative array maps user names to the pathnames
of their home directories.
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usergroups
This associative array maps names of system groups of
which the current user is a member to the corresponding
group identifiers. The contents are the same as the
groups output by the id command.
funcfiletrace
This array contains the absolute line numbers and cor-
responding file names for the point where the current
function, sourced file, or (if EVAL_LINENO is set) eval
command was called. The array is of the same length as
funcsourcetrace and functrace, but differs from func-
sourcetrace in that the line and file are the point of
call, not the point of definition, and differs from
functrace in that all values are absolute line numbers
in files, rather than relative to the start of a func-
tion, if any.
funcsourcetrace
This array contains the file names and line numbers of
the points where the functions, sourced files, and (if
EVAL_LINENO is set) eval commands currently being exe-
cuted were defined. The line number is the line where
the `function name' or `name ()' started. In the case
of an autoloaded function the line number is reported
as zero. The format of each element is file-
name:lineno. For functions autoloaded from a file in
native zsh format, where only the body of the function
occurs in the file, or for files that have been exe-
cuted by the source or `.' builtins, the trace informa-
tion is shown as filename:0, since the entire file is
the definition.
Most users will be interested in the information in the
funcfiletrace array instead.
funcstack
This array contains the names of the functions, sourced
files, and (if EVAL_LINENO is set) eval commands. cur-
rently being executed. The first element is the name of
the function using the parameter.
functrace
This array contains the names and line numbers of the
callers corresponding to the functions currently being
executed. The format of each element is name:lineno.
Callers are also shown for sourced files; the caller is
the point where the source or `.' command was executed.
THE ZSH/PCRE MODULE
The zsh/pcre module makes some commands available as
builtins:
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pcre_compile [ -aimxs ] PCRE
Compiles a perl-compatible regular expression.
Option -a will force the pattern to be anchored.
Option -i will compile a case-insensitive pattern.
Option -m will compile a multi-line pattern; that is, ^
and $ will match newlines within the pattern. Option
-x will compile an extended pattern, wherein whitespace
and # comments are ignored. Option -s makes the dot
metacharacter match all characters, including those
that indicate newline.
pcre_study
Studies the previously-compiled PCRE which may result
in faster matching.
pcre_match [ -v var ] [ -a arr ] [ -n offset ] [ -b ] string
Returns successfully if string matches the previ-
ously-compiled PCRE.
Upon successful match, if the expression captures sub-
strings within parentheses, pcre_match will set the
array $match to those substrings, unless the -a option
is given, in which case it will set the array arr.
Similarly, the variable MATCH will be set to the entire
matched portion of the string, unless the -v option is
given, in which case the variable var will be set. No
variables are altered if there is no successful match.
A -n option starts searching for a match from the byte
offset position in string. If the -b option is given,
the variable ZPCRE_OP will be set to an offset pair
string, representing the byte offset positions of the
entire matched portion within the string. For example,
a ZPCRE_OP set to "32 45" indicates that the matched
portion began on byte offset 32 and ended on byte off-
set 44. Here, byte offset position 45 is the position
directly after the matched portion. Keep in mind that
the byte position isn't necessarily the same as the
character position when UTF-8 characters are involved.
Consequently, the byte offset positions are only to be
relied on in the context of using them for subsequent
searches on string, using an offset position as an
argument to the -n option. This is mostly used to
implement the "find all non-overlapping matches" func-
tionality.
A simple example of "find all non-overlapping matches":
string="The following zip codes: 78884 90210 99513"
pcre_compile -m "\d{5}"
accum=()
pcre_match -b -- $string
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while [[ $? -eq 0 ]] do
b=($=ZPCRE_OP)
accum+=$MATCH
pcre_match -b -n $b[2] -- $string
done
print -l $accum
The zsh/pcre module makes available the following test con-
dition:
expr -pcre-match pcre
Matches a string against a perl-compatible regular
expression.
For example,
[[ "$text" -pcre-match ^d+$ ]] && print text variable
contains only "d's".
THE ZSH/REGEX MODULE
The zsh/regex module makes available the following test con-
dition:
expr -regex-match regex
Matches a string against a POSIX extended regular
expression. On successful match, matched portion of
the string will normally be placed in the MATCH vari-
able. If there are any capturing parentheses within
the regex, then the match array variable will contain
those. If the match is not successful, then the vari-
ables will not be altered.
For example,
[[ alphabetical -regex-match ^a([^a]+)a([^a]+)a ]] &&
print -l $MATCH X $match
If the option REMATCH_PCRE is not set, then the =~
operator will automatically load this module as needed
and will invoke the -regex-match operator.
If BASH_REMATCH is set, then the array BASH_REMATCH
will be set instead of MATCH and match.
THE ZSH/SCHED MODULE
The zsh/sched module makes available one builtin command and
one parameter.
sched [-o] [+]hh:mm[:ss] command ...
sched [-o] [+]seconds command ...
sched [ -item ]
Make an entry in the scheduled list of commands to exe-
cute. The time may be specified in either absolute or
relative time, and either as hours, minutes and
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(optionally) seconds separated by a colon, or seconds
alone. An absolute number of seconds indicates the
time since the epoch (1970/01/01 00:00); this is useful
in combination with the features in the zsh/datetime
module, see the zsh/datetime module entry in zshmod-
ules(1).
With no arguments, prints the list of scheduled com-
mands. If the scheduled command has the -o flag set,
this is shown at the start of the command.
With the argument `-item', removes the given item from
the list. The numbering of the list is continuous and
entries are in time order, so the numbering can change
when entries are added or deleted.
Commands are executed either immediately before a
prompt, or while the shell's line editor is waiting for
input. In the latter case it is useful to be able to
produce output that does not interfere with the line
being edited. Providing the option -o causes the shell
to clear the command line before the event and redraw
it afterwards. This should be used with any scheduled
event that produces visible output to the terminal; it
is not needed, for example, with output that updates a
terminal emulator's title bar.
The sched builtin is not made available by default when
the shell starts in a mode emulating another shell. It
can be made available with the command `zmodload -F
zsh/sched b:sched'.
zsh_scheduled_events
A readonly array corresponding to the events scheduled
by the sched builtin. The indices of the array corre-
spond to the numbers shown when sched is run with no
arguments (provided that the KSH_ARRAYS option is not
set). The value of the array consists of the scheduled
time in seconds since the epoch (see the section `The
zsh/datetime Module' for facilities for using this num-
ber), followed by a colon, followed by any options
(which may be empty but will be preceded by a `-' oth-
erwise), followed by a colon, followed by the command
to be executed.
The sched builtin should be used for manipulating the
events. Note that this will have an immediate effect
on the contents of the array, so that indices may
become invalid.
THE ZSH/NET/SOCKET MODULE
The zsh/net/socket module makes available one builtin
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command:
zsocket [ -altv ] [ -d fd ] [ args ]
zsocket is implemented as a builtin to allow full use
of shell command line editing, file I/O, and job con-
trol mechanisms.
Outbound Connections
zsocket [ -v ] [ -d fd ] filename
Open a new Unix domain connection to filename. The
shell parameter REPLY will be set to the file descrip-
tor associated with that connection. Currently, only
stream connections are supported.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
Inbound Connections
zsocket -l [ -v ] [ -d fd ] filename
zsocket -l will open a socket listening on filename.
The shell parameter REPLY will be set to the file
descriptor associated with that listener.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
zsocket -a [ -tv ] [ -d targetfd ] listenfd
zsocket -a will accept an incoming connection to the
socket associated with listenfd. The shell parameter
REPLY will be set to the file descriptor associated
with the inbound connection.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
If -t is specified, zsocket will return if no incoming
connection is pending. Otherwise it will wait for one.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
THE ZSH/STAT MODULE
The zsh/stat module makes available one builtin command
under two possible names:
] [ +element ] [ file ... ]
zstat [ -gnNolLtTrs ] [ -f fd ] [ -H hash ] [ -A array ] [
-F fmt
stat ...
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The command acts as a front end to the stat system call
(see stat(2)). The same command is provided with two
names; as the name stat is often used by an external
command it is recommended that only the zstat form of
the command is used. This can be arranged by loading
the module with the command `zmodload -F zsh/stat
b:zstat'.
If the stat call fails, the appropriate system error
message printed and status 1 is returned. The fields
of struct stat give information about the files pro-
vided as arguments to the command. In addition to
those available from the stat call, an extra element
`link' is provided. These elements are:
device
The number of the device on which the file
resides.
inode
The unique number of the file on this device
(`inode' number).
mode The mode of the file; that is, the file's type and
access permissions. With the -s option, this will
be returned as a string corresponding to the first
column in the display of the ls -l command.
nlink
The number of hard links to the file.
uid The user ID of the owner of the file. With the -s
option, this is displayed as a user name.
gid The group ID of the file. With the -s option,
this is displayed as a group name.
rdev The raw device number. This is only useful for
special devices.
size The size of the file in bytes.
atime
mtime
ctime
The last access, modification and inode change
times of the file, respectively, as the number of
seconds since midnight GMT on 1st January, 1970.
With the -s option, these are printed as strings
for the local time zone; the format can be altered
with the -F option, and with the -g option the
times are in GMT.
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blksize
The number of bytes in one allocation block on the
device on which the file resides.
block
The number of disk blocks used by the file.
link If the file is a link and the -L option is in
effect, this contains the name of the file linked
to, otherwise it is empty. Note that if this ele-
ment is selected (``zstat +link'') then the -L
option is automatically used.
A particular element may be selected by including its
name preceded by a `+' in the option list; only one
element is allowed. The element may be shortened to
any unique set of leading characters. Otherwise, all
elements will be shown for all files.
Options:
-A array
Instead of displaying the results on standard out-
put, assign them to an array, one struct stat ele-
ment per array element for each file in order. In
this case neither the name of the element nor the
name of the files appears in array unless the -t
or -n options were given, respectively. If -t is
given, the element name appears as a prefix to the
appropriate array element; if -n is given, the
file name appears as a separate array element pre-
ceding all the others. Other formatting options
are respected.
-H hash
Similar to -A, but instead assign the values to
hash. The keys are the elements listed above. If
the -n option is provided then the name of the
file is included in the hash with key name.
-f fd
Use the file on file descriptor fd instead of
named files; no list of file names is allowed in
this case.
-F fmt
Supplies a strftime (see strftime(3)) string for
the formatting of the time elements. The -s
option is implied.
-g Show the time elements in the GMT time zone. The
-s option is implied.
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-l List the names of the type elements (to standard
output or an array as appropriate) and return
immediately; options other than -A and arguments
are ignored.
-L Perform an lstat (see lstat(2)) rather than a stat
system call. In this case, if the file is a link,
information about the link itself rather than the
target file is returned. This option is required
to make the link element useful. It's important
to note that this is the exact opposite from
ls(1), etc.
-n Always show the names of files. Usually these are
only shown when output is to standard output and
there is more than one file in the list.
-N Never show the names of files.
-o If a raw file mode is printed, show it in octal,
which is more useful for human consumption than
the default of decimal. A leading zero will be
printed in this case. Note that this does not
affect whether a raw or formatted file mode is
shown, which is controlled by the -r and -s
options, nor whether a mode is shown at all.
-r Print raw data (the default format) alongside
string data (the -s format); the string data
appears in parentheses after the raw data.
-s Print mode, uid, gid and the three time elements
as strings instead of numbers. In each case the
format is like that of ls -l.
-t Always show the type names for the elements of
struct stat. Usually these are only shown when
output is to standard output and no individual
element has been selected.
-T Never show the type names of the struct stat ele-
ments.
THE ZSH/SYSTEM MODULE
The zsh/system module makes available various builtin com-
mands and parameters.
Builtins
syserror [ -e errvar ] [ -p prefix ] [ errno | errname ]
This command prints out the error message associated
with errno, a system error number, followed by a new-
line to standard error.
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Instead of the error number, a name errname, for exam-
ple ENOENT, may be used. The set of names is the same
as the contents of the array errnos, see below.
If the string prefix is given, it is printed in front
of the error message, with no intervening space.
If errvar is supplied, the entire message, without a
newline, is assigned to the parameter names errvar and
nothing is output.
A return status of 0 indicates the message was success-
fully printed (although it may not be useful if the
error number was out of the system's range), a return
status of 1 indicates an error in the parameters, and a
return status of 2 indicates the error name was not
recognised (no message is printed for this).
sysread [ -c countvar ] [ -i infd ] [ -o outfd ]
[ -s bufsize ] [ -t timeout ] [ param ]
Perform a single system read from file descriptor infd,
or zero if that is not given. The result of the read
is stored in param or REPLY if that is not given. If
countvar is given, the number of bytes read is assigned
to the parameter named by countvar.
The maximum number of bytes read is bufsize or 8192 if
that is not given, however the command returns as soon
as any number of bytes was successfully read.
If timeout is given, it specifies a timeout in seconds,
which may be zero to poll the file descriptor. This is
handled by the poll system call if available, otherwise
the select system call if available.
If outfd is given, an attempt is made to write all the
bytes just read to the file descriptor outfd. If this
fails, because of a system error other than EINTR or
because of an internal zsh error during an interrupt,
the bytes read but not written are stored in the param-
eter named by param if supplied (no default is used in
this case), and the number of bytes read but not writ-
ten is stored in the parameter named by countvar if
that is supplied. If it was successful, countvar con-
tains the full number of bytes transferred, as usual,
and param is not set.
The error EINTR (interrupted system call) is handled
internally so that shell interrupts are transparent to
the caller. Any other error causes a return.
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The possible return statuses are
0 At least one byte of data was successfully read
and, if appropriate, written.
1 There was an error in the parameters to the com-
mand. This is the only error for which a message
is printed to standard error.
2 There was an error on the read, or on polling the
input file descriptor for a timeout. The parame-
ter ERRNO gives the error.
3 Data were successfully read, but there was an
error writing them to outfd. The parameter ERRNO
gives the error.
4 The attempt to read timed out. Note this does not
set ERRNO as this is not a system error.
5 No system error occurred, but zero bytes were
read. This usually indicates end of file. The
parameters are set according to the usual rules;
no write to outfd is attempted.
syswrite [ -c countvar ] [ -o outfd ] data
The data (a single string of bytes) are written to the
file descriptor outfd, or 1 if that is not given, using
the write system call. Multiple write operations may
be used if the first does not write all the data.
If countvar is given, the number of byte written is
stored in the parameter named by countvar; this may not
be the full length of data if an error occurred.
The error EINTR (interrupted system call) is handled
internally by retrying; otherwise an error causes the
command to return. For example, if the file descriptor
is set to non-blocking output, an error EAGAIN (on some
systems, EWOULDBLOCK) may result in the command return-
ing early.
The return status may be 0 for success, 1 for an error
in the parameters to the command, or 2 for an error on
the write; no error message is printed in the last
case, but the parameter ERRNO will reflect the error
that occurred.
zsystem flock [ -t timeout ] [ -f var ] [-er] file
zsystem flock -u fd_expr
The builtin zsystem's subcommand flock performs advi-
sory file locking (via the fcntl(2) system call) over
the entire contents of the given file. This form of
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locking requires the processes accessing the file to
cooperate; its most obvious use is between two
instances of the shell itself.
In the first form the named file, which must already
exist, is locked by opening a file descriptor to the
file and applying a lock to the file descriptor. The
lock terminates when the shell process that created the
lock exits; it is therefore often convenient to create
file locks within subshells, since the lock is automat-
ically released when the subshell exits. Status 0 is
returned if the lock succeeds, else status 1.
In the second form the file descriptor given by the
arithmetic expression fd_expr is closed, releasing a
lock. The file descriptor can be queried by using the
`-f var' form during the lock; on a successful lock,
the shell variable var is set to the file descriptor
used for locking. The lock will be released if the
file descriptor is closed by any other means, for exam-
ple using `exec {var}>&-'; however, the form described
here performs a safety check that the file descriptor
is in use for file locking.
By default the shell waits indefinitely for the lock to
succeed. The option -t timeout specifies a timeout for
the lock in seconds; currently this must be an integer.
The shell will attempt to lock the file once a second
during this period. If the attempt times out, status 2
is returned.
If the option -e is given, the file descriptor for the
lock is preserved when the shell uses exec to start a
new process; otherwise it is closed at that point and
the lock released.
If the option -r is given, the lock is only for read-
ing, otherwise it is for reading and writing. The file
descriptor is opened accordingly.
zsystem supports subcommand
The builtin zsystem's subcommand supports tests whether
a given subcommand is supported. It returns status 0
if so, else status 1. It operates silently unless
there was a syntax error (i.e. the wrong number of
arguments), in which case status 255 is returned. Sta-
tus 1 can indicate one of two things: subcommand is
known but not supported by the current operating sys-
tem, or subcommand is not known (possibly because this
is an older version of the shell before it was imple-
mented).
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 42
User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
Parameters
errnos
A readonly array of the names of errors defined on the
system. These are typically macros defined in C by
including the system header file errno.h. The index of
each name (assuming the option KSH_ARRAYS is unset)
corresponds to the error number. Error numbers num
before the last known error which have no name are
given the name Enum in the array.
Note that aliases for errors are not handled; only the
canonical name is used.
sysparams
A readonly associative array. The keys are:
pid Returns the process ID of the current process, even in
subshells. Compare $$, which returns the process ID of
the main shell process.
ppid Returns the process ID of the parent of the current
process, even in subshells. Compare $PPID, which
returns the process ID of the parent of the main shell
process.
THE ZSH/NET/TCP MODULE
The zsh/net/tcp module makes available one builtin command:
ztcp [ -acflLtv ] [ -d fd ] [ args ]
ztcp is implemented as a builtin to allow full use of
shell command line editing, file I/O, and job control
mechanisms.
If ztcp is run with no options, it will output the con-
tents of its session table.
If it is run with only the option -L, it will output
the contents of the session table in a format suitable
for automatic parsing. The option is ignored if given
with a command to open or close a session. The output
consists of a set of lines, one per session, each con-
taining the following elements separated by spaces:
File descriptor
The file descriptor in use for the connection.
For normal inbound (I) and outbound (O) connec-
tions this may be read and written by the usual
shell mechanisms. However, it should only be
close with `ztcp -c'.
Connection type
A letter indicating how the session was created:
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
Z A session created with the zftp command.
L A connection opened for listening with `ztcp
-l'.
I An inbound connection accepted with `ztcp
-a'.
O An outbound connection created with `ztcp
host ...'.
The local host
This is usually set to an all-zero IP address as
the address of the localhost is irrelevant.
The local port
This is likely to be zero unless the connection is
for listening.
The remote host
This is the fully qualified domain name of the
peer, if available, else an IP address. It is an
all-zero IP address for a session opened for lis-
tening.
The remote port
This is zero for a connection opened for listen-
ing.
Outbound Connections
ztcp [ -v ] [ -d fd ] host [ port ]
Open a new TCP connection to host. If the port is
omitted, it will default to port 23. The connection
will be added to the session table and the shell param-
eter REPLY will be set to the file descriptor associ-
ated with that connection.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
Inbound Connections
ztcp -l [ -v ] [ -d fd ] port
ztcp -l will open a socket listening on TCP port. The
socket will be added to the session table and the shell
parameter REPLY will be set to the file descriptor
associated with that listener.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
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In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
ztcp -a [ -tv ] [ -d targetfd ] listenfd
ztcp -a will accept an incoming connection to the port
associated with listenfd. The connection will be added
to the session table and the shell parameter REPLY will
be set to the file descriptor associated with the
inbound connection.
If -d is specified, its argument will be taken as the
target file descriptor for the connection.
If -t is specified, ztcp will return if no incoming
connection is pending. Otherwise it will wait for one.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
Closing Connections
ztcp -cf [ -v ] [ fd ]
ztcp -c [ -v ] [ fd ]
ztcp -c will close the socket associated with fd. The
socket will be removed from the session table. If fd
is not specified, ztcp will close everything in the
session table.
Normally, sockets registered by zftp (see zshmodules(1)
) cannot be closed this way. In order to force such a
socket closed, use -f.
In order to elicit more verbose output, use -v.
Example
Here is how to create a TCP connection between two instances
of zsh. We need to pick an unassigned port; here we use the
randomly chosen 5123.
On host1,
zmodload zsh/net/tcp
ztcp -l 5123
listenfd=$REPLY
ztcp -a $listenfd
fd=$REPLY
The second from last command blocks until there is an incom-
ing connection.
Now create a connection from host2 (which may, of course, be
the same machine):
zmodload zsh/net/tcp
ztcp host1 5123
fd=$REPLY
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
Now on each host, $fd contains a file descriptor for talking
to the other. For example, on host1:
print This is a message >&$fd
and on host2:
read -r line <&$fd; print -r - $line
prints `This is a message'.
To tidy up, on host1:
ztcp -c $listenfd
ztcp -c $fd
and on host2
ztcp -c $fd
THE ZSH/TERMCAP MODULE
The zsh/termcap module makes available one builtin command:
echotc cap [ arg ... ]
Output the termcap value corresponding to the capabil-
ity cap, with optional arguments.
The zsh/termcap module makes available one parameter:
termcap
An associative array that maps termcap capability codes
to their values.
THE ZSH/TERMINFO MODULE
The zsh/terminfo module makes available one builtin command:
echoti cap [ arg ]
Output the terminfo value corresponding to the capabil-
ity cap, instantiated with arg if applicable.
The zsh/terminfo module makes available one parameter:
terminfo
An associative array that maps terminfo capability
names to their values.
THE ZSH/ZFTP MODULE
The zsh/zftp module makes available one builtin command:
zftp subcommand [ args ]
The zsh/zftp module is a client for FTP (file transfer
protocol). It is implemented as a builtin to allow
full use of shell command line editing, file I/O, and
job control mechanisms. Often, users will access it
via shell functions providing a more powerful inter-
face; a set is provided with the zsh distribution and
is described in zshzftpsys(1). However, the zftp com-
mand is entirely usable in its own right.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 46
User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
All commands consist of the command name zftp followed
by the name of a subcommand. These are listed below.
The return status of each subcommand is supposed to
reflect the success or failure of the remote operation.
See a description of the variable ZFTP_VERBOSE for more
information on how responses from the server may be
printed.
Subcommands
open host[:port] [ user [ password [ account ] ] ]
Open a new FTP session to host, which may be the name
of a TCP/IP connected host or an IP number in the stan-
dard dot notation. If the argument is in the form
host:port, open a connection to TCP port port instead
of the standard FTP port 21. This may be the name of a
TCP service or a number: see the description of
ZFTP_PORT below for more information.
If IPv6 addresses in colon format are used, the host
should be surrounded by quoted square brackets to dis-
tinguish it from the port, for example
'[fe80::203:baff:fe02:8b56]'. For consistency this is
allowed with all forms of host.
Remaining arguments are passed to the login subcommand.
Note that if no arguments beyond host are supplied,
open will not automatically call login. If no argu-
ments at all are supplied, open will use the parameters
set by the params subcommand.
After a successful open, the shell variables ZFTP_HOST,
ZFTP_PORT, ZFTP_IP and ZFTP_SYSTEM are available; see
`Variables' below.
login [ name [ password [ account ] ] ]
user [ name [ password [ account ] ] ]
Login the user name with parameters password and
account. Any of the parameters can be omitted, and
will be read from standard input if needed (name is
always needed). If standard input is a terminal, a
prompt for each one will be printed on standard error
and password will not be echoed. If any of the parame-
ters are not used, a warning message is printed.
After a successful login, the shell variables
ZFTP_USER, ZFTP_ACCOUNT and ZFTP_PWD are available; see
`Variables' below.
This command may be re-issued when a user is already
logged in, and the server will first be reinitialized
for a new user.
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params [ host [ user [ password [ account ] ] ] ]
params -
Store the given parameters for a later open command
with no arguments. Only those given on the command
line will be remembered. If no arguments are given,
the parameters currently set are printed, although the
password will appear as a line of stars; the return
status is one if no parameters were set, zero other-
wise.
Any of the parameters may be specified as a `?', which
may need to be quoted to protect it from shell expan-
sion. In this case, the appropriate parameter will be
read from stdin as with the login subcommand, including
special handling of password. If the `?' is followed
by a string, that is used as the prompt for reading the
parameter instead of the default message (any necessary
punctuation and whitespace should be included at the
end of the prompt). The first letter of the parameter
(only) may be quoted with a `\'; hence an argument
"\\$word" guarantees that the string from the shell
parameter $word will be treated literally, whether or
not it begins with a `?'.
If instead a single `-' is given, the existing parame-
ters, if any, are deleted. In that case, calling open
with no arguments will cause an error.
The list of parameters is not deleted after a close,
however it will be deleted if the zsh/zftp module is
unloaded.
For example,
zftp params ftp.elsewhere.xx juser '?Password for juser: '
will store the host ftp.elsewhere.xx and the user juser
and then prompt the user for the corresponding password
with the given prompt.
test Test the connection; if the server has reported that it
has closed the connection (maybe due to a timeout),
return status 2; if no connection was open anyway,
return status 1; else return status 0. The test sub-
command is silent, apart from messages printed by the
$ZFTP_VERBOSE mechanism, or error messages if the con-
nection closes. There is no network overhead for this
test.
The test is only supported on systems with either the
select(2) or poll(2) system calls; otherwise the mes-
sage `not supported on this system' is printed instead.
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The test subcommand will automatically be called at the
start of any other subcommand for the current session
when a connection is open.
cd directory
Change the remote directory to directory. Also alters
the shell variable ZFTP_PWD.
cdup Change the remote directory to the one higher in the
directory tree. Note that cd .. will also work cor-
rectly on non-UNIX systems.
dir [ args... ]
Give a (verbose) listing of the remote directory. The
args are passed directly to the server. The command's
behaviour is implementation dependent, but a UNIX
server will typically interpret args as arguments to
the ls command and with no arguments return the result
of `ls -l'. The directory is listed to standard output.
ls [ args ]
Give a (short) listing of the remote directory. With
no args, produces a raw list of the files in the direc-
tory, one per line. Otherwise, up to vagaries of the
server implementation, behaves similar to dir.
type [ type ]
Change the type for the transfer to type, or print the
current type if type is absent. The allowed values are
`A' (ASCII), `I' (Image, i.e. binary), or `B' (a syn-
onym for `I').
The FTP default for a transfer is ASCII. However, if
zftp finds that the remote host is a UNIX machine with
8-bit byes, it will automatically switch to using
binary for file transfers upon open. This can subse-
quently be overridden.
The transfer type is only passed to the remote host
when a data connection is established; this command
involves no network overhead.
ascii
The same as type A.
binary
The same as type I.
mode [ S | B ]
Set the mode type to stream (S) or block (B). Stream
mode is the default; block mode is not widely sup-
ported.
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
remote files...
local [ files... ]
Print the size and last modification time of the remote
or local files. If there is more than one item on the
list, the name of the file is printed first. The first
number is the file size, the second is the last modifi-
cation time of the file in the format CCYYMMDDhhmmSS
consisting of year, month, date, hour, minutes and sec-
onds in GMT. Note that this format, including the
length, is guaranteed, so that time strings can be
directly compared via the [[ builtin's < and > opera-
tors, even if they are too long to be represented as
integers.
Not all servers support the commands for retrieving
this information. In that case, the remote command
will print nothing and return status 2, compared with
status 1 for a file not found.
The local command (but not remote) may be used with no
arguments, in which case the information comes from
examining file descriptor zero. This is the same file
as seen by a put command with no further redirection.
get file [...]
Retrieve all files from the server, concatenating them
and sending them to standard output.
put file [...]
For each file, read a file from standard input and send
that to the remote host with the given name.
append file [...]
As put, but if the remote file already exists, data is
appended to it instead of overwriting it.
getat file point
putat file point
appendat file point
Versions of get, put and append which will start the
transfer at the given point in the remote file. This
is useful for appending to an incomplete local file.
However, note that this ability is not universally sup-
ported by servers (and is not quite the behaviour spec-
ified by the standard).
delete file [...]
Delete the list of files on the server.
mkdir directory
Create a new directory directory on the server.
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
rmdir directory
Delete the directory directory on the server.
rename old-name new-name
Rename file old-name to new-name on the server.
site args...
Send a host-specific command to the server. You will
probably only need this if instructed by the server to
use it.
quote args...
Send the raw FTP command sequence to the server. You
should be familiar with the FTP command set as defined
in RFC959 before doing this. Useful commands may
include STAT and HELP. Note also the mechanism for
returning messages as described for the variable
ZFTP_VERBOSE below, in particular that all messages
from the control connection are sent to standard error.
close
quit Close the current data connection. This unsets the
shell parameters ZFTP_HOST, ZFTP_PORT, ZFTP_IP,
ZFTP_SYSTEM, ZFTP_USER, ZFTP_ACCOUNT, ZFTP_PWD,
ZFTP_TYPE and ZFTP_MODE.
session [ sessname ]
Allows multiple FTP sessions to be used at once. The
name of the session is an arbitrary string of charac-
ters; the default session is called `default'. If this
command is called without an argument, it will list all
the current sessions; with an argument, it will either
switch to the existing session called sessname, or cre-
ate a new session of that name.
Each session remembers the status of the connection,
the set of connection-specific shell parameters (the
same set as are unset when a connection closes, as
given in the description of close), and any user param-
eters specified with the params subcommand. Changing
to a previous session restores those values; changing
to a new session initialises them in the same way as if
zftp had just been loaded. The name of the current
session is given by the parameter ZFTP_SESSION.
rmsession [ sessname ]
Delete a session; if a name is not given, the current
session is deleted. If the current session is deleted,
the earliest existing session becomes the new current
session, otherwise the current session is not changed.
If the session being deleted is the only one, a new
session called `default' is created and becomes the
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
current session; note that this is a new session even
if the session being deleted is also called `default'.
It is recommended that sessions not be deleted while
background commands which use zftp are still active.
Parameters
The following shell parameters are used by zftp. Currently
none of them are special.
ZFTP_TMOUT
Integer. The time in seconds to wait for a network
operation to complete before returning an error. If
this is not set when the module is loaded, it will be
given the default value 60. A value of zero turns off
timeouts. If a timeout occurs on the control connec-
tion it will be closed. Use a larger value if this
occurs too frequently.
ZFTP_IP
Readonly. The IP address of the current connection in
dot notation.
ZFTP_HOST
Readonly. The hostname of the current remote server.
If the host was opened as an IP number, ZFTP_HOST con-
tains that instead; this saves the overhead for a name
lookup, as IP numbers are most commonly used when a
nameserver is unavailable.
ZFTP_PORT
Readonly. The number of the remote TCP port to which
the connection is open (even if the port was originally
specified as a named service). Usually this is the
standard FTP port, 21.
In the unlikely event that your system does not have
the appropriate conversion functions, this appears in
network byte order. If your system is little-endian,
the port then consists of two swapped bytes and the
standard port will be reported as 5376. In that case,
numeric ports passed to zftp open will also need to be
in this format.
ZFTP_SYSTEM
Readonly. The system type string returned by the
server in response to an FTP SYST request. The most
interesting case is a string beginning "UNIX Type: L8",
which ensures maximum compatibility with a local UNIX
host.
ZFTP_TYPE
Readonly. The type to be used for data transfers ,
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
either `A' or `I'. Use the type subcommand to change
this.
ZFTP_USER
Readonly. The username currently logged in, if any.
ZFTP_ACCOUNT
Readonly. The account name of the current user, if
any. Most servers do not require an account name.
ZFTP_PWD
Readonly. The current directory on the server.
ZFTP_CODE
Readonly. The three digit code of the last FTP reply
from the server as a string. This can still be read
after the connection is closed, and is not changed when
the current session changes.
ZFTP_REPLY
Readonly. The last line of the last reply sent by the
server. This can still be read after the connection is
closed, and is not changed when the current session
changes.
ZFTP_SESSION
Readonly. The name of the current FTP session; see the
description of the session subcommand.
ZFTP_PREFS
A string of preferences for altering aspects of zftp's
behaviour. Each preference is a single character. The
following are defined:
P Passive: attempt to make the remote server initi-
ate data transfers. This is slightly more effi-
cient than sendport mode. If the letter S occurs
later in the string, zftp will use sendport mode
if passive mode is not available.
S Sendport: initiate transfers by the FTP PORT com-
mand. If this occurs before any P in the string,
passive mode will never be attempted.
D Dumb: use only the bare minimum of FTP commands.
This prevents the variables ZFTP_SYSTEM and
ZFTP_PWD from being set, and will mean all connec-
tions default to ASCII type. It may prevent
ZFTP_SIZE from being set during a transfer if the
server does not send it anyway (many servers do).
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If ZFTP_PREFS is not set when zftp is loaded, it will
be set to a default of `PS', i.e. use passive mode if
available, otherwise fall back to sendport mode.
ZFTP_VERBOSE
A string of digits between 0 and 5 inclusive, specify-
ing which responses from the server should be printed.
All responses go to standard error. If any of the num-
bers 1 to 5 appear in the string, raw responses from
the server with reply codes beginning with that digit
will be printed to standard error. The first digit of
the three digit reply code is defined by RFC959 to cor-
respond to:
1. A positive preliminary reply.
2. A positive completion reply.
3. A positive intermediate reply.
4. A transient negative completion reply.
5. A permanent negative completion reply.
It should be noted that, for unknown reasons, the reply
`Service not available', which forces termination of a
connection, is classified as 421, i.e. `transient nega-
tive', an interesting interpretation of the word `tran-
sient'.
The code 0 is special: it indicates that all but the
last line of multiline replies read from the server
will be printed to standard error in a processed for-
mat. By convention, servers use this mechanism for
sending information for the user to read. The appro-
priate reply code, if it matches the same response,
takes priority.
If ZFTP_VERBOSE is not set when zftp is loaded, it will
be set to the default value 450, i.e., messages des-
tined for the user and all errors will be printed. A
null string is valid and specifies that no messages
should be printed.
Functions
zftp_chpwd
If this function is set by the user, it is called every
time the directory changes on the server, including
when a user is logged in, or when a connection is
closed. In the last case, $ZFTP_PWD will be unset;
otherwise it will reflect the new directory.
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
zftp_progress
If this function is set by the user, it will be called
during a get, put or append operation each time suffi-
cient data has been received from the host. During a
get, the data is sent to standard output, so it is
vital that this function should write to standard error
or directly to the terminal, not to standard output.
When it is called with a transfer in progress, the fol-
lowing additional shell parameters are set:
ZFTP_FILE
The name of the remote file being transferred from
or to.
ZFTP_TRANSFER
A G for a get operation and a P for a put opera-
tion.
ZFTP_SIZE
The total size of the complete file being trans-
ferred: the same as the first value provided by
the remote and local subcommands for a particular
file. If the server cannot supply this value for
a remote file being retrieved, it will not be set.
If input is from a pipe the value may be incorrect
and correspond simply to a full pipe buffer.
ZFTP_COUNT
The amount of data so far transferred; a number
between zero and $ZFTP_SIZE, if that is set. This
number is always available.
The function is initially called with ZFTP_TRANSFER set
appropriately and ZFTP_COUNT set to zero. After the
transfer is finished, the function will be called one
more time with ZFTP_TRANSFER set to GF or PF, in case
it wishes to tidy up. It is otherwise never called
twice with the same value of ZFTP_COUNT.
Sometimes the progress meter may cause disruption. It
is up to the user to decide whether the function should
be defined and to use unfunction when necessary.
Problems
A connection may not be opened in the left hand side of a
pipe as this occurs in a subshell and the file information
is not updated in the main shell. In the case of type or
mode changes or closing the connection in a subshell, the
information is returned but variables are not updated until
the next call to zftp. Other status changes in subshells
will not be reflected by changes to the variables (but
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 55
User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
should be otherwise harmless).
Deleting sessions while a zftp command is active in the
background can have unexpected effects, even if it does not
use the session being deleted. This is because all shell
subprocesses share information on the state of all connec-
tions, and deleting a session changes the ordering of that
information.
On some operating systems, the control connection is not
valid after a fork(), so that operations in subshells, on
the left hand side of a pipeline, or in the background are
not possible, as they should be. This is presumably a bug
in the operating system.
THE ZSH/ZLE MODULE
The zsh/zle module contains the Zsh Line Editor. See zsh-
zle(1).
THE ZSH/ZLEPARAMETER MODULE
The zsh/zleparameter module defines two special parameters
that can be used to access internal information of the Zsh
Line Editor (see zshzle(1)).
keymaps
This array contains the names of the keymaps currently
defined.
widgets
This associative array contains one entry per widget
defined. The name of the widget is the key and the
value gives information about the widget. It is either
the string `builtin' for builtin widgets, a string of
the form `user:name' for user-defined widgets, where
name is the name of the shell function implementing the
widget, or it is a string of the form `comple-
tion:type:name', for completion widgets. In the last
case type is the name of the builtin widgets the com-
pletion widget imitates in its behavior and name is the
name of the shell function implementing the completion
widget.
THE ZSH/ZPROF MODULE
When loaded, the zsh/zprof causes shell functions to be pro-
filed. The profiling results can be obtained with the zprof
builtin command made available by this module. There is no
way to turn profiling off other than unloading the module.
zprof [ -c ]
Without the -c option, zprof lists profiling results to
standard output. The format is comparable to that of
commands like gprof.
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User Commands ZSHMODULES(1)
At the top there is a summary listing all functions
that were called at least once. This summary is sorted
in decreasing order of the amount of time spent in
each. The lines contain the number of the function in
order, which is used in other parts of the list in suf-
fixes of the form `[num]', then the number of calls
made to the function. The next three columns list the
time in milliseconds spent in the function and its
descendants, the average time in milliseconds spent in
the function and its descendants per call and the per-
centage of time spent in all shell functions used in
this function and its descendants. The following three
columns give the same information, but counting only
the time spent in the function itself. The final col-
umn shows the name of the function.
After the summary, detailed information about every
function that was invoked is listed, sorted in decreas-
ing order of the amount of time spent in each function
and its descendants. Each of these entries consists of
descriptions for the functions that called the function
described, the function itself, and the functions that
were called from it. The description for the function
itself has the same format as in the summary (and shows
the same information). The other lines don't show the
number of the function at the beginning and have their
function named indented to make it easier to distin-
guish the line showing the function described in the
section from the surrounding lines.
The information shown in this case is almost the same
as in the summary, but only refers to the call hierar-
chy being displayed. For example, for a calling func-
tion the column showing the total running time lists
the time spent in the described function and its
descendants only for the times when it was called from
that particular calling function. Likewise, for a
called function, this columns lists the total time
spent in the called function and its descendants only
for the times when it was called from the function
described.
Also in this case, the column showing the number of
calls to a function also shows a slash and then the
total number of invocations made to the called func-
tion.
As long as the zsh/zprof module is loaded, profiling
will be done and multiple invocations of the zprof
builtin command will show the times and numbers of
calls since the module was loaded. With the -c option,
the zprof builtin command will reset its internal
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counters and will not show the listing.
THE ZSH/ZPTY MODULE
The zsh/zpty module offers one builtin:
zpty [ -e ] [ -b ] name [ arg ... ]
The arguments following name are concatenated with spa-
ces between, then executed as a command, as if passed
to the eval builtin. The command runs under a newly
assigned pseudo-terminal; this is useful for running
commands non-interactively which expect an interactive
environment. The name is not part of the command, but
is used to refer to this command in later calls to
zpty.
With the -e option, the pseudo-terminal is set up so
that input characters are echoed.
With the -b option, input to and output from the
pseudo-terminal are made non-blocking.
zpty -d [ names ... ]
The second form, with the -d option, is used to delete
commands previously started, by supplying a list of
their names. If no names are given, all commands are
deleted. Deleting a command causes the HUP signal to
be sent to the corresponding process.
zpty -w [ -n ] name [ strings ... ]
The -w option can be used to send the to command name
the given strings as input (separated by spaces). If
the -n option is not given, a newline is added at the
end.
If no strings are provided, the standard input is
copied to the pseudo-terminal; this may stop before
copying the full input if the pseudo-terminal is
non-blocking.
Note that the command under the pseudo-terminal sees
this input as if it were typed, so beware when sending
special tty driver characters such as word-erase,
line-kill, and end-of-file.
zpty -r [ -mt ] name [ param [ pattern ] ]
The -r option can be used to read the output of the
command name. With only a name argument, the output
read is copied to the standard output. Unless the
pseudo-terminal is non-blocking, copying continues
until the command under the pseudo-terminal exits; when
non-blocking, only as much output as is immediately
available is copied. The return status is zero if any
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output is copied.
When also given a param argument, at most one line is
read and stored in the parameter named param. Less
than a full line may be read if the pseudo-terminal is
non-blocking. The return status is zero if at least
one character is stored in param.
If a pattern is given as well, output is read until the
whole string read matches the pattern, even in the
non-blocking case. The return status is zero if the
string read matches the pattern, or if the command has
exited but at least one character could still be read.
If the option -m is present, the return status is zero
only if the pattern matches. As of this writing, a
maximum of one megabyte of output can be consumed this
way; if a full megabyte is read without matching the
pattern, the return status is non-zero.
In all cases, the return status is non-zero if nothing
could be read, and is 2 if this is because the command
has finished.
If the -r option is combined with the -t option, zpty
tests whether output is available before trying to
read. If no output is available, zpty immediately
returns the status 1. When used with a pattern, the
behaviour on a failed poll is similar to when the com-
mand has exited: the return value is zero if at least
one character could still be read even if the pattern
failed to match.
zpty -t name
The -t option without the -r option can be used to test
whether the command name is still running. It returns
a zero status if the command is running and a non-zero
value otherwise.
zpty [ -L ]
The last form, without any arguments, is used to list
the commands currently defined. If the -L option is
given, this is done in the form of calls to the zpty
builtin.
THE ZSH/ZSELECT MODULE
The zsh/zselect module makes available one builtin command:
zselect [ -rwe -t timeout -a array ] [ fd ... ]
The zselect builtin is a front-end to the `select' sys-
tem call, which blocks until a file descriptor is ready
for reading or writing, or has an error condition, with
an optional timeout. If this is not available on your
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system, the command prints an error message and returns
status 2 (normal errors return status 1). For more
information, see your systems documentation for
select(3). Note there is no connection with the shell
builtin of the same name.
Arguments and options may be intermingled in any order.
Non-option arguments are file descriptors, which must
be decimal integers. By default, file descriptors are
to be tested for reading, i.e. zselect will return when
data is available to be read from the file descriptor,
or more precisely, when a read operation from the file
descriptor will not block. After a -r, -w and -e, the
given file descriptors are to be tested for reading,
writing, or error conditions. These options and an
arbitrary list of file descriptors may be given in any
order.
(The presence of an `error condition' is not well
defined in the documentation for many implementations
of the select system call. According to recent ver-
sions of the POSIX specification, it is really an
exception condition, of which the only standard example
is out-of-band data received on a socket. So zsh users
are unlikely to find the -e option useful.)
The option `-t timeout' specifies a timeout in hun-
dredths of a second. This may be zero, in which case
the file descriptors will simply be polled and zselect
will return immediately. It is possible to call zse-
lect with no file descriptors and a non-zero timeout
for use as a finer-grained replacement for `sleep';
note, however, the return status is always 1 for a
timeout.
The option `-a array' indicates that array should be
set to indicate the file descriptor(s) which are ready.
If the option is not given, the array reply will be
used for this purpose. The array will contain a string
similar to the arguments for zselect. For example,
zselect -t 0 -r 0 -w 1
might return immediately with status 0 and $reply con-
taining `-r 0 -w 1' to show that both file descriptors
are ready for the requested operations.
The option `-A assoc' indicates that the associative
array assoc should be set to indicate the file descrip-
tor(s( which are ready. This option overrides the
option -a, nor will reply be modified. The keys of
assoc are the file descriptors, and the corresponding
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values are any of the characters `rwe' to indicate the
condition.
The command returns status 0 if some file descriptors
are ready for reading. If the operation timed out, or
a timeout of 0 was given and no file descriptors were
ready, or there was an error, it returns status 1 and
the array will not be set (nor modified in any way).
If there was an error in the select operation the
appropriate error message is printed.
THE ZSH/ZUTIL MODULE
The zsh/zutil module only adds some builtins:
zstyle [ -L [ pattern [ style ] ] ]
zstyle [ -e | - | -- ] pattern style strings ...
zstyle -d [ pattern [ styles ... ] ]
zstyle -g name [ pattern [ style ] ]
zstyle -abs context style name [ sep ]
zstyle -Tt context style [ strings ...]
zstyle -m context style pattern
This builtin command is used to define and lookup
styles. Styles are pairs of names and values, where
the values consist of any number of strings. They are
stored together with patterns and lookup is done by
giving a string, called the `context', which is com-
pared to the patterns. The definition stored for the
first matching pattern will be returned.
For ordering of comparisons, patterns are searched from
most specific to least specific, and patterns that are
equally specific keep the order in which they were
defined. A pattern is considered to be more specific
than another if it contains more components (substrings
separated by colons) or if the patterns for the compo-
nents are more specific, where simple strings are con-
sidered to be more specific than patterns and complex
patterns are considered to be more specific than the
pattern `*'.
The first form (without arguments) lists the defini-
tions. Styles are shown in alphabetic order and pat-
terns are shown in the order zstyle will test them.
If the -L option is given, listing is done in the form
of calls to zstyle. The optional first argument is a
pattern which will be matched against the string sup-
plied as the pattern for the context; note that this
means, for example, `zstyle -L ":completion:*"' will
match any supplied pattern beginning `:completion:',
not just ":completion:*": use ":completion:\*" to
match that. The optional second argument limits the
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output to a specific style (not a pattern). -L is not
compatible with any other options.
The other forms are the following:
zstyle [ - | -- | -e ] pattern style strings ...
Defines the given style for the pattern with the
strings as the value. If the -e option is given,
the strings will be concatenated (separated by
spaces) and the resulting string will be evaluated
(in the same way as it is done by the eval builtin
command) when the style is looked up. In this
case the parameter `reply' must be assigned to set
the strings returned after the evaluation. Before
evaluating the value, reply is unset, and if it is
still unset after the evaluation, the style is
treated as if it were not set.
zstyle -d [ pattern [ styles ... ] ]
Delete style definitions. Without arguments all
definitions are deleted, with a pattern all defi-
nitions for that pattern are deleted and if any
styles are given, then only those styles are
deleted for the pattern.
zstyle -g name [ pattern [ style ] ]
Retrieve a style definition. The name is used as
the name of an array in which the results are
stored. Without any further arguments, all pat-
terns defined are returned. With a pattern the
styles defined for that pattern are returned and
with both a pattern and a style, the value strings
of that combination is returned.
The other forms can be used to look up or test pat-
terns.
zstyle -s context style name [ sep ]
The parameter name is set to the value of the
style interpreted as a string. If the value con-
tains several strings they are concatenated with
spaces (or with the sep string if that is given)
between them.
zstyle -b context style name
The value is stored in name as a boolean, i.e. as
the string `yes' if the value has only one string
and that string is equal to one of `yes', `true',
`on', or `1'. If the value is any other string or
has more than one string, the parameter is set to
`no'.
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zstyle -a context style name
The value is stored in name as an array. If name
is declared as an associative array, the first,
third, etc. strings are used as the keys and the
other strings are used as the values.
zstyle -t context style [ strings ...]
zstyle -T context style [ strings ...]
Test the value of a style, i.e. the -t option only
returns a status (sets $?). Without any strings
the return status is zero if the style is defined
for at least one matching pattern, has only one
string in its value, and that is equal to one of
`true', `yes', `on' or `1'. If any strings are
given the status is zero if and only if at least
one of the strings is equal to at least one of the
strings in the value. If the style is defined but
doesn't match, the return status is 1. If the
style is not defined, the status is 2.
The -T option tests the values of the style like
-t, but it returns status zero (rather than 2) if
the style is not defined for any matching pattern.
zstyle -m context style pattern
Match a value. Returns status zero if the pattern
matches at least one of the strings in the value.
zformat -f param format specs ...
zformat -a array sep specs ...
This builtin provides two different forms of format-
ting. The first form is selected with the -f option. In
this case the format string will be modified by replac-
ing sequences starting with a percent sign in it with
strings from the specs. Each spec should be of the
form `char:string' which will cause every appearance of
the sequence `%char' in format to be replaced by the
string. The `%' sequence may also contain optional
minimum and maximum field width specifications between
the `%' and the `char' in the form `%min.maxc', i.e.
the minimum field width is given first and if the maxi-
mum field width is used, it has to be preceded by a
dot. Specifying a minimum field width makes the result
be padded with spaces to the right if the string is
shorter than the requested width. Padding to the left
can be achieved by giving a negative minimum field
width. If a maximum field width is specified, the
string will be truncated after that many characters.
After all `%' sequences for the given specs have been
processed, the resulting string is stored in the param-
eter param.
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The %-escapes also understand ternary expressions in
the form used by prompts. The % is followed by a `('
and then an ordinary format specifier character as
described above. There may be a set of digits either
before or after the `('; these specify a test number,
which defaults to zero. Negative numbers are also
allowed. An arbitrary delimiter character follows the
format specifier, which is followed by a piece of
`true' text, the delimiter character again, a piece of
`false' text, and a closing parenthesis. The complete
expression (without the digits) thus looks like
`%(X.text1.text2)', except that the `.' character is
arbitrary. The value given for the format specifier in
the char:string expressions is evaluated as a mathemat-
ical expression, and compared with the test number. If
they are the same, text1 is output, else text2 is out-
put. A parenthesis may be escaped in text2 as %).
Either of text1 or text2 may contain nested %-escapes.
For example:
zformat -f REPLY "The answer is '%3(c.yes.no)'." c:3
outputs "The answer is 'yes'." to REPLY since the value
for the format specifier c is 3, agreeing with the
digit argument to the ternary expression.
The second form, using the -a option, can be used for
aligning strings. Here, the specs are of the form
`left:right' where `left' and `right' are arbitrary
strings. These strings are modified by replacing the
colons by the sep string and padding the left strings
with spaces to the right so that the sep strings in the
result (and hence the right strings after them) are all
aligned if the strings are printed below each other.
All strings without a colon are left unchanged and all
strings with an empty right string have the trailing
colon removed. In both cases the lengths of the
strings are not used to determine how the other strings
are to be aligned. The resulting strings are stored in
the array.
zregexparse
This implements some internals of the _regex_arguments
function.
specs
zparseopts [ -D ] [ -K ] [ -M ] [ -E ] [ -a array ] [ -A
assoc ]
This builtin simplifies the parsing of options in posi-
tional parameters, i.e. the set of arguments given by
$*. Each spec describes one option and must be of the
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form `opt[=array]'. If an option described by opt is
found in the positional parameters it is copied into
the array specified with the -a option; if the optional
`=array' is given, it is instead copied into that
array.
Note that it is an error to give any spec without an
`=array' unless one of the -a or -A options is used.
Unless the -E option is given, parsing stops at the
first string that isn't described by one of the specs.
Even with -E, parsing always stops at a positional
parameter equal to `-' or `--'.
The opt description must be one of the following. Any
of the special characters can appear in the option name
provided it is preceded by a backslash.
name
name+
The name is the name of the option without the
leading `-'. To specify a GNU-style long option,
one of the usual two leading `-' must be included
in name; for example, a `--file' option is repre-
sented by a name of `-file'.
If a `+' appears after name, the option is
appended to array each time it is found in the
positional parameters; without the `+' only the
last occurrence of the option is preserved.
If one of these forms is used, the option takes no
argument, so parsing stops if the next positional
parameter does not also begin with `-' (unless the
-E option is used).
name:
name:-
name::
If one or two colons are given, the option takes
an argument; with one colon, the argument is
mandatory and with two colons it is optional. The
argument is appended to the array after the option
itself.
An optional argument is put into the same array
element as the option name (note that this makes
empty strings as arguments indistinguishable). A
mandatory argument is added as a separate element
unless the `:-' form is used, in which case the
argument is put into the same element.
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A `+' as described above may appear between the
name and the first colon.
The options of zparseopts itself are:
-a array
As described above, this names the default array in
which to store the recognised options.
-A assoc
If this is given, the options and their values are also
put into an associative array with the option names as
keys and the arguments (if any) as the values.
-D If this option is given, all options found are removed
from the positional parameters of the calling shell or
shell function, up to but not including any not
described by the specs. This is similar to using the
shift builtin.
-K With this option, the arrays specified with the -a and
-A options and with the `=array' forms are kept
unchanged when none of the specs for them is used.
This allows assignment of default values to them before
calling zparseopts.
-M This changes the assignment rules to implement a map
among equivalent option names. If any spec uses the
`=array' form, the string array is interpreted as the
name of another spec, which is used to choose where to
store the values. If no other spec is found, the val-
ues are stored as usual. This changes only the way the
values are stored, not the way $* is parsed, so results
may be unpredicable if the `name+' specifier is used
inconsistently.
-E This changes the parsing rules to not stop at the first
string that isn't described by one of the specs. It
can be used to test for or (if used together with -D)
extract options and their arguments, ignoring all other
options and arguments that may be in the positional
parameters.
For example,
set -- -a -bx -c y -cz baz -cend
zparseopts a=foo b:=bar c+:=bar
will have the effect of
foo=(-a)
bar=(-b x -c y -c z)
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The arguments from `baz' on will not be used.
As an example for the -E option, consider:
set -- -a x -b y -c z arg1 arg2
zparseopts -E -D b:=bar
will have the effect of
bar=(-b y)
set -- -a x -c z arg1 arg2
I.e., the option -b and its arguments are taken from the
positional parameters and put into the array bar.
The -M option can be used like this:
set -- -a -bx -c y -cz baz -cend
zparseopts -A bar -M a=foo b+: c:=b
to have the effect of
foo=(-a)
bar=(-a '' -b xyz)
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 67
User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
NAME
zshcalsys - zsh calendar system
DESCRIPTION
The shell is supplied with a series of functions to replace
and enhance the traditional Unix calendar programme, which
warns the user of imminent or future events, details of
which are stored in a text file (typically calendar in the
user's home directory). The version provided here includes
a mechanism for alerting the user when an event is due.
In addition a function age is provided that can be used in a
glob qualifier; it allows files to be selected based on
their modification times.
The format of the calendar file and the dates used there in
and in the age function are described first, then the func-
tions that can be called to examine and modify the calendar
file.
The functions here depend on the availability of the
zsh/datetime module which is usually installed with the
shell. The library function strptime() must be available;
it is present on most recent operating systems.
FILE AND DATE FORMATS
Calendar File Format
The calendar file is by default ~/calendar. This can be
configured by the calendar-file style, see the section
STYLES below. The basic format consists of a series of sep-
arate lines, with no indentation, each including a date and
time specification followed by a description of the event.
Various enhancements to this format are supported, based on
the syntax of Emacs calendar mode. An indented line indi-
cates a continuation line that continues the description of
the event from the preceding line (note the date may not be
continued in this way). An initial ampersand (&) is ignored
for compatibility.
An indented line on which the first non-whitespace character
is # is not displayed with the calendar entry, but is still
scanned for information. This can be used to hide informa-
tion useful to the calendar system but not to the user, such
as the unique identifier used by calendar_add.
The Emacs extension that a date with no description may
refer to a number of succeeding events at different times is
not supported.
Unless the done-file style has been altered, any events
which have been processed are appended to the file with the
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same name as the calendar file with the suffix .done, hence
~/calendar.done by default.
An example is shown below.
Date Format
The format of the date and time is designed to allow flexi-
bility without admitting ambiguity. (The words `date' and
`time' are both used in the documentation below; except
where specifically noted this implies a string that may
include both a date and a time specification.) Note that
there is no localization support; month and day names must
be in English and separator characters are fixed. Matching
is case insensitive, and only the first three letters of the
names are significant, although as a special case a form
beginning "month" does not match "Monday". Furthermore,
time zones are not handled; all times are assumed to be
local.
It is recommended that, rather than exploring the intrica-
cies of the system, users find a date format that is natural
to them and stick to it. This will avoid unexpected
effects. Various key facts should be noted.
o In particular, note the confusion between
month/day/year and day/month/year when the month is
numeric; these formats should be avoided if at all pos-
sible. Many alternatives are available.
o The year must be given in full to avoid confusion, and
only years from 1900 to 2099 inclusive are matched.
The following give some obvious examples; users finding here
a format they like and not subject to vagaries of style may
skip the full description. As dates and times are matched
separately (even though the time may be embedded in the
date), any date format may be mixed with any format for the
time of day provide the separators are clear (whitespace,
colons, commas).
2007/04/03 13:13
2007/04/03:13:13
2007/04/03 1:13 pm
3rd April 2007, 13:13
April 3rd 2007 1:13 p.m.
Apr 3, 2007 13:13
Tue Apr 03 13:13:00 2007
13:13 2007/apr/3
More detailed rules follow.
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Times are parsed and extracted before dates. They must use
colons to separate hours and minutes, though a dot is
allowed before seconds if they are present. This limits
time formats to the following:
o HH:MM[:SS[.FFFFF]] [am|pm|a.m.|p.m.]
o HH:MM.SS[.FFFFF] [am|pm|a.m.|p.m.]
Here, square brackets indicate optional elements, possibly
with alternatives. Fractions of a second are recognised but
ignored. For absolute times (the normal format require by
the calendar file and the age function) a date is mandatory
but a time of day is not; the time returned is at the start
of the date. One variation is allowed: if a.m. or p.m. or
one of their variants is present, an hour without a minute
is allowed, e.g. 3 p.m..
Time zones are not handled, though if one is matched follow-
ing a time specification it will be removed to allow a sur-
rounding date to be parsed. This only happens if the format
of the timezone is not too unusual. The following are exam-
ples of forms that are understood:
+0100
GMT
GMT-7
CET+1CDT
Any part of the timezone that is not numeric must have
exactly three capital letters in the name.
Dates suffer from the ambiguity between DD/MM/YYYY and
MM/DD/YYYY. It is recommended this form is avoided with
purely numeric dates, but use of ordinals, eg. 3rd/04/2007,
will resolve the ambiguity as the ordinal is always parsed
as the day of the month. Years must be four digits (and the
first two must be 19 or 20); 03/04/08 is not recognised.
Other numbers may have leading zeroes, but they are not
required. The following are handled:
o YYYY/MM/DD
o YYYY-MM-DD
o YYYY/MNM/DD
o YYYY-MNM-DD
o DD[th|st|rd] MNM[,] [ YYYY ]
o MNM DD[th|st|rd][,] [ YYYY ]
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o DD[th|st|rd]/MM[,] YYYY
o DD[th|st|rd]/MM/YYYY
o MM/DD[th|st|rd][,] YYYY
o MM/DD[th|st|rd]/YYYY
Here, MNM is at least the first three letters of a month
name, matched case-insensitively. The remainder of the
month name may appear but its contents are irrelevant, so
janissary, febrile, martial, apricot, maybe, junta, etc. are
happily handled.
Where the year is shown as optional, the current year is
assumed. There are only two such cases, the form Jun 20 or
14 September (the only two commonly occurring forms, apart
from a "the" in some forms of English, which isn't currently
supported). Such dates will of course become ambiguous in
the future, so should ideally be avoided.
Times may follow dates with a colon, e.g. 1965/07/12:09:45;
this is in order to provide a format with no whitespace. A
comma and whitespace are allowed, e.g. 1965/07/12, 09:45.
Currently the order of these separators is not checked, so
illogical formats such as 1965/07/12, : ,09:45 will also be
matched. For simplicity such variations are not shown in
the list above. Otherwise, a time is only recognised as
being associated with a date if there is only whitespace in
between, or if the time was embedded in the date.
Days of the week are not normally scanned, but will be
ignored if they occur at the start of the date pattern only.
However, in contexts where it is useful to specify dates
relative to today, days of the week with no other date spec-
ification may be given. The day is assumed to be either
today or within the past week. Likewise, the words yester-
day, today and tomorrow are handled. All matches are
case-insensitive. Hence if today is Monday, then Sunday is
equivalent to yesterday, Monday is equivalent to today, but
Tuesday gives a date six days ago. This is not generally
useful within the calendar file. Dates in this format may
be combined with a time specification; for example Tomorrow,
8 p.m..
For example, the standard date format:
Fri Aug 18 17:00:48 BST 2006
is handled by matching HH:MM:SS and removing it together
with the matched (but unused) time zone. This leaves the
following:
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Fri Aug 18 2006
Fri is ignored and the rest is matched according to the
standard rules.
Relative Time Format
In certain places relative times are handled. Here, a date
is not allowed; instead a combination of various supported
periods are allowed, together with an optional time. The
periods must be in order from most to least significant.
In some cases, a more accurate calculation is possible when
there is an anchor date: offsets of months or years pick
the correct day, rather than being rounded, and it is possi-
ble to pick a particular day in a month as `(1st Friday)',
etc., as described in more detail below.
Anchors are available in the following cases. If one or two
times are passed to the function calendar, the start time
acts an anchor for the end time when the end time is rela-
tive (even if the start time is implicit). When examining
calendar files, the scheduled event being examined anchors
the warning time when it is given explicitly by means of the
WARN keyword; likewise, the scheduled event anchors a repe-
tition period when given by the RPT keyword, so that speci-
fications such as RPT 2 months, 3rd Thursday are handled
properly. Finally, the -R argument to calendar_scandate
directly provides an anchor for relative calculations.
The periods handled, with possible abbreviations are:
Years
years, yrs, ys, year, yr, y, yearly. A year is 365.25
days unless there is an anchor.
Months
months, mons, mnths, mths, month, mon, mnth, mth,
monthly. Note that m, ms, mn, mns are ambiguous and
are not handled. A month is a period of 30 days rather
than a calendar month unless there is an anchor.
Weeks
weeks, wks, ws, week, wk, w, weekly
Days days, dys, ds, day, dy, d, daily
Hours
hours, hrs, hs, hour, hr, h, hourly
Minutes
minutes, mins, minute, min, but not m, ms, mn or mns
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Seconds
seconds, secs, ss, second, sec, s
Spaces between the numbers are optional, but are required
between items, although a comma may be used (with or without
spaces).
The forms yearly to hourly allow the number to be omitted;
it is assumed to be 1. For example, 1 d and daily are
equivalent. Note that using those forms with plurals is
confusing; 2 yearly is the same as 2 years, not twice
yearly, so it is recommended they only be used without num-
bers.
When an anchor time is present, there is an extension to
handle regular events in the form of the nth someday of the
month. Such a specification must occur immediately after
any year and month specification, but before any time of
day, and must be in the form n(th|st|rd) day, for example
1st Tuesday or 3rd Monday. As in other places, days are
matched case insensitively, must be in English, and only the
first three letters are significant except that a form
beginning `month' does not match `Monday'. No attempt is
made to sanitize the resulting date; attempts to squeeze too
many occurrences into a month will push the day into the
next month (but in the obvious fashion, retaining the cor-
rect day of the week).
Here are some examples:
30 years 3 months 4 days 3:42:41
14 days 5 hours
Monthly, 3rd Thursday
4d,10hr
Example
Here is an example calendar file. It uses a consistent date
format, as recommended above.
Feb 1, 2006 14:30 Pointless bureaucratic meeting
Mar 27, 2006 11:00 Mutual recrimination and finger pointing
Bring water pistol and waterproofs
Mar 31, 2006 14:00 Very serious managerial pontification
# UID 12C7878A9A50
Apr 10, 2006 13:30 Even more pointless blame assignment exercise WARN 30 mins
May 18, 2006 16:00 Regular moaning session RPT monthly, 3rd Thursday
The second entry has a continuation line. The third entry
has a continuation line that will not be shown when the
entry is displayed, but the unique identifier will be used
by the calendar_add function when updating the event. The
fourth entry will produce a warning 30 minutes before the
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
event (to allow you to equip yourself appropriately). The
fifth entry repeats after a month on the 3rd Thursday, i.e.
June 15, 2006, at the same time.
USER FUNCTIONS
This section describes functions that are designed to be
called directly by the user. The first part describes those
functions associated with the user's calendar; the second
part describes the use in glob qualifiers.
Calendar system functions
[ start ] end ](
calendar [ -abdDsv ] [ -C calfile ] [ -n num ] [ -S show-
prog ] [
] [ start ]
calendar -r [ -abdDrsv ] [ -C calfile ] [ -n num ] [ -S
showprog
Show events in the calendar.
With no arguments, show events from the start of today
until the end of the next working day after today. In
other words, if today is Friday, Saturday, or Sunday,
show up to the end of the following Monday, otherwise
show today and tomorrow.
If end is given, show events from the start of today up
to the time and date given, which is in the format
described in the previous section. Note that if this
is a date the time is assumed to be midnight at the
start of the date, so that effectively this shows all
events before the given date.
end may start with a +, in which case the remainder of
the specification is a relative time format as
described in the previous section indicating the range
of time from the start time that is to be included.
If start is also given, show events starting from that
time and date. The word now can be used to indicate
the current time.
To implement an alert when events are due, include cal-
endar -s in your ~/.zshrc file.
Options:
-a Show all items in the calendar, regardless of the
start and end.
-b Brief: don't display continuation lines (i.e.
indented lines following the line with the
date/time), just the first line.
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
-B lines
Brief: display at most the first lines lines of
the calendar entry. `-B 1' is equivalent to `-b'.
-C calfile
Explicitly specify a calendar file instead of the
value of the calendar-file style or the default
~/calendar.
-d Move any events that have passed from the calendar
file to the "done" file, as given by the done-file
style or the default which is the calendar file
with .done appended. This option is implied by
the -s option.
-D Turns off the option -d, even if the -s option is
also present.
-n num, -num
Show at least num events, if present in the calen-
dar file, regardless of the start and end.
-r Show all the remaining options in the calendar,
ignoring the given end time. The start time is
respected; any argument given is treated as a
start time.
-s Use the shell's sched command to schedule a timed
event that will warn the user when an event is
due. Note that the sched command only runs if the
shell is at an interactive prompt; a foreground
task blocks the scheduled task from running until
it is finished.
The timed event usually runs the programme calen-
dar_show to show the event, as described in the
section UTILITY FUNCTIONS below.
By default, a warning of the event is shown five
minutes before it is due. The warning period can
be configured by the style warn-time or for a sin-
gle calendar entry by including WARN reltime in
the first line of the entry, where reltime is one
of the usual relative time formats.
A repeated event may be indicated by including RPT
reldate in the first line of the entry. After the
scheduled event has been displayed it will be
re-entered into the calendar file at a time rel-
date after the existing event. Note that this is
currently the only use made of the repeat count,
so that it is not possible to query the schedule
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
for a recurrence of an event in the calendar until
the previous event has passed.
If RPT is used, it is also possible to specify
that certain recurrences of an event are resched-
uled or cancelled. This is done with the OCCUR-
RENCE keyword, followed by whitespace and the date
and time of the occurrence in the regular
sequence, followed by whitespace and either the
date and time of the rescheduled event or the
exact string CANCELLED. In this case the date and
time must be in exactly the "date with local time"
format used by the text/calendar MIME type (RFC
2445), <YYYY><MM><DD>T<hh><mm><ss> (note the pres-
ence of the literal character T). The first word
(the regular recurrence) may be something other
than a proper date/time to indicate that the event
is additional to the normal sequence; a convention
that retains the formatting appearance is
XXXXXXXXTXXXXXX.
Furthermore, it is useful to record the next regu-
lar recurrence (as then the displayed date may be
for a rescheduled event so cannot be used for cal-
culating the regular sequence). This is specified
by RECURRENCE and a time or date in the same for-
mat. calendar_add adds such an indication when it
encounters a recurring event that does not include
one, based on the headline date/time.
If calendar_add is used to update occurrences the
UID keyword described there should be present in
both the existing entry and the added occurrence
in order to identify recurring event sequences.
For example,
Thu May 6, 2010 11:00 Informal chat RPT 1 week
# RECURRENCE 20100506T110000
# OCCURRENCE 20100513T110000 20100513T120000
# OCCURRENCE 20100520T110000 CANCELLED
The event that occurs at 11:00 on 13th May 2010 is
rescheduled an hour later. The event that occurs
a week later is cancelled. The occurrences are
given on a continuation line starting with a #
character so will not usually be displayed as part
of the event. As elsewhere, no account of time
zones is taken with the times. After the next
event occurs the headline date/time will be `Thu
May 13, 2010 12:00' while the RECURRENCE date/time
will be `20100513T110000' (note that cancelled and
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
moved events are not taken account of in the
RECURRENCE, which records what the next regular
recurrence is, but they are accounted for in the
headline date/time).
It is safe to run calendar -s to reschedule an
existing event (if the calendar file has changed,
for example), and also to have it running in mul-
tiples instances of the shell since the calendar
file is locked when in use.
By default, expired events are moved to the "done"
file; see the -d option. Use -D to prevent this.
-S showprog
Explicitly specify a programme to be used for
showing events instead of the value of the
show-prog style or the default calendar_show.
-v Verbose: show more information about stages of
processing. This is useful for confirming that
the function has successfully parsed the dates in
the calendar file.
calendar_add [ -BL ] event ...
Adds a single event to the calendar in the appropriate
location. The event can contain multiple lines, as
described in the section Calendar File Format above.
Using this function ensures that the calendar file is
sorted in date and time order. It also makes special
arrangements for locking the file while it is altered.
The old calendar is left in a file with the suffix
.old.
The option -B indicates that backing up the calendar
file will be handled by the caller and should not be
performed by calendar_add. The option -L indicates
that calendar_add does not need to lock the calendar
file as it is already locked. These options will not
usually be needed by users.
If the style reformat-date is true, the date and time
of the new entry will be rewritten into the standard
date format: see the descriptions of this style and
the style date-format.
The function can use a unique identifier stored with
each event to ensure that updates to existing events
are treated correctly. The entry should contain the
word UID, followed by whitespace, followed by a word
consisting entirely of hexadecimal digits of arbitrary
length (all digits are significant, including leading
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 10
User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
zeroes). As the UID is not directly useful to the
user, it is convenient to hide it on an indented con-
tinuation line starting with a #, for example:
Aug 31, 2007 09:30 Celebrate the end of the holidays
# UID 045B78A0
The second line will not be shown by the calendar func-
tion.
It is possible to specify the RPT keyword followed by
CANCELLED instead of a relative time. This causes any
matched event or series of events to be cancelled (the
original event does not have to be marked as recurring
in order to be cancelled by this method). A UID is
required in order to match an existing event in the
calendar.
calendar_add will attempt to manage recurrences and
occurrences of repeating events as described for event
scheduling by calendar -s above. To reschedule or can-
cel a single event calendar_add should be called with
an entry that includes the correct UID but does not
include the RPT keyword as this is taken to mean the
entry applies to a series of repeating events and hence
replaces all existing information. Each rescheduled or
cancelled occurrence must have an OCCURRENCE keyword in
the entry passed to calendar_add which will be merged
into the calendar file. Any existing reference to the
occurrence is replaced. An occurrence that does not
refer to a valid existing event is added as a one-off
occurrence to the same calendar entry.
calendar_edit
This calls the user's editor to edit the calendar file.
If there are arguments, they are taken as the editor to
use (the file name is appended to the commands); other-
wise, the editor is given by the variable VISUAL, if
set, else the variable EDITOR.
If the calendar scheduler was running, then after edit-
ing the file calendar -s is called to update it.
This function locks out the calendar system during the
edit. Hence it should be used to edit the calendar
file if there is any possibility of a calendar event
occurring meanwhile. Note this can lead to another
shell with calendar functions enabled hanging waiting
for a lock, so it is necessary to quit the editor as
soon as possible.
calendar_parse calendar-entry
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
This is the internal function that analyses the parts
of a calendar entry, which is passed as the only argu-
ment. The function returns status 1 if the argument
could not be parsed as a calendar entry and status 2 if
the wrong number of arguments were passed; it also sets
the parameter reply to an empty associative array.
Otherwise, it returns status 0 and sets elements of the
associative array reply as follows:
time The time as a string of digits in the same units as
$EPOCHSECONDS
schedtime
The regularly scheduled time. This may differ from the
actual event time time if this is a recurring event and
the next occurrence has been rescheduled. Then time
gives the actual time and schedtime the time of the
regular recurrence before modification.
text1
The text from the line not including the date and time
of the event, but including any WARN or RPT keywords
and values.
warntime
Any warning time given by the WARN keyword as a string
of digits containing the time at which to warn in the
same units as $EPOCHSECONDS. (Note this is an absolute
time, not the relative time passed down.) Not set no
WARN keyword and value were matched.
warnstr
The raw string matched after the WARN keyword, else
unset.
rpttime
Any recurrence time given by the RPT keyword as a
string of digits containing the time of the recurrence
in the same units as $EPOCHSECONDS. (Note this is an
absolute time.) Not set if no RPT keyword and value
were matched.
schedrpttime
The next regularly scheduled occurrence of a recurring
event before modification. This may differ from rpt-
time, which is the actual time of the event that may
have been rescheduled from the regular time.
rptstr
The raw string matched after the RPT keyword, else
unset.
text2
The text from the line after removal of the date and
any keywords and values. )
calendar_showdate [ -r ] [ -f fmt ] date-spec ...
The given date-spec is interpreted and the correspond-
ing date and time printed. If the initial date-spec
begins with a + or - it is treated as relative to the
current time; date-specs after the first are treated as
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
relative to the date calculated so far and a leading +
is optional in that case. This allows one to use the
system as a date calculator. For example, calen-
dar_showdate '+1 month, 1st Friday' shows the date of
the first Friday of next month.
With the option -r nothing is printed but the value of
the date and time in seconds since the epoch is stored
in the parameter REPLY.
With the option -f fmt the given date/time conversion
format is passed to strftime; see notes on the
date-format style below.
In order to avoid ambiguity with negative relative date
specifications, options must occur in separate words;
in other words, -r and -f should not be combined in the
same word.
calendar_sort
Sorts the calendar file into date and time order.
The old calendar is left in a file with the suffix
.old.
Glob qualifiers
The function age can be autoloaded and use separately from
the calendar system, although it uses the function calen-
dar_scandate for date formatting. It requires the zsh/stat
builtin, but uses only the builtin zstat.
age selects files having a given modification time for use
as a glob qualifier. The format of the date is the same as
that understood by the calendar system, described in the
section FILE AND DATE FORMATS above.
The function can take one or two arguments, which can be
supplied either directly as command or arguments, or sepa-
rately as shell parameters.
print *(e:age 2006/10/04 2006/10/09:)
The example above matches all files modified between the
start of those dates. The second argument may alternatively
be a relative time introduced by a +:
print *(e:age 2006/10/04 +5d:)
The example above is equivalent to the previous example.
In addition to the special use of days of the week, today
and yesterday, times with no date may be specified; these
apply to today. Obviously such uses become problematic
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
around midnight.
print *(e-age 12:00 13:30-)
The example above shows files modified between 12:00 and
13:00 today.
print *(e:age 2006/10/04:)
The example above matches all files modified on that date.
If the second argument is omitted it is taken to be exactly
24 hours after the first argument (even if the first argu-
ment contains a time).
print *(e-age 2006/10/04:10:15 2006/10/04:10:45-)
The example above supplies times. Note that whitespace
within the time and date specification must be quoted to
ensure age receives the correct arguments, hence the use of
the additional colon to separate the date and time.
AGEREF=2006/10/04:10:15
AGEREF2=2006/10/04:10:45
print *(+age)
This shows the same example before using another form of
argument passing. The dates and times in the parameters
AGEREF and AGEREF2 stay in effect until unset, but will be
overridden if any argument is passed as an explicit argument
to age. Any explicit argument causes both parameters to be
ignored.
Instead of an explicit date and time, it's possible to use
the modification time of a file as the date and time for
either argument by introducing the file name with a colon:
print *(e-age :file1-)
matches all files created on the same day (24 hours starting
from midnight) as file1.
print *(e-age :file1 :file2-)
matches all files modified no earlier than file1 and no
later than file2; precision here is to the nearest second.
STYLES
The zsh style mechanism using the zstyle command is describe
in zshmodules(1). This is the same mechanism used in the
completion system.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 14
User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
The styles below are all examined in the context :date-
time:function:, for example :datetime:calendar:.
calendar-file
The location of the main calendar. The default is
~/calendar.
date-format
A strftime format string (see strftime(3)) with the zsh
extensions providing various numbers with no leading
zero or space if the number is a single digit as
described for the %D{string} prompt format in the sec-
tion EXPANSION OF PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1).
This is used for outputting dates in calendar, both to
support the -v option and when adding recurring events
back to the calendar file, and in calendar_showdate as
the final output format.
If the style is not set, the default used is similar
the standard system format as output by the date com-
mand (also known as `ctime format'): `%a %b %d %H:%M:%S
%Z %Y'.
done-file
The location of the file to which events which have
passed are appended. The default is the calendar file
location with the suffix .done. The style may be set
to an empty string in which case a "done" file will not
be maintained.
reformat-date
Boolean, used by calendar_add. If it is true, the date
and time of new entries added to the calendar will be
reformatted to the format given by the style date-for-
mat or its default. Only the date and time of the
event itself is reformatted; any subsidiary dates and
times such as those associated with repeat and warning
times are left alone.
show-prog
The programme run by calendar for showing events. It
will be passed the start time and stop time of the
events requested in seconds since the epoch followed by
the event text. Note that calendar -s uses a start
time and stop time equal to one another to indicate
alerts for specific events.
The default is the function calendar_show.
warn-time
The time before an event at which a warning will be
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 15
User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
displayed, if the first line of the event does not
include the text EVENT reltime. The default is 5 min-
utes.
UTILITY FUNCTIONS
calendar_lockfiles
Attempt to lock the files given in the argument. To
prevent problems with network file locking this is done
in an ad hoc fashion by attempting to create a symbolic
link to the file with the name file.lockfile. No other
system level functions are used for locking, i.e. the
file can be accessed and modified by any utility that
does not use this mechanism. In particular, the user
is not prevented from editing the calendar file at the
same time unless calendar_edit is used.
Three attempts are made to lock the file before giving
up. If the module zsh/zselect is available, the times
of the attempts are jittered so that multiple instances
of the calling function are unlikely to retry at the
same time.
The files locked are appended to the array lockfiles,
which should be local to the caller.
If all files were successfully locked, status zero is
returned, else status one.
This function may be used as a general file locking
function, although this will only work if only this
mechanism is used to lock files.
calendar_read
This is a backend used by various other functions to
parse the calendar file, which is passed as the only
argument. The array calendar_entries is set to the
list of events in the file; no pruning is done except
that ampersands are removed from the start of the line.
Each entry may contain multiple lines.
calendar_scandate
This is a generic function to parse dates and times
that may be used separately from the calendar system.
The argument is a date or time specification as
described in the section FILE AND DATE FORMATS above.
The parameter REPLY is set to the number of seconds
since the epoch corresponding to that date or time. By
default, the date and time may occur anywhere within
the given argument.
Returns status zero if the date and time were success-
fully parsed, else one.
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
Options:
-a The date and time are anchored to the start of the
argument; they will not be matched if there is
preceding text.
-A The date and time are anchored to both the start
and end of the argument; they will not be matched
if the is any other text in the argument.
-d Enable additional debugging output.
-m Minus. When -R anchor_time is also given the rel-
ative time is calculated backwards from
anchor_time.
-r The argument passed is to be parsed as a relative
time.
-R anchor_time
The argument passed is to be parsed as a relative
time. The time is relative to anchor_time, a time
in seconds since the epoch, and the returned value
is the absolute time corresponding to advancing
anchor_time by the relative time given. This
allows lengths of months to be correctly taken
into account. If the final day does not exist in
the given month, the last day of the final month
is given. For example, if the anchor time is dur-
ing 31st January 2007 and the relative time is 1
month, the final time is the same time of day dur-
ing 28th February 2007.
-s In addition to setting REPLY, set REPLY2 to the
remainder of the argument after the date and time
have been stripped. This is empty if the option
-A was given.
-t Allow a time with no date specification. The date
is assumed to be today. The behaviour is unspeci-
fied if the iron tongue of midnight is tolling
twelve.
calendar_show
The function used by default to display events. It
accepts a start time and end time for events, both in
epoch seconds, and an event description.
The event is always printed to standard output. If the
command line editor is active (which will usually be
the case) the command line will be redisplayed after
the output.
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User Commands ZSHCALSYS(1)
If the parameter DISPLAY is set and the start and end
times are the same (indicating a scheduled event), the
function uses the command xmessage to display a window
with the event details.
BUGS
As the system is based entirely on shell functions (with a
little support from the zsh/datetime module) the mechanisms
used are not as robust as those provided by a dedicated cal-
endar utility. Consequently the user should not rely on the
shell for vital alerts.
There is no calendar_delete function.
There is no localization support for dates and times, nor
any support for the use of time zones.
Relative periods of months and years do not take into
account the variable number of days.
The calendar_show function is currently hardwired to use
xmessage for displaying alerts on X Window System displays.
This should be configurable and ideally integrate better
with the desktop.
calendar_lockfiles hangs the shell while waiting for a lock
on a file. If called from a scheduled task, it should
instead reschedule the event that caused it.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 18
User Commands ZSHTCPSYS(1)
NAME
zshtcpsys - zsh tcp system
DESCRIPTION
A module zsh/net/tcp is provided to provide network I/O over
TCP/IP from within the shell; see its description in zshmod-
ules(1) . This manual page describes a function suite based
on the module. If the module is installed, the functions
are usually installed at the same time, in which case they
will be available for autoloading in the default function
search path. In addition to the zsh/net/tcp module, the
zsh/zselect module is used to implement timeouts on read
operations. For troubleshooting tips, consult the corre-
sponding advice for the zftp functions described in zshzftp-
sys(1) .
There are functions corresponding to the basic I/O opera-
tions open, close, read and send, named tcp_open etc., as
well as a function tcp_expect for pattern match analysis of
data read as input. The system makes it easy to receive
data from and send data to multiple named sessions at once.
In addition, it can be linked with the shell's line editor
in such a way that input data is automatically shown at the
terminal. Other facilities available including logging,
filtering and configurable output prompts.
To use the system where it is available, it should be enough
to `autoload -U tcp_open' and run tcp_open as documented
below to start a session. The tcp_open function will
autoload the remaining functions.
TCP USER FUNCTIONS
Basic I/O
tcp_open [-qz] host port [ sess ]
tcp_open [-qz] [ -s sess | -l sess,... ] ...
tcp_open [-qz] [-a fd | -f fd ] [ sess ]
Open a new session. In the first and simplest form,
open a TCP connection to host host at port port;
numeric and symbolic forms are understood for both.
If sess is given, this becomes the name of the session
which can be used to refer to multiple different TCP
connections. If sess is not given, the function will
invent a numeric name value (note this is not the same
as the file descriptor to which the session is
attached). It is recommended that session names not
include `funny' characters, where funny characters are
not well-defined but certainly do not include alphanu-
merics or underscores, and certainly do include white-
space.
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In the second case, one or more sessions to be opened
are given by name. A single session name is given
after -s and a comma-separated list after -l; both
options may be repeated as many times as necessary. A
failure to open any session causes tcp_open to abort.
The host and port are read from the file .ztcp_sessions
in the same directory as the user's zsh initialisation
files, i.e. usually the home directory, but $ZDOTDIR if
that is set. The file consists of lines each giving a
session name and the corresponding host and port, in
that order (note the session name comes first, not
last), separated by whitespace.
The third form allows passive and fake TCP connections.
If the option -a is used, its argument is a file
descriptor open for listening for connections. No
function front-end is provided to open such a file
descriptor, but a call to `ztcp -l port' will create
one with the file descriptor stored in the parameter
$REPLY. The listening port can be closed with `ztcp -c
fd'. A call to `tcp_open -a fd' will block until a
remote TCP connection is made to port on the local
machine. At this point, a session is created in the
usual way and is largely indistinguishable from an
active connection created with one of the first two
forms.
If the option -f is used, its argument is a file
descriptor which is used directly as if it were a TCP
session. How well the remainder of the TCP function
system copes with this depends on what actually under-
lies this file descriptor. A regular file is likely to
be unusable; a FIFO (pipe) of some sort will work bet-
ter, but note that it is not a good idea for two dif-
ferent sessions to attempt to read from the same FIFO
at once.
If the option -q is given with any of the three forms,
tcp_open will not print informational messages,
although it will in any case exit with an appropriate
status.
If the line editor (zle) is in use, which is typically
the case if the shell is interactive, tcp_open installs
a handler inside zle which will check for new data at
the same time as it checks for keyboard input. This is
convenient as the shell consumes no CPU time while
waiting; the test is performed by the operating system.
Giving the option -z to any of the forms of tcp_open
prevents the handler from being installed, so data must
be read explicitly. Note, however, this is not neces-
sary for executing complete sets of send and read
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commands from a function, as zle is not active at this
point. Generally speaking, the handler is only active
when the shell is waiting for input at a command prompt
or in the vared builtin. The option has no effect if
zle is not active; `[[ -o zle]]' will test for this.
The first session to be opened becomes the current ses-
sion and subsequent calls to tcp_open do not change it.
The current session is stored in the parameter
$TCP_SESS; see below for more detail about the parame-
ters used by the system.
The function tcp_on_open, if defined, is called when a
session is opened. See the description below.
tcp_close [-qn] [ -a | -l sess,... | sess ... ]
Close the named sessions, or the current session if
none is given, or all open sessions if -a is given.
The options -l and -s are both handled for consistency
with tcp_open, although the latter is redundant.
If the session being closed is the current one,
$TCP_SESS is unset, leaving no current session, even if
there are other sessions still open.
If the session was opened with tcp_open -f, the file
descriptor is closed so long as it is in the range 0 to
9 accessible directly from the command line. If the
option -n is given, no attempt will be made to close
file descriptors in this case. The -n option is not
used for genuine ztcp session; the file descriptors are
always closed with the session.
If the option -q is given, no informational messages
will be printed.
tcp_read [-bdq] [ -t TO ] [ -T TO ]
[ -a | -u fd ... | -l sess,... | -s sess ...]
Perform a read operation on the current session, or on
a list of sessions if any are given with -u, -l or -s,
or all open sessions if the option -a is given. Any of
the -u, -l or -s options may be repeated or mixed
together. The -u option specifies a file descriptor
directly (only those managed by this system are use-
ful), the other two specify sessions as described for
tcp_open above.
The function checks for new data available on all the
sessions listed. Unless the -b option is given, it
will not block waiting for new data. Any one line of
data from any of the available sessions will be read,
stored in the parameter $TCP_LINE, and displayed to
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standard output unless $TCP_SILENT contains a non-empty
string. When printed to standard output the string
$TCP_PROMPT will be shown at the start of the line; the
default form for this includes the name of the session
being read. See below for more information on these
parameters. In this mode, tcp_read can be called
repeatedly until it returns status 2 which indicates
all pending input from all specified sessions has been
handled.
With the option -b, equivalent to an infinite timeout,
the function will block until a line is available to
read from one of the specified sessions. However, only
a single line is returned.
The option -d indicates that all pending input should
be drained. In this case tcp_read may process multiple
lines in the manner given above; only the last is
stored in $TCP_LINE, but the complete set is stored in
the array $tcp_lines. This is cleared at the start of
each call to tcp_read.
The options -t and -T specify a timeout in seconds,
which may be a floating point number for increased
accuracy. With -t the timeout is applied before each
line read. With -T, the timeout applies to the overall
operation, possibly including multiple read operations
if the option -d is present; without this option, there
is no distinction between -t and -T.
The function does not print informational messages, but
if the option -q is given, no error message is printed
for a non-existent session.
A return status of 2 indicates a timeout or no data to
read. Any other non-zero return status indicates some
error condition.
See tcp_log for how to control where data is sent by
tcp_read.
tcp_send [-cnq] [ -s sess | -l sess,... ] data ...
tcp_send [-cnq] -a data ...
Send the supplied data strings to all the specified
sessions in turn. The underlying operation differs
little from a `print -r' to the session's file descrip-
tor, although it attempts to prevent the shell from
dying owing to a SIGPIPE caused by an attempt to write
to a defunct session.
The option -c causes tcp_send to behave like cat. It
reads lines from standard input until end of input and
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sends them in turn to the specified session(s) exactly
as if they were given as data arguments to individual
tcp_send commands.
The option -n prevents tcp_send from putting a newline
at the end of the data strings.
The remaining options all behave as for tcp_read.
The data arguments are not further processed once they
have been passed to tcp_send; they are simply passed
down to print -r.
If the parameter $TCP_OUTPUT is a non-empty string and
logging is enabled then the data sent to each session
will be echoed to the log file(s) with $TCP_OUTPUT in
front where appropriate, much in the manner of
$TCP_PROMPT.
Session Management
tcp_alias [-q] alias=sess ...
tcp_alias [-q] [ alias ] ...
tcp_alias -d [-q] alias ...
This function is not particularly well tested.
The first form creates an alias for a session name;
alias can then be used to refer to the existing session
sess. As many aliases may be listed as required.
The second form lists any aliases specified, or all
aliases if none.
The third form deletes all the aliases listed. The
underlying sessions are not affected.
The option -q suppresses an inconsistently chosen sub-
set of error messages.
tcp_log [-asc] [ -n | -N ] [ logfile ]
With an argument logfile, all future input from
tcp_read will be logged to the named file. Unless -a
(append) is given, this file will first be truncated or
created empty. With no arguments, show the current
status of logging.
With the option -s, per-session logging is enabled.
Input from tcp_read is output to the file logfile.sess.
As the session is automatically discriminated by the
filename, the contents are raw (no $TCP_PROMPT). The
option -a applies as above. Per-session logging and
logging of all data in one file are not mutually exclu-
sive.
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The option -c closes all logging, both complete and
per-session logs.
The options -n and -N respectively turn off or restore
output of data read by tcp_read to standard output;
hence `tcp_log -cn' turns off all output by tcp_read.
The function is purely a convenient front end to set-
ting the parameters $TCP_LOG, $TCP_LOG_SESS,
$TCP_SILENT, which are described below.
tcp_rename old new
Rename session old to session new. The old name
becomes invalid.
tcp_sess [ sess [ command ... ] ]
With no arguments, list all the open sessions and asso-
ciated file descriptors. The current session is marked
with a star. For use in functions, direct access to
the parameters $tcp_by_name, $tcp_by_fd and $TCP_SESS
is probably more convenient; see below.
With a sess argument, set the current session to sess.
This is equivalent to changing $TCP_SESS directly.
With additional arguments, temporarily set the current
session while executing the string command .... The
first argument is re-evaluated so as to expand aliases
etc., but the remaining arguments are passed through as
the appear to tcp_sess. The original session is
restored when tcp_sess exits.
Advanced I/O
tcp_command send-options ... send-arguments ...
This is a convenient front-end to tcp_send. All argu-
ments are passed to tcp_send, then the function pauses
waiting for data. While data is arriving at least
every $TCP_TIMEOUT (default 0.3) seconds, data is han-
dled and printed out according to the current settings.
Status 0 is always returned.
This is generally only useful for interactive use, to
prevent the display becoming fragmented by output
returned from the connection. Within a programme or
function it is generally better to handle reading data
by a more explicit method.
tcp_expect [ -q ] [ -p var ] [ -t to | -T TO]
[ -a | -s sess ... | -l sess,... ] pattern ...
Wait for input matching any of the given patterns from
any of the specified sessions. Input is ignored until
an input line matches one of the given patterns; at
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this point status zero is returned, the matching line
is stored in $TCP_LINE, and the full set of lines read
during the call to tcp_expect is stored in the array
$tcp_expect_lines.
Sessions are specified in the same way as tcp_read: the
default is to use the current session, otherwise the
sessions specified by -a, -s, or -l are used.
Each pattern is a standard zsh extended-globbing pat-
tern; note that it needs to be quoted to avoid it being
expanded immediately by filename generation. It must
match the full line, so to match a substring there must
be a `*' at the start and end. The line matched
against includes the $TCP_PROMPT added by tcp_read. It
is possible to include the globbing flags `#b' or `#m'
in the patterns to make backreferences available in the
parameters $MATCH, $match, etc., as described in the
base zsh documentation on pattern matching.
Unlike tcp_read, the default behaviour of tcp_expect is
to block indefinitely until the required input is
found. This can be modified by specifying a timeout
with -t or -T; these function as in tcp_read, specify-
ing a per-read or overall timeout, respectively, in
seconds, as an integer or floating-point number. As
tcp_read, the function returns status 2 if a timeout
occurs.
The function returns as soon as any one of the patterns
given match. If the caller needs to know which of the
patterns matched, the option -p var can be used; on
return, $var is set to the number of the pattern using
ordinary zsh indexing, i.e. the first is 1, and so on.
Note the absence of a `$' in front of var. To avoid
clashes, the parameter cannot begin with `_expect'.
The option -q is passed directly down to tcp_read.
As all input is done via tcp_read, all the usual rules
about output of lines read apply. One exception is
that the parameter $tcp_lines will only reflect the
line actually matched by tcp_expect; use
$tcp_expect_lines for the full set of lines read during
the function call.
tcp_proxy
This is a simple-minded function to accept a TCP con-
nection and execute a command with I/O redirected to
the connection. Extreme caution should be taken as
there is no security whatsoever and this can leave your
computer open to the world. Ideally, it should only be
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used behind a firewall.
The first argument is a TCP port on which the function
will listen.
The remaining arguments give a command and its argu-
ments to execute with standard input, standard output
and standard error redirected to the file descriptor on
which the TCP session has been accepted. If no command
is given, a new zsh is started. This gives everyone on
your network direct access to your account, which in
many cases will be a bad thing.
The command is run in the background, so tcp_proxy can
then accept new connections. It continues to accept
new connections until interrupted.
tcp_spam [-ertv] [ -a | -s sess | -l sess,... ] cmd ...
Execute `cmd ...' for each session in turn. Note this
executes the command and arguments; it does not send
the command line as data unless the -t (transmit)
option is given.
The sessions may be selected explicitly with the stan-
dard -a, -s or -l options, or may be chosen implicitly.
If none of the three options is given the rules are:
first, if the array $tcp_spam_list is set, this is
taken as the list of sessions, otherwise all sessions
are taken. Second, any sessions given in the array
$tcp_no_spam_list are removed from the list of ses-
sions.
Normally, any sessions added by the `-a' flag or when
all sessions are chosen implicitly are spammed in
alphabetic order; sessions given by the $tcp_spam_list
array or on the command line are spammed in the order
given. The -r flag reverses the order however it was
arrived it.
The -v flag specifies that a $TCP_PROMPT will be output
before each session. This is output after any modifi-
cation to TCP_SESS by the user-defined tcp_on_spam
function described below. (Obviously that function is
able to generate its own output.)
If the option -e is present, the line given as cmd ...
is executed using eval, otherwise it is executed with-
out any further processing.
tcp_talk
This is a fairly simple-minded attempt to force input
to the line editor to go straight to the default
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TCP_SESSION.
An escape string, $TCP_TALK_ESCAPE, default `:', is
used to allow access to normal shell operation. If it
is on its own at the start of the line, or followed
only by whitespace, the line editor returns to normal
operation. Otherwise, the string and any following
whitespace are skipped and the remainder of the line
executed as shell input without any change of the line
editor's operating mode.
The current implementation is somewhat deficient in
terms of use of the command history. For this reason,
many users will prefer to use some form of alternative
approach for sending data easily to the current ses-
sion. One simple approach is to alias some special
character (such as `%') to `tcp_command --'.
tcp_wait
The sole argument is an integer or floating point num-
ber which gives the seconds to delay. The shell will
do nothing for that period except wait for input on all
TCP sessions by calling tcp_read -a. This is similar
to the interactive behaviour at the command prompt when
zle handlers are installed.
`One-shot' file transfer
tcp_point port
tcp_shoot host port
This pair of functions provide a simple way to transfer
a file between two hosts within the shell. Note, how-
ever, that bulk data transfer is currently done using
cat. tcp_point reads any data arriving at port and
sends it to standard output; tcp_shoot connects to port
on host and sends its standard input. Any unused port
may be used; the standard mechanism for picking a port
is to think of a random four-digit number above 1024
until one works.
To transfer a file from host woodcock to host springes,
on springes:
tcp_point 8091 >output_file
and on woodcock:
tcp_shoot springes 8091 <input_file
As these two functions do not require tcp_open to set
up a TCP connection first, they may need to be
autoloaded separately.
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TCP USER-DEFINED FUNCTIONS
Certain functions, if defined by the user, will be called by
the function system in certain contexts. This facility
depends on the module zsh/parameter, which is usually avail-
able in interactive shells as the completion system depends
on it. None of the functions need be defined; they simply
provide convenient hooks when necessary.
Typically, these are called after the requested action has
been taken, so that the various parameters will reflect the
new state.
tcp_on_alias alias fd
When an alias is defined, this function will be called
with two arguments: the name of the alias, and the file
descriptor of the corresponding session.
tcp_on_awol sess fd
If the function tcp_fd_handler is handling input from
the line editor and detects that the file descriptor is
no longer reusable, by default it removes it from the
list of file descriptors handled by this method and
prints a message. If the function tcp_on_awol is
defined it is called immediately before this point. It
may return status 100, which indicates that the normal
handling should still be performed; any other return
status indicates that no further action should be taken
and the tcp_fd_handler should return immediately with
the given status. Typically the action of tcp_on_awol
will be to close the session.
The variable TCP_INVALIDATE_ZLE will be a non-empty
string if it is necessary to invalidate the line editor
display using `zle -I' before printing output from the
function.
(`AWOL' is military jargon for `absent without leave'
or some variation. It has no pre-existing technical
meaning known to the author.)
tcp_on_close sess fd
This is called with the name of a session being closed
and the file descriptor which corresponded to that ses-
sion. Both will be invalid by the time the function is
called.
tcp_on_open sess fd
This is called after a new session has been defined
with the session name and file descriptor as arguments.
If it returns a non-zero status, opening the session is
assumed to fail and the session is closed again; how-
ever, tcp_open will continue to attempt to open any
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remaining sessions given on the command line.
tcp_on_rename oldsess fd newsess
This is called after a session has been renamed with
the three arguments old session name, file descriptor,
new session name.
tcp_on_spam sess command ...
This is called once for each session spammed, just
before a command is executed for a session by tcp_spam.
The arguments are the session name followed by the com-
mand list to be executed. If tcp_spam was called with
the option -t, the first command will be tcp_send.
This function is called after $TCP_SESS is set to
reflect the session to be spammed, but before any use
of it is made. Hence it is possible to alter the value
of $TCP_SESS within this function. For example, the
session arguments to tcp_spam could include extra
information to be stripped off and processed in
tcp_on_spam.
If the function sets the parameter $REPLY to `done',
the command line is not executed; in addition, no
prompt is printed for the -v option to tcp_spam.
tcp_on_unalias alias fd
This is called with the name of an alias and the corre-
sponding session's file descriptor after an alias has
been deleted.
TCP UTILITY FUNCTIONS
The following functions are used by the TCP function system
but will rarely if ever need to be called directly.
tcp_fd_handler
This is the function installed by tcp_open for handling
input from within the line editor, if that is required.
It is in the format documented for the builtin `zle -F'
in zshzle(1) .
While active, the function sets the parameter TCP_HAN-
DLER_ACTIVE to 1. This allows shell code called inter-
nally (for example, by setting tcp_on_read) to tell if
is being called when the shell is otherwise idle at the
editor prompt.
tcp_output [ -q ] -P prompt -F fd -S sess
This function is used for both logging and handling
output to standard output, from within tcp_read and (if
$TCP_OUTPUT is set) tcp_send.
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The prompt to use is specified by -P; the default is
the empty string. It can contain:
%c Expands to 1 if the session is the current ses-
sion, otherwise 0. Used with ternary expressions
such as `%(c.-.+)' to output `+' for the current
session and `-' otherwise.
%f Replaced by the session's file descriptor.
%s Replaced by the session name.
%% Replaced by a single `%'.
The option -q suppresses output to standard output, but
not to any log files which are configured.
The -S and -F options are used to pass in the session
name and file descriptor for possible replacement in
the prompt.
TCP USER PARAMETERS
Parameters follow the usual convention that uppercase is
used for scalars and integers, while lowercase is used for
normal and associative array. It is always safe for user
code to read these parameters. Some parameters may also be
set; these are noted explicitly. Others are included in
this group as they are set by the function system for the
user's benefit, i.e. setting them is typically not useful
but is benign.
It is often also useful to make settable parameters local to
a function. For example, `local TCP_SILENT=1' specifies
that data read during the function call will not be printed
to standard output, regardless of the setting outside the
function. Likewise, `local TCP_SESS=sess' sets a session
for the duration of a function, and `local TCP_PROMPT='
specifies that no prompt is used for input during the func-
tion.
tcp_expect_lines
Array. The set of lines read during the last call to
tcp_expect, including the last ($TCP_LINE).
tcp_filter
Array. May be set directly. A set of extended globbing
patterns which, if matched in tcp_output, will cause
the line not to be printed to standard output. The
patterns should be defined as described for the argu-
ments to tcp_expect. Output of line to log files is
not affected.
TCP_HANDLER_ACTIVE
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Scalar. Set to 1 within tcp_fd_handler to indicate to
functions called recursively that they have been called
during an editor session. Otherwise unset.
TCP_LINE
The last line read by tcp_read, and hence also
tcp_expect.
TCP_LINE_FD
The file descriptor from which $TCP_LINE was read.
${tcp_by_fd[$TCP_LINE_FD]} will give the corresponding
session name.
tcp_lines
Array. The set of lines read during the last call to
tcp_read, including the last ($TCP_LINE).
TCP_LOG
May be set directly, although it is also controlled by
tcp_log. The name of a file to which output from all
sessions will be sent. The output is proceeded by the
usual $TCP_PROMPT. If it is not an absolute path name,
it will follow the user's current directory.
TCP_LOG_SESS
May be set directly, although it is also controlled by
tcp_log. The prefix for a set of files to which output
from each session separately will be sent; the full
filename is ${TCP_LOG_SESS}.sess. Output to each file
is raw; no prompt is added. If it is not an absolute
path name, it will follow the user's current directory.
tcp_no_spam_list
Array. May be set directly. See tcp_spam for how this
is used.
TCP_OUTPUT
May be set directly. If a non-empty string, any data
sent to a session by tcp_send will be logged. This
parameter gives the prompt to be used in a file speci-
fied by $TCP_LOG but not in a file generated from
$TCP_LOG_SESS. The prompt string has the same format
as TCP_PROMPT and the same rules for its use apply.
TCP_PROMPT
May be set directly. Used as the prefix for data read
by tcp_read which is printed to standard output or to
the log file given by $TCP_LOG, if any. Any `%s', `%f'
or `%%' occurring in the string will be replaced by the
name of the session, the session's underlying file
descriptor, or a single `%', respectively. The expres-
sion `%c' expands to 1 if the session being read is the
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current session, else 0; this is most useful in ternary
expressions such as `%(c.-.+)' which outputs `+' if the
session is the current one, else `-'.
TCP_READ_DEBUG
May be set directly. If this has non-zero length,
tcp_read will give some limited diagnostics about data
being read.
TCP_SECONDS_START
This value is created and initialised to zero by
tcp_open.
The functions tcp_read and tcp_expect use the shell's
SECONDS parameter for their own timing purposes. If
that parameter is not of floating point type on entry
to one of the functions, it will create a local parame-
ter SECONDS which is floating point and set the parame-
ter TCP_SECONDS_START to the previous value of $SEC-
ONDS. If the parameter is already floating point, it
is used without a local copy being created and TCP_SEC-
ONDS_START is not set. As the global value is zero,
the shell elapsed time is guaranteed to be the sum of
$SECONDS and $TCP_SECONDS_START.
This can be avoided by setting SECONDS globally to a
floating point value using `typeset -F SECONDS'; then
the TCP functions will never make a local copy and
never set TCP_SECONDS_START to a non-zero value.
TCP_SESS
May be set directly. The current session; must refer
to one of the sessions established by tcp_open.
TCP_SILENT
May be set directly, although it is also controlled by
tcp_log. If of non-zero length, data read by tcp_read
will not be written to standard output, though may
still be written to a log file.
tcp_spam_list
Array. May be set directly. See the description of
the function tcp_spam for how this is used.
TCP_TALK_ESCAPE
May be set directly. See the description of the func-
tion tcp_talk for how this is used.
TCP_TIMEOUT
May be set directly. Currently this is only used by
the function tcp_command, see above.
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TCP USER-DEFINED PARAMETERS
The following parameters are not set by the function system,
but have a special effect if set by the user.
tcp_on_read
This should be an associative array; if it is not, the
behaviour is undefined. Each key is the name of a
shell function or other command, and the corresponding
value is a shell pattern (using EXTENDED_GLOB). Every
line read from a TCP session directly or indirectly
using tcp_read (which includes lines read by
tcp_expect) is compared against the pattern. If the
line matches, the command given in the key is called
with two arguments: the name of the session from which
the line was read, and the line itself.
If any function called to handle a line returns a
non-zero status, the line is not output. Thus a
tcp_on_read handler containing only the instruction
`return 1' can be used to suppress output of particular
lines (see, however, tcp_filter above). However, the
line is still stored in TCP_LINE and tcp_lines; this
occurs after all tcp_on_read processing.
TCP UTILITY PARAMETERS
These parameters are controlled by the function system; they
may be read directly, but should not usually be set by user
code.
tcp_aliases
Associative array. The keys are the names of sessions
established with tcp_open; each value is a space-sepa-
rated list of aliases which refer to that session.
tcp_by_fd
Associative array. The keys are session file descrip-
tors; each value is the name of that session.
tcp_by_name
Associative array. The keys are the names of sessions;
each value is the file descriptor associated with that
session.
TCP EXAMPLES
Here is a trivial example using a remote calculator.
TO create a calculator server on port 7337 (see the dc man-
ual page for quite how infuriating the underlying command
is):
tcp_proxy 7337 dc
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To connect to this from the same host with a session also
named `dc':
tcp_open localhost 7337 dc
To send a command to the remote session and wait a short
while for output (assuming dc is the current session):
tcp_command 2 4 + p
To close the session:
tcp_close
The tcp_proxy needs to be killed to be stopped. Note this
will not usually kill any connections which have already
been accepted, and also that the port is not immediately
available for reuse.
The following chunk of code puts a list of sessions into an
xterm header, with the current session followed by a star.
print -n "\033]2;TCP:" ${(k)tcp_by_name:/$TCP_SESS/$TCP_SESS\*} "\a"
TCP BUGS
The function tcp_read uses the shell's normal read builtin.
As this reads a complete line at once, data arriving without
a terminating newline can cause the function to block indef-
initely.
Though the function suite works well for interactive use and
for data arriving in small amounts, the performance when
large amounts of data are being exchanged is likely to be
extremely poor.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from
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http://downloads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
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NAME
zshzftpsys - zftp function front-end
DESCRIPTION
This describes the set of shell functions supplied with the
source distribution as an interface to the zftp builtin com-
mand, allowing you to perform FTP operations from the shell
command line or within functions or scripts. The interface
is similar to a traditional FTP client (e.g. the ftp command
itself, see ftp(1)), but as it is entirely done within the
shell all the familiar completion, editing and globbing fea-
tures, and so on, are present, and macros are particularly
simple to write as they are just ordinary shell functions.
The prerequisite is that the zftp command, as described in
zshmodules(1) , must be available in the version of zsh
installed at your site. If the shell is configured to load
new commands at run time, it probably is: typing `zmodload
zsh/zftp' will make sure (if that runs silently, it has
worked). If this is not the case, it is possible zftp was
linked into the shell anyway: to test this, type `which
zftp' and if zftp is available you will get the message
`zftp: shell built-in command'.
Commands given directly with zftp builtin may be inter-
spersed between the functions in this suite; in a few cases,
using zftp directly may cause some of the status information
stored in shell parameters to become invalid. Note in par-
ticular the description of the variables $ZFTP_TMOUT,
$ZFTP_PREFS and $ZFTP_VERBOSE for zftp.
INSTALLATION
You should make sure all the functions from the Func-
tions/Zftp directory of the source distribution are avail-
able; they all begin with the two letters `zf'. They may
already have been installed on your system; otherwise, you
will need to find them and copy them. The directory should
appear as one of the elements of the $fpath array (this
should already be the case if they were installed), and at
least the function zfinit should be autoloaded; it will
autoload the rest. Finally, to initialize the use of the
system you need to call the zfinit function. The following
code in your .zshrc will arrange for this; assume the func-
tions are stored in the directory ~/myfns:
fpath=(~/myfns $fpath)
autoload -U zfinit
zfinit
Note that zfinit assumes you are using the zmodload method
to load the zftp command. If it is already built into the
shell, change zfinit to zfinit -n. It is helpful (though
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not essential) if the call to zfinit appears after any code
to initialize the new completion system, else unnecessary
compctl commands will be given.
FUNCTIONS
The sequence of operations in performing a file transfer is
essentially the same as that in a standard FTP client. Note
that, due to a quirk of the shell's getopts builtin, for
those functions that handle options you must use `--' rather
than `-' to ensure the remaining arguments are treated lit-
erally (a single `-' is treated as an argument).
Opening a connection
zfparams [ host [ user [ password ... ] ] ]
Set or show the parameters for a future zfopen with no
arguments. If no arguments are given, the current
parameters are displayed (the password will be shown as
a line of asterisks). If a host is given, and either
the user or password is not, they will be prompted for;
also, any parameter given as `?' will be prompted for,
and if the `?' is followed by a string, that will be
used as the prompt. As zfopen calls zfparams to store
the parameters, this usually need not be called
directly.
A single argument `-' will delete the stored parame-
ters. This will also cause the memory of the last
directory (and so on) on the other host to be deleted.
zfopen [ -1 ] [ host [ user [ password [ account ] ] ] ]
If host is present, open a connection to that host
under username user with password password (and, on the
rare occasions when it is necessary, account account).
If a necessary parameter is missing or given as `?' it
will be prompted for. If host is not present, use a
previously stored set of parameters.
If the command was successful, and the terminal is com-
patible with xterm or is sun-cmd, a summary will appear
in the title bar, giving the local host:directory and
the remote host:directory; this is handled by the func-
tion zftp_chpwd, described below.
Normally, the host, user and password are internally
recorded for later re-opening, either by a zfopen with
no arguments, or automatically (see below). With the
option `-1', no information is stored. Also, if an
open command with arguments failed, the parameters will
not be retained (and any previous parameters will also
be deleted). A zfopen on its own, or a zfopen -1,
never alters the stored parameters.
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Both zfopen and zfanon (but not zfparams) understand
URLs of the form ftp://host/path... as meaning to con-
nect to the host, then change directory to path (which
must be a directory, not a file). The `ftp://' can be
omitted; the trailing `/' is enough to trigger recogni-
tion of the path. Note prefixes other than `ftp:' are
not recognized, and that all characters after the first
slash beyond host are significant in path.
zfanon [ -1 ] host
Open a connection host for anonymous FTP. The username
used is `anonymous'. The password (which will be
reported the first time) is generated as user@host;
this is then stored in the shell parameter $EMAIL_ADDR
which can alternatively be set manually to a suitable
string.
Directory management
zfcd [ dir ]
zfcd -
zfcd old new
Change the current directory on the remote server:
this is implemented to have many of the features of the
shell builtin cd.
In the first form with dir present, change to the
directory dir. The command `zfcd ..' is treated spe-
cially, so is guaranteed to work on non-UNIX servers
(note this is handled internally by zftp). If dir is
omitted, has the effect of `zfcd ~'.
The second form changes to the directory previously
current.
The third form attempts to change the current directory
by replacing the first occurrence of the string old
with the string new in the current directory.
Note that in this command, and indeed anywhere a remote
filename is expected, the string which on the local
host corresponds to `~' is converted back to a `~'
before being passed to the remote machine. This is
convenient because of the way expansion is performed on
the command line before zfcd receives a string. For
example, suppose the command is `zfcd ~/foo'. The
shell will expand this to a full path such as `zfcd
/home/user2/pws/foo'. At this stage, zfcd recognises
the initial path as corresponding to `~' and will send
the directory to the remote host as ~/foo, so that the
`~' will be expanded by the server to the correct
remote host directory. Other named directories of the
form `~name' are not treated in this fashion.
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zfhere
Change directory on the remote server to the one corre-
sponding to the current local directory, with special
handling of `~' as in zfcd. For example, if the cur-
rent local directory is ~/foo/bar, then zfhere performs
the effect of `zfcd ~/foo/bar'.
zfdir [ -rfd ] [ - ] [ dir-options ] [ dir ]
Produce a long directory listing. The arguments
dir-options and dir are passed directly to the server
and their effect is implementation dependent, but spec-
ifying a particular remote directory dir is usually
possible. The output is passed through a pager given
by the environment variable $PAGER, or `more' if that
is not set.
The directory is usually cached for re-use. In fact,
two caches are maintained. One is for use when there
is no dir-options or dir, i.e. a full listing of the
current remote directory; it is flushed when the cur-
rent remote directory changes. The other is kept for
repeated use of zfdir with the same arguments; for
example, repeated use of `zfdir /pub/gnu' will only
require the directory to be retrieved on the first
call. Alternatively, this cache can be re-viewed with
the -r option. As relative directories will confuse
zfdir, the -f option can be used to force the cache to
be flushed before the directory is listed. The option
-d will delete both caches without showing a directory
listing; it will also delete the cache of file names in
the current remote directory, if any.
zfls [ ls-options ] [ dir ]
List files on the remote server. With no arguments,
this will produce a simple list of file names for the
current remote directory. Any arguments are passed
directly to the server. No pager and no caching is
used.
Status commands
zftype [ type ]
With no arguments, show the type of data to be trans-
ferred, usually ASCII or binary. With an argument,
change the type: the types `A' or `ASCII' for ASCII
data and `B' or `BINARY', `I' or `IMAGE' for binary
data are understood case-insensitively.
zfstat [ -v ]
Show the status of the current or last connection, as
well as the status of some of zftp's status variables.
With the -v option, a more verbose listing is produced
by querying the server for its version of events, too.
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Retrieving files
The commands for retrieving files all take at least two
options. -G suppresses remote filename expansion which would
otherwise be performed (see below for a more detailed
description of that). -t attempts to set the modification
time of the local file to that of the remote file: see the
description of the function zfrtime below for more informa-
tion.
zfget [ -Gtc ] file1 ...
Retrieve all the listed files file1 ... one at a time
from the remote server. If a file contains a `/', the
full name is passed to the remote server, but the file
is stored locally under the name given by the part
after the final `/'. The option -c (cat) forces all
files to be sent as a single stream to standard output;
in this case the -t option has no effect.
zfuget [ -Gvst ] file1 ...
As zfget, but only retrieve files where the version on
the remote server is newer (has a later modification
time), or where the local file does not exist. If the
remote file is older but the files have different
sizes, or if the sizes are the same but the remote file
is newer, the user will usually be queried. With the
option -s, the command runs silently and will always
retrieve the file in either of those two cases. With
the option -v, the command prints more information
about the files while it is working out whether or not
to transfer them.
zfcget [ -Gt ] file1 ...
As zfget, but if any of the local files exists, and is
shorter than the corresponding remote file, the command
assumes that it is the result of a partially completed
transfer and attempts to transfer the rest of the file.
This is useful on a poor connection which keeps fail-
ing.
Note that this requires a commonly implemented, but
non-standard, version of the FTP protocol, so is not
guaranteed to work on all servers.
zfgcp [ -Gt ] remote-file local-file
zfgcp [ -Gt ] rfile1 ... ldir
This retrieves files from the remote server with argu-
ments behaving similarly to the cp command.
In the first form, copy remote-file from the server to
the local file local-file.
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In the second form, copy all the remote files rfile1
... into the local directory ldir retaining the same
basenames. This assumes UNIX directory semantics.
Sending files
zfput [ -r ] file1 ...
Send all the file1 ... given separately to the remote
server. If a filename contains a `/', the full file-
name is used locally to find the file, but only the
basename is used for the remote file name.
With the option -r, if any of the files are directories
they are sent recursively with all their subdirecto-
ries, including files beginning with `.'. This
requires that the remote machine understand UNIX file
semantics, since `/' is used as a directory separator.
zfuput [ -vs ] file1 ...
As zfput, but only send files which are newer than
their local equivalents, or if the remote file does not
exist. The logic is the same as for zfuget, but
reversed between local and remote files.
zfcput file1 ...
As zfput, but if any remote file already exists and is
shorter than the local equivalent, assume it is the
result of an incomplete transfer and send the rest of
the file to append to the existing part. As the FTP
append command is part of the standard set, this is in
principle more likely to work than zfcget.
zfpcp local-file remote-file
zfpcp lfile1 ... rdir
This sends files to the remote server with arguments
behaving similarly to the cp command.
With two arguments, copy local-file to the server as
remote-file.
With more than two arguments, copy all the local files
lfile1 ... into the existing remote directory rdir
retaining the same basenames. This assumes UNIX direc-
tory semantics.
A problem arises if you attempt to use zfpcp lfile1
rdir, i.e. the second form of copying but with two
arguments, as the command has no simple way of knowing
if rdir corresponds to a directory or a filename. It
attempts to resolve this in various ways. First, if
the rdir argument is `.' or `..' or ends in a slash, it
is assumed to be a directory. Secondly, if the opera-
tion of copying to a remote file in the first form
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failed, and the remote server sends back the expected
failure code 553 and a reply including the string `Is a
directory', then zfpcp will retry using the second
form.
Closing the connection
zfclose
Close the connection.
Session management
zfsession [ -lvod ] [ sessname ]
Allows you to manage multiple FTP sessions at once. By
default, connections take place in a session called
`default'; by giving the command `zfsession sessname'
you can change to a new or existing session with a name
of your choice. The new session remembers its own con-
nection, as well as associated shell parameters, and
also the host/user parameters set by zfparams. Hence
you can have different sessions set up to connect to
different hosts, each remembering the appropriate host,
user and password.
With no arguments, zfsession prints the name of the
current session; with the option -l it lists all ses-
sions which currently exist, and with the option -v it
gives a verbose list showing the host and directory for
each session, where the current session is marked with
an asterisk. With -o, it will switch to the most
recent previous session.
With -d, the given session (or else the current one) is
removed; everything to do with it is completely forgot-
ten. If it was the only session, a new session called
`default' is created and made current. It is safest
not to delete sessions while background commands using
zftp are active.
zftransfer sess1:file1 sess2:file2
Transfer files between two sessions; no local copy is
made. The file is read from the session sess1 as file1
and written to session sess2 as file file2; file1 and
file2 may be relative to the current directories of the
session. Either sess1 or sess2 may be omitted (though
the colon should be retained if there is a possibility
of a colon appearing in the file name) and defaults to
the current session; file2 may be omitted or may end
with a slash, in which case the basename of file1 will
be added. The sessions sess1 and sess2 must be dis-
tinct.
The operation is performed using pipes, so it is
required that the connections still be valid in a
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subshell, which is not the case under versions of some
operating systems, presumably due to a system bug.
Bookmarks
The two functions zfmark and zfgoto allow you to `bookmark'
the present location (host, user and directory) of the cur-
rent FTP connection for later use. The file to be used for
storing and retrieving bookmarks is given by the parameter
$ZFTP_BMFILE; if not set when one of the two functions is
called, it will be set to the file .zfbkmarks in the direc-
tory where your zsh startup files live (usually ~).
zfmark [ bookmark ]
If given an argument, mark the current host, user and
directory under the name bookmark for later use by
zfgoto. If there is no connection open, use the values
for the last connection immediately before it was
closed; it is an error if there was none. Any existing
bookmark under the same name will be silently replaced.
If not given an argument, list the existing bookmarks
and the points to which they refer in the form
user@host:directory; this is the format in which they
are stored, and the file may be edited directly.
zfgoto [ -n ] bookmark
Return to the location given by bookmark, as previously
set by zfmark. If the location has user `ftp' or
`anonymous', open the connection with zfanon, so that
no password is required. If the user and host parame-
ters match those stored for the current session, if
any, those will be used, and again no password is
required. Otherwise a password will be prompted for.
With the option -n, the bookmark is taken to be a nick-
name stored by the ncftp program in its bookmark file,
which is assumed to be ~/.ncftp/bookmarks. The func-
tion works identically in other ways. Note that there
is no mechanism for adding or modifying ncftp bookmarks
from the zftp functions.
Other functions
Mostly, these functions will not be called directly (apart
from zfinit), but are described here for completeness. You
may wish to alter zftp_chpwd and zftp_progress, in particu-
lar.
zfinit [ -n ]
As described above, this is used to initialize the zftp
function system. The -n option should be used if the
zftp command is already built into the shell.
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zfautocheck [ -dn ]
This function is called to implement automatic reopen-
ing behaviour, as described in more detail below. The
options must appear in the first argument; -n prevents
the command from changing to the old directory, while
-d prevents it from setting the variable do_close,
which it otherwise does as a flag for automatically
closing the connection after a transfer. The host and
directory for the last session are stored in the vari-
able $zflastsession, but the internal host/user/pass-
word parameters must also be correctly set.
zfcd_match prefix suffix
This performs matching for completion of remote direc-
tory names. If the remote server is UNIX, it will
attempt to persuade the server to list the remote
directory with subdirectories marked, which usually
works but is not guaranteed. On other hosts it simply
calls zfget_match and hence completes all files, not
just directories. On some systems, directories may not
even look like filenames.
zfget_match prefix suffix
This performs matching for completion of remote file-
names. It caches files for the current directory
(only) in the shell parameter $zftp_fcache. It is in
the form to be called by the -K option of compctl, but
also works when called from a widget-style completion
function with prefix and suffix set appropriately.
zfrglob varname
Perform remote globbing, as describes in more detail
below. varname is the name of a variable containing
the pattern to be expanded; if there were any matches,
the same variable will be set to the expanded set of
filenames on return.
zfrtime lfile rfile [ time ]
Set the local file lfile to have the same modification
time as the remote file rfile, or the explicit time
time in FTP format CCYYMMDDhhmmSS for the GMT timezone.
This uses the shell's zsh/datetime module to perform
the conversion from GMT to local time.
zftp_chpwd
This function is called every time a connection is
opened, or closed, or the remote directory changes.
This version alters the title bar of an xterm-compati-
ble or sun-cmd terminal emulator to reflect the local
and remote hostnames and current directories. It works
best when combined with the function chpwd. In partic-
ular, a function of the form
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chpwd() {
if [[ -n $ZFTP_USER ]]; then
zftp_chpwd
else
# usual chpwd e.g put host:directory in title bar
fi
}
fits in well.
zftp_progress
This function shows the status of the transfer. It
will not write anything unless the output is going to a
terminal; however, if you transfer files in the back-
ground, you should turn off progress reports by hand
using `zstyle ':zftp:*' progress none'. Note also that
if you alter it, any output must be to standard error,
as standard output may be a file being received. The
form of the progress meter, or whether it is used at
all, can be configured without altering the function,
as described in the next section.
zffcache
This is used to implement caching of files in the cur-
rent directory for each session separately. It is used
by zfget_match and zfrglob.
MISCELLANEOUS FEATURES
Configuration
Various styles are available using the standard shell style
mechanism, described in zshmodules(1). Briefly, the command
`zstyle ':zftp:*' style value ...'. defines the style to
have value value; more than one value may be given, although
that is not useful in the cases described here. These val-
ues will then be used throughout the zftp function system.
For more precise control, the first argument, which gives a
context in which the style applies, can be modified to
include a particular function, as for example `:zftp:zfget':
the style will then have the given value only in the zfget
function. Values for the same style in different contexts
may be set; the most specific function will be used, where
strings are held to be more specific than patterns, and
longer patterns and shorter patterns. Note that only the
top level function name, as called by the user, is used;
calling of lower level functions is transparent to the user.
Hence modifications to the title bar in zftp_chpwd use the
contexts :zftp:zfopen, :zftp:zfcd, etc., depending where it
was called from. The following styles are understood:
progress
Controls the way that zftp_progress reports on the
progress of a transfer. If empty, unset, or `none', no
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progress report is made; if `bar' a growing bar of
inverse video is shown; if `percent' (or any other
string, though this may change in future), the percent-
age of the file transferred is shown. The bar meter
requires that the width of the terminal be available
via the $COLUMNS parameter (normally this is set auto-
matically). If the size of the file being transferred
is not available, bar and percent meters will simply
show the number of bytes transferred so far.
When zfinit is run, if this style is not defined for
the context :zftp:*, it will be set to `bar'.
update
Specifies the minimum time interval between updates of
the progress meter in seconds. No update is made
unless new data has been received, so the actual time
interval is limited only by $ZFTP_TIMEOUT.
As described for progress, zfinit will force this to
default to 1.
remote-glob
If set to `1', `yes' or `true', filename generation
(globbing) is performed on the remote machine instead
of by zsh itself; see below.
titlebar
If set to `1', `yes' or `true', zftp_chpwd will put the
remote host and remote directory into the titlebar of
terminal emulators such as xterm or sun-cmd that allow
this.
As described for progress, zfinit will force this to
default to 1.
chpwd
If set to `1' `yes' or `true', zftp_chpwd will call the
function chpwd when a connection is closed. This is
useful if the remote host details were put into the
terminal title bar by zftp_chpwd and your usual chpwd
also modifies the title bar.
When zfinit is run, it will determine whether chpwd
exists and if so it will set the default value for the
style to 1 if none exists already.
Note that there is also an associative array zfconfig which
contains values used by the function system. This should
not be modified or overwritten.
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Remote globbing
The commands for retrieving files usually perform filename
generation (globbing) on their arguments; this can be turned
off by passing the option -G to each of the commands. Nor-
mally this operates by retrieving a complete list of files
for the directory in question, then matching these locally
against the pattern supplied. This has the advantage that
the full range of zsh patterns (respecting the setting of
the option EXTENDED_GLOB) can be used. However, it means
that the directory part of a filename will not be expanded
and must be given exactly. If the remote server does not
support the UNIX directory semantics, directory handling is
problematic and it is recommended that globbing only be used
within the current directory. The list of files in the cur-
rent directory, if retrieved, will be cached, so that subse-
quent globs in the same directory without an intervening
zfcd are much faster.
If the remote-glob style (see above) is set, globbing is
instead performed on the remote host: the server is asked
for a list of matching files. This is highly dependent on
how the server is implemented, though typically UNIX servers
will provide support for basic glob patterns. This may in
some cases be faster, as it avoids retrieving the entire
list of directory contents.
Automatic and temporary reopening
As described for the zfopen command, a subsequent zfopen
with no parameters will reopen the connection to the last
host (this includes connections made with the zfanon com-
mand). Opened in this fashion, the connection starts in the
default remote directory and will remain open until explic-
itly closed.
Automatic re-opening is also available. If a connection is
not currently open and a command requiring a connection is
given, the last connection is implicitly reopened. In this
case the directory which was current when the connection was
closed again becomes the current directory (unless, of
course, the command given changes it). Automatic reopening
will also take place if the connection was close by the
remote server for whatever reason (e.g. a timeout). It is
not available if the -1 option to zfopen or zfanon was used.
Furthermore, if the command issued is a file transfer, the
connection will be closed after the transfer is finished,
hence providing a one-shot mode for transfers. This does
not apply to directory changing or listing commands; for
example a zfdir may reopen a connection but will leave it
open. Also, automatic closure will only ever happen in the
same command as automatic opening, i.e a zfdir directly fol-
lowed by a zfget will never close the connection
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User Commands ZSHZFTPSYS(1)
automatically.
Information about the previous connection is given by the
zfstat function. So, for example, if that reports:
Session: default
Not connected.
Last session: ftp.bar.com:/pub/textfiles
then the command zfget file.txt will attempt to reopen a
connection to ftp.bar.com, retrieve the file
/pub/textfiles/file.txt, and immediately close the connec-
tion again. On the other hand, zfcd .. will open the con-
nection in the directory /pub and leave it open.
Note that all the above is local to each session; if you
return to a previous session, the connection for that ses-
sion is the one which will be reopened.
Completion
Completion of local and remote files, directories, sessions
and bookmarks is supported. The older, compctl-style com-
pletion is defined when zfinit is called; support for the
new widget-based completion system is provided in the func-
tion Completion/Zsh/Command/_zftp, which should be installed
with the other functions of the completion system and hence
should automatically be available.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 13
User Commands ZSHCONTRIB(1)
NAME
zshcontrib - user contributions to zsh
DESCRIPTION
The Zsh source distribution includes a number of items con-
tributed by the user community. These are not inherently a
part of the shell, and some may not be available in every
zsh installation. The most significant of these are docu-
mented here. For documentation on other contributed items
such as shell functions, look for comments in the function
source files.
UTILITIES
Accessing On-Line Help
The key sequence ESC h is normally bound by ZLE to execute
the run-help widget (see zshzle(1)). This invokes the
run-help command with the command word from the current
input line as its argument. By default, run-help is an
alias for the man command, so this often fails when the com-
mand word is a shell builtin or a user-defined function. By
redefining the run-help alias, one can improve the on-line
help provided by the shell.
The helpfiles utility, found in the Util directory of the
distribution, is a Perl program that can be used to process
the zsh manual to produce a separate help file for each
shell builtin and for many other shell features as well.
The autoloadable run-help function, found in Functions/Misc,
searches for these helpfiles and performs several other
tests to produce the most complete help possible for the
command.
There may already be a directory of help files on your sys-
tem; look in /usr/share/zsh or /usr/local/share/zsh and sub-
directories below those, or ask your system administrator.
To create your own help files with helpfiles, choose or cre-
ate a directory where the individual command help files will
reside. For example, you might choose ~/zsh_help. If you
unpacked the zsh distribution in your home directory, you
would use the commands:
mkdir ~/zsh_help
cd ~/zsh_help
man zshall | colcrt - | \
perl ~/zsh-5.0.5/Util/helpfiles
Next, to use the run-help function, you need to add lines
something like the following to your .zshrc or equivalent
startup file:
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unalias run-help
autoload run-help
HELPDIR=~/zsh_help
The HELPDIR parameter tells run-help where to look for the
help files. If your system already has a help file direc-
tory installed, set HELPDIR to the path of that directory
instead.
Note that in order for `autoload run-help' to work, the
run-help file must be in one of the directories named in
your fpath array (see zshparam(1)). This should already be
the case if you have a standard zsh installation; if it is
not, copy Functions/Misc/run-help to an appropriate direc-
tory.
Recompiling Functions
If you frequently edit your zsh functions, or periodically
update your zsh installation to track the latest develop-
ments, you may find that function digests compiled with the
zcompile builtin are frequently out of date with respect to
the function source files. This is not usually a problem,
because zsh always looks for the newest file when loading a
function, but it may cause slower shell startup and function
loading. Also, if a digest file is explicitly used as an
element of fpath, zsh won't check whether any of its source
files has changed.
The zrecompile autoloadable function, found in Func-
tions/Misc, can be used to keep function digests up to date.
zrecompile [ -qt ] [ name ... ]
zrecompile [ -qt ] -p args [ -- args ... ]
This tries to find *.zwc files and automatically
re-compile them if at least one of the original files
is newer than the compiled file. This works only if
the names stored in the compiled files are full paths
or are relative to the directory that contains the .zwc
file.
In the first form, each name is the name of a compiled
file or a directory containing *.zwc files that should
be checked. If no arguments are given, the directories
and *.zwc files in fpath are used.
When -t is given, no compilation is performed, but a
return status of zero (true) is set if there are files
that need to be re-compiled and non-zero (false) other-
wise. The -q option quiets the chatty output that
describes what zrecompile is doing.
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Without the -t option, the return status is zero if all
files that needed re-compilation could be compiled and
non-zero if compilation for at least one of the files
failed.
If the -p option is given, the args are interpreted as
one or more sets of arguments for zcompile, separated
by `--'. For example:
zrecompile -p \
-R ~/.zshrc -- \
-M ~/.zcompdump -- \
~/zsh/comp.zwc ~/zsh/Completion/*/_*
This compiles ~/.zshrc into ~/.zshrc.zwc if that
doesn't exist or if it is older than ~/.zshrc. The com-
piled file will be marked for reading instead of map-
ping. The same is done for ~/.zcompdump and ~/.zcomp-
dump.zwc, but this compiled file is marked for mapping.
The last line re-creates the file ~/zsh/comp.zwc if any
of the files matching the given pattern is newer than
it.
Without the -p option, zrecompile does not create func-
tion digests that do not already exist, nor does it add
new functions to the digest.
The following shell loop is an example of a method for cre-
ating function digests for all functions in your fpath,
assuming that you have write permission to the directories:
for ((i=1; i <= $#fpath; ++i)); do
dir=$fpath[i]
zwc=${dir:t}.zwc
if [[ $dir == (.|..) || $dir == (.|..)/* ]]; then
continue
fi
files=($dir/*(N-.))
if [[ -w $dir:h && -n $files ]]; then
files=(${${(M)files%/*/*}#/})
if ( cd $dir:h &&
zrecompile -p -U -z $zwc $files ); then
fpath[i]=$fpath[i].zwc
fi
fi
done
The -U and -z options are appropriate for functions in the
default zsh installation fpath; you may need to use differ-
ent options for your personal function directories.
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Once the digests have been created and your fpath modified
to refer to them, you can keep them up to date by running
zrecompile with no arguments.
Keyboard Definition
The large number of possible combinations of keyboards,
workstations, terminals, emulators, and window systems makes
it impossible for zsh to have built-in key bindings for
every situation. The zkbd utility, found in Functions/Misc,
can help you quickly create key bindings for your configura-
tion.
Run zkbd either as an autoloaded function, or as a shell
script:
zsh -f ~/zsh-5.0.5/Functions/Misc/zkbd
When you run zkbd, it first asks you to enter your terminal
type; if the default it offers is correct, just press
return. It then asks you to press a number of different
keys to determine characteristics of your keyboard and ter-
minal; zkbd warns you if it finds anything out of the ordi-
nary, such as a Delete key that sends neither ^H nor ^?.
The keystrokes read by zkbd are recorded as a definition for
an associative array named key, written to a file in the
subdirectory .zkbd within either your HOME or ZDOTDIR direc-
tory. The name of the file is composed from the TERM, VEN-
DOR and OSTYPE parameters, joined by hyphens.
You may read this file into your .zshrc or another startup
file with the `source' or `.' commands, then reference the
key parameter in bindkey commands, like this:
source ${ZDOTDIR:-$HOME}/.zkbd/$TERM-$VENDOR-$OSTYPE
[[ -n ${key[Left]} ]] && bindkey "${key[Left]}" backward-char
[[ -n ${key[Right]} ]] && bindkey "${key[Right]}" forward-char
# etc.
Note that in order for `autoload zkbd' to work, the zkdb
file must be in one of the directories named in your fpath
array (see zshparam(1)). This should already be the case if
you have a standard zsh installation; if it is not, copy
Functions/Misc/zkbd to an appropriate directory.
Dumping Shell State
Occasionally you may encounter what appears to be a bug in
the shell, particularly if you are using a beta version of
zsh or a development release. Usually it is sufficient to
send a description of the problem to one of the zsh mailing
lists (see zsh(1)), but sometimes one of the zsh developers
will need to recreate your environment in order to track the
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User Commands ZSHCONTRIB(1)
problem down.
The script named reporter, found in the Util directory of
the distribution, is provided for this purpose. (It is also
possible to autoload reporter, but reporter is not installed
in fpath by default.) This script outputs a detailed dump
of the shell state, in the form of another script that can
be read with `zsh -f' to recreate that state.
To use reporter, read the script into your shell with the
`.' command and redirect the output into a file:
. ~/zsh-5.0.5/Util/reporter > zsh.report
You should check the zsh.report file for any sensitive
information such as passwords and delete them by hand before
sending the script to the developers. Also, as the output
can be voluminous, it's best to wait for the developers to
ask for this information before sending it.
You can also use reporter to dump only a subset of the shell
state. This is sometimes useful for creating startup files
for the first time. Most of the output from reporter is far
more detailed than usually is necessary for a startup file,
but the aliases, options, and zstyles states may be useful
because they include only changes from the defaults. The
bindings state may be useful if you have created any of your
own keymaps, because reporter arranges to dump the keymap
creation commands as well as the bindings for every keymap.
As is usual with automated tools, if you create a startup
file with reporter, you should edit the results to remove
unnecessary commands. Note that if you're using the new
completion system, you should not dump the functions state
to your startup files with reporter; use the compdump func-
tion instead (see zshcompsys(1)).
reporter [ state ... ]
Print to standard output the indicated subset of the
current shell state. The state arguments may be one or
more of:
all Output everything listed below.
aliases
Output alias definitions.
bindings
Output ZLE key maps and bindings.
completion
Output old-style compctl commands. New completion
is covered by functions and zstyles.
functions
Output autoloads and function definitions.
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limits
Output limit commands.
options
Output setopt commands.
styles
Same as zstyles.
variables
Output shell parameter assignments, plus export
commands for any environment variables.
zstyles
Output zstyle commands.
If the state is omitted, all is assumed.
With the exception of `all', every state can be abbreviated
by any prefix, even a single letter; thus a is the same as
aliases, z is the same as zstyles, etc.
Manipulating Hook Functions
add-zsh-hook [-dD] hook function
Several functions are special to the shell, as
described in the section SPECIAL FUNCTIONS, see zsh-
misc(1), in that they are automatic called at a spe-
cific point during shell execution. Each has an asso-
ciated array consisting of names of functions to be
called at the same point; these are so-called `hook
functions'. The shell function add-zsh-hook provides a
simple way of adding or removing functions from the
array.
hook is one of chpwd, periodic, precmd, preexec, zshad-
dhistory, zshexit, or zsh_directory_name, the special
functions in question. Note that zsh_directory_name is
called in a different way from the other functions, but
may still be manipulated as a hook.
function is name of an ordinary shell function. If no
options are given this will be added to the array of
functions to be executed in the given context.
If the option -d is given, the function is removed from
the array of functions to be executed.
If the option -D is given, the function is treated as a
pattern and any matching names of functions are removed
from the array of functions to be executed.
The options -U, -z and -k are passed as arguments to
autoload for function. For functions contributed with
zsh, the options -Uz are appropriate.
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REMEMBERING RECENT DIRECTORIES
The function cdr allows you to change the working directory
to a previous working directory from a list maintained auto-
matically. It is similar in concept to the directory stack
controlled by the pushd, popd and dirs builtins, but is more
configurable, and as it stores all entries in files it is
maintained across sessions and (by default) between terminal
emulators in the current session. (The pushd directory
stack is not actually modified or used by cdr unless you
configure it to do so as described in the configuration sec-
tion below.)
Installation
The system works by means of a hook function that is called
every time the directory changes. To install the system,
autoload the required functions and use the add-zsh-hook
function described above:
autoload -Uz chpwd_recent_dirs cdr add-zsh-hook
add-zsh-hook chpwd chpwd_recent_dirs
Now every time you change directly interactively, no matter
which command you use, the directory to which you change
will be remembered in most-recent-first order.
Use
All direct user interaction is via the cdr function.
The argument to cdr is a number N corresponding to the Nth
most recently changed-to directory. 1 is the immediately
preceding directory; the current directory is remembered but
is not offered as a destination. Note that if you have mul-
tiple windows open 1 may refer to a directory changed to in
another window; you can avoid this by having per-terminal
files for storing directory as described for the
recent-dirs-file style below.
If you set the recent-dirs-default style described below cdr
will behave the same as cd if given a non-numeric argument,
or more than one argument. The recent directory list is
updated just the same however you change directory.
If the argument is omitted, 1 is assumed. This is similar
to pushd's behaviour of swapping the two most recent direc-
tories on the stack.
Completion for the argument to cdr is available if compinit
has been run; menu selection is recommended, using:
zstyle ':completion:*:*:cdr:*:*' menu selection
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User Commands ZSHCONTRIB(1)
to allow you to cycle through recent directories; the order
is preserved, so the first choice is the most recent direc-
tory before the current one. The verbose style is also rec-
ommended to ensure the directory is shown; this style is on
by default so no action is required unless you have changed
it.
Options
The behaviour of cdr may be modified by the following
options.
-l lists the numbers and the corresponding directories in
abbreviated form (i.e. with ~ substitution reapplied),
one per line. The directories here are not quoted
(this would only be an issue if a directory name con-
tained a newline). This is used by the completion sys-
tem.
-r sets the variable reply to the current set of directo-
ries. Nothing is printed and the directory is not
changed.
-e allows you to edit the list of directories, one per
line. The list can be edited to any extent you like;
no sanity checking is performed. Completion is avail-
able. No quoting is necessary (except for newlines,
where I have in any case no sympathy); directories are
in unabbreviated from and contain an absolute path,
i.e. they start with /. Usually the first entry should
be left as the current directory.
Configuration
Configuration is by means of the styles mechanism that
should be familiar from completion; if not, see the descrip-
tion of the zstyle command in see zshmodules(1). The con-
text for setting styles should be ':chpwd:*' in case the
meaning of the context is extended in future, for example:
zstyle ':chpwd:*' recent-dirs-max 0
sets the value of the recent-dirs-max style to 0. In prac-
tice the style name is specific enough that a context of '*'
should be fine.
An exception is recent-dirs-insert, which is used exclu-
sively by the completion system and so has the usual comple-
tion system context (':completion:*' if nothing more spe-
cific is needed), though again '*' should be fine in prac-
tice.
recent-dirs-default
If true, and the command is expecting a recent
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directory index, and either there is more than one
argument or the argument is not an integer, then fall
through to "cd". This allows the lazy to use only one
command for directory changing. Completion recognises
this, too; see recent-dirs-insert for how to control
completion when this option is in use.
recent-dirs-file
The file where the list of directories is saved. The
default is ${ZDOTDIR:-$HOME}/.chpwd-recent-dirs, i.e.
this is in your home directory unless you have set the
variable ZDOTDIR to point somewhere else. Directory
names are saved in $'...' quoted form, so each line in
the file can be supplied directly to the shell as an
argument.
The value of this style may be an array. In this case,
the first file in the list will always be used for sav-
ing directories while any other files are left
untouched. When reading the recent directory list, if
there are fewer than the maximum number of entries in
the first file, the contents of later files in the
array will be appended with duplicates removed from the
list shown. The contents of the two files are not
sorted together, i.e. all the entries in the first file
are shown first. The special value + can appear in the
list to indicate the default file should be read at
that point. This allows effects like the following:
zstyle ':chpwd:*' recent-dirs-file \
~/.chpwd-recent-dirs-${TTY##*/} +
Recent directories are read from a file numbered
according to the terminal. If there are insufficient
entries the list is supplemented from the default file.
It is possible to use zstyle -e to make the directory
configurable at run time:
zstyle -e ':chpwd:*' recent-dirs-file pick-recent-dirs-file
pick-recent-dirs-file() {
if [[ $PWD = ~/text/writing(|/*) ]]; then
reply=(~/.chpwd-recent-dirs-writing)
else
reply=(+)
fi
}
In this example, if the current directory is
~/text/writing or a directory under it, then use a spe-
cial file for saving recent directories, else use the
default.
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recent-dirs-insert
Used by completion. If recent-dirs-default is true,
then setting this to true causes the actual directory,
rather than its index, to be inserted on the command
line; this has the same effect as using the correspond-
ing index, but makes the history clearer and the line
easier to edit. With this setting, if part of an argu-
ment was already typed, normal directory completion
rather than recent directory completion is done; this
is because recent directory completion is expected to
be done by cycling through entries menu fashion.
If the value of the style is always, then only recent
directories will be completed; in that case, use the cd
command when you want to complete other directories.
If the value is fallback, recent directories will be
tried first, then normal directory completion is per-
formed if recent directory completion failed to find a
match.
Finally, if the value is both then both sets of comple-
tions are presented; the usual tag mechanism can be
used to distinguish results, with recent directories
tagged as recent-dirs. Note that the recent directo-
ries inserted are abbreviated with directory names
where appropriate.
recent-dirs-max
The maximum number of directories to save to the file.
If this is zero or negative there is no maximum. The
default is 20. Note this includes the current direc-
tory, which isn't offered, so the highest number of
directories you will be offered is one less than the
maximum.
recent-dirs-prune
This style is an array determining what directories
should (or should not) be added to the recent list.
Elements of the array can include:
parent
Prune parents (more accurately, ancestors) from
the recent list. If present, changing directly
down by any number of directories causes the cur-
rent directory to be overwritten. For example,
changing from ~pws to ~pws/some/other/dir causes
~pws not to be left on the recent directory stack.
This only applies to direct changes to descendant
directories; earlier directories on the list are
not pruned. For example, changing from
~pws/yet/another to ~pws/some/other/dir does not
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User Commands ZSHCONTRIB(1)
cause ~pws to be pruned.
pattern:pattern
Gives a zsh pattern for directories that should
not be added to the recent list (if not already
there). This element can be repeated to add dif-
ferent patterns. For example, 'pattern:/tmp(|/*)'
stops /tmp or its descendants from being added.
The EXTENDED_GLOB option is always turned on for
these patterns.
recent-dirs-pushd
If set to true, cdr will use pushd instead of cd to
change the directory, so the directory is saved on the
directory stack. As the directory stack is completely
separate from the list of files saved by the mechanism
used in this file there is no obvious reason to do
this.
Use with dynamic directory naming
It is possible to refer to recent directories using the
dynamic directory name syntax by using the supplied function
zsh_directory_name_cdr a hook:
autoload -Uz add-zsh-hook
add-zsh-hook -Uz zsh_directory_name zsh_directory_name_cdr
When this is done, ~[1] will refer to the most recent direc-
tory other than $PWD, and so on. Completion after ~[...
also works.
Details of directory handling
This section is for the curious or confused; most users will
not need to know this information.
Recent directories are saved to a file immediately and hence
are preserved across sessions. Note currently no file lock-
ing is applied: the list is updated immediately on interac-
tive commands and nowhere else (unlike history), and it is
assumed you are only going to change directory in one window
at once. This is not safe on shared accounts, but in any
case the system has limited utility when someone else is
changing to a different set of directories behind your back.
To make this a little safer, only directory changes insti-
tuted from the command line, either directly or indirectly
through shell function calls (but not through subshells,
evals, traps, completion functions and the like) are saved.
Shell functions should use cd -q or pushd -q to avoid side
effects if the change to the directory is to be invisible at
the command line. See the contents of the function
chpwd_recent_dirs for more details.
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GATHERING INFORMATION FROM VERSION CONTROL SYSTEMS
In a lot of cases, it is nice to automatically retrieve
information from version control systems (VCSs), such as
subversion, CVS or git, to be able to provide it to the
user; possibly in the user's prompt. So that you can
instantly tell which branch you are currently on, for exam-
ple.
In order to do that, you may use the vcs_info function.
The following VCSs are supported, showing the abbreviated
name by which they are referred to within the system:
Bazaar (bzr)
http://bazaar-vcs.org/
Codeville (cdv)
http://codeville.org/
Concurrent Versioning System (cvs)
http://www.nongnu.org/cvs/
Darcs (darcs)
http://darcs.net/
Fossil (fossil)
http://fossil-scm.org/
Git (git)
http://git-scm.com/
GNU arch (tla)
http://www.gnu.org/software/gnu-arch/
Mercurial (hg)
http://mercurial.selenic.com/
Monotone (mtn)
http://monotone.ca/
Perforce (p4)
http://www.perforce.com/
Subversion (svn)
http://subversion.tigris.org/
SVK (svk)
http://svk.bestpractical.com/
There is also support for the patch management system quilt
(http://savannah.nongnu.org/projects/quilt). See Quilt Sup-
port below for details.
To load vcs_info:
autoload -Uz vcs_info
It can be used in any existing prompt, because it does not
require any specific $psvar entries to be available.
Quickstart
To get this feature working quickly (including colors), you
can do the following (assuming, you loaded vcs_info properly
- see above):
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zstyle ':vcs_info:*' actionformats \
'%F{5}(%f%s%F{5})%F{3}-%F{5}[%F{2}%b%F{3}|%F{1}%a%F{5}]%f '
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' formats \
'%F{5}(%f%s%F{5})%F{3}-%F{5}[%F{2}%b%F{5}]%f '
zstyle ':vcs_info:(sv[nk]|bzr):*' branchformat '%b%F{1}:%F{3}%r'
precmd () { vcs_info }
PS1='%F{5}[%F{2}%n%F{5}] %F{3}%3~ ${vcs_info_msg_0_}%f%# '
Obviously, the last two lines are there for demonstration.
You need to call vcs_info from your precmd function. Once
that is done you need a single quoted '${vcs_info_msg_0_}'
in your prompt.
To be able to use '${vcs_info_msg_0_}' directly in your
prompt like this, you will need to have the PROMPT_SUBST
option enabled.
Now call the vcs_info_printsys utility from the command
line:
% vcs_info_printsys
## list of supported version control backends:
## disabled systems are prefixed by a hash sign (#)
bzr
cdv
cvs
darcs
fossil
git
hg
mtn
p4
svk
svn
tla
## flavours (cannot be used in the enable or disable styles; they
## are enabled and disabled with their master [git-svn -> git])
## they *can* be used in contexts: ':vcs_info:git-svn:*'.
git-p4
git-svn
hg-git
hg-hgsubversion
hg-hgsvn
You may not want all of these because there is no point in
running the code to detect systems you do not use. So there
is a way to disable some backends altogether:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' disable bzr cdv darcs mtn svk tla
You may also pick a few from that list and enable only
those:
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zstyle ':vcs_info:*' enable git cvs svn
If you rerun vcs_info_printsys after one of these commands,
you will see the backends listed in the disable style (or
backends not in the enable style - if you used that) marked
as disabled by a hash sign. That means the detection of
these systems is skipped completely. No wasted time there.
Configuration
The vcs_info feature can be configured via zstyle.
First, the context in which we are working:
:vcs_info:vcs-string:user-context:repo-root-name
vcs-string
is one of: git, git-svn, git-p4, hg, hg-git, hg-hgsub-
version, hg-hgsvn, darcs, bzr, cdv, mtn, svn, cvs, svk,
tla, p4 or fossil. When hooks are active the hooks name
is added after a `+'. (See Hooks in vcs_info below.)
user-context
is a freely configurable string, assignable by the user
as the first argument to vcs_info (see its description
below).
repo-root-name
is the name of a repository in which you want a style
to match. So, if you want a setting specific to
/usr/src/zsh, with that being a CVS checkout, you can
set repo-root-name to zsh to make it so.
There are three special values for vcs-string: The first is
named -init-, that is in effect as long as there was no
decision what VCS backend to use. The second is -preinit-;
it is used before vcs_info is run, when initializing the
data exporting variables. The third special value is formats
and is used by the vcs_info_lastmsg for looking up its
styles.
The initial value of repo-root-name is -all- and it is
replaced with the actual name, as soon as it is known. Only
use this part of the context for defining the formats,
actionformats or branchformat styles, as it is guaranteed
that repo-root-name is set up correctly for these only. For
all other styles, just use '*' instead.
There are two pre-defined values for user-context:
default
the one used if none is specified
command
used by vcs_info_lastmsg to lookup its styles
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You can of course use ':vcs_info:*' to match all VCSs in all
user-contexts at once.
This is a description of all styles that are looked up.
formats
A list of formats, used when actionformats is not used
(which is most of the time).
actionformats
A list of formats, used if there is a special action
going on in your current repository; like an interac-
tive rebase or a merge conflict.
branchformat
Some backends replace %b in the formats and actionfor-
mats styles above, not only by a branch name but also
by a revision number. This style lets you modify how
that string should look.
nvcsformats
These "formats" are exported when we didn't detect a
version control system for the current directory or
vcs_info was disabled. This is useful if you want
vcs_info to completely take over the generation of your
prompt. You would do something like
PS1='${vcs_info_msg_0_}' to accomplish that.
hgrevformat
hg uses both a hash and a revision number to reference
a specific changeset in a repository. With this style
you can format the revision string (see branchformat)
to include either or both. It's only useful when
get-revision is true. Note, the full 40-character revi-
sion id is not available (except when using the
use-simple option) because executing hg more than once
per prompt is too slow; you may customize this behavior
using hooks.
max-exports
Defines the maximum number of vcs_info_msg_*_ variables
vcs_info will export.
enable
A list of backends you want to use. Checked in the
-init- context. If this list contains an item called
NONE no backend is used at all and vcs_info will do
nothing. If this list contains ALL, vcs_info will use
all known backends. Only with ALL in enable will the
disable style have any effect. ALL and NONE are case
insensitive.
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disable
A list of VCSs you don't want vcs_info to test for
repositories (checked in the -init- context, too). Only
used if enable contains ALL.
disable-patterns
A list of patterns that are checked against $PWD. If a
pattern matches, vcs_info will be disabled. This style
is checked in the :vcs_info:-init-:*:-all- context.
Say, ~/.zsh is a directory under version control, in
which you do not want vcs_info to be active, do:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' disable-patterns "$HOME/.zsh(|/*)"
use-quilt
If enabled, the quilt support code is active in `addon'
mode. See Quilt Support for details.
quilt-standalone
If enabled, `standalone' mode detection is attempted if
no VCS is active in a given directory. See Quilt Sup-
port for details.
quilt-patch-dir
Overwrite the value of the $QUILT_PATCHES environment
variable. See Quilt Support for details.
quiltcommand
When quilt itself is called in quilt support the value
of this style is used as the command name.
check-for-changes
If enabled, this style causes the %c and %u format
escapes to show when the working directory has uncom-
mitted changes. The strings displayed by these escapes
can be controlled via the stagedstr and unstagedstr
styles. The only backends that currently support this
option are git and hg (hg only supports unstaged).
For this style to be evaluated with the hg backend, the
get-revision style needs to be set and the use-simple
style needs to be unset. The latter is the default; the
former is not.
Note, the actions taken if this style is enabled are
potentially expensive (read: they may be slow, depend-
ing on how big the current repository is). Therefore,
it is disabled by default.
stagedstr
This string will be used in the %c escape if there are
staged changes in the repository.
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unstagedstr
This string will be used in the %u escape if there are
unstaged changes in the repository.
command
This style causes vcs_info to use the supplied string
as the command to use as the VCS's binary. Note, that
setting this in ':vcs_info:*' is not a good idea.
If the value of this style is empty (which is the
default), the used binary name is the name of the back-
end in use (e.g. svn is used in an svn repository).
The repo-root-name part in the context is always the
default -all- when this style is looked up.
For example, this style can be used to use binaries
from non-default installation directories. Assume, git
is installed in /usr/bin but your sysadmin installed a
newer version in /usr/bin/local. Instead of changing
the order of your $PATH parameter, you can do this:
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*:-all-' command /usr/local/bin/git
use-server
This is used by the Perforce backend (p4) to decide if
it should contact the Perforce server to find out if a
directory is managed by Perforce. This is the only
reliable way of doing this, but runs the risk of a
delay if the server name cannot be found. If the
server (more specifically, the host:port pair describ-
ing the server) cannot be contacted, its name is put
into the associative array vcs_info_p4_dead_servers and
is not contacted again during the session until it is
removed by hand. If you do not set this style, the p4
backend is only usable if you have set the environment
variable P4CONFIG to a file name and have corresponding
files in the root directories of each Perforce client.
See comments in the function VCS_INFO_detect_p4 for
more detail.
use-simple
If there are two different ways of gathering informa-
tion, you can select the simpler one by setting this
style to true; the default is to use the not-that-sim-
ple code, which is potentially a lot slower but might
be more accurate in all possible cases. This style is
used by the bzr and hg backends. In the case of hg it
will invoke the external hexdump program to parse the
binary dirstate cache file; this method will not return
the local revision number.
get-revision
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If set to true, vcs_info goes the extra mile to figure
out the revision of a repository's work tree (currently
for the git and hg backends, where this kind of infor-
mation is not always vital). For git, the hash value of
the currently checked out commit is available via the
%i expansion. With hg, the local revision number and
the corresponding global hash are available via %i.
get-mq
If set to true, the hg backend will look for a Mercu-
rial Queue (mq) patch directory. Information will be
available via the `%m' replacement.
get-bookmarks
If set to true, the hg backend will try to get a list
of current bookmarks. They will be available via the
`%m' replacement.
use-prompt-escapes
Determines if we assume that the assembled string from
vcs_info includes prompt escapes. (Used by
vcs_info_lastmsg.)
debug
Enable debugging output to track possible problems.
Currently this style is only used by vcs_info's hooks
system.
hooks
A list style that defines hook-function names. See
Hooks in vcs_info below for details.
The default values for these styles in all contexts are:
formats
" (%s)-[%b]%u%c-"
actionformats
" (%s)-[%b|%a]%u%c-"
branchformat
"%b:%r" (for bzr, svn, svk and hg)
nvcsformats
""
hgrevformat
"%r:%h"
max-exports
2
enable
ALL
disable
(empty list)
disable-patterns
(empty list)
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check-for-changes
false
stagedstr
(string: "S")
unstagedstr
(string: "U")
command
(empty string)
use-server
false
use-simple
false
get-revision
false
get-mq
true
get-bookmarks
false
use-prompt-escapes
true
debug
false
hooks
(empty list)
use-quilt
false
quilt-standalone
false
quilt-patch-dir
empty - use $QUILT_PATCHES
quiltcommand
quilt
In normal formats and actionformats the following replace-
ments are done:
%s The VCS in use (git, hg, svn, etc.).
%b Information about the current branch.
%a An identifier that describes the action. Only makes
sense in actionformats.
%i The current revision number or identifier. For hg the
hgrevformat style may be used to customize the output.
%c The string from the stagedstr style if there are staged
changes in the repository.
%u The string from the unstagedstr style if there are
unstaged changes in the repository.
%R The base directory of the repository.
%r The repository name. If %R is /foo/bar/repoXY, %r is
repoXY.
%S A subdirectory within a repository. If $PWD is
/foo/bar/repoXY/beer/tasty, %S is beer/tasty.
%m A "misc" replacement. It is at the discretion of the
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backend to decide what this replacement expands to. It
is currently used by the hg and git backends to display
patch information from the mq and stgit extensions.
In branchformat these replacements are done:
%b The branch name.
%r The current revision number or the hgrevformat style
for hg.
In hgrevformat these replacements are done:
%r The current local revision number.
%h The current global revision identifier.
In patch-format and nopatch-format these replacements are
done:
%p The name of the top-most applied patch
(applied-string).
%u The number of unapplied patches (unapplied-string).
%n The number of applied patches.
%c The number of unapplied patches.
%a The number of all patches.
%g The names of active mq guards (hg backend).
%G The number of active mq guards (hg backend).
Not all VCS backends have to support all replacements. For
nvcsformats no replacements are performed at all, it is just
a string.
Oddities
If you want to use the %b (bold off) prompt expansion in
formats, which expands %b itself, use %%b. That will cause
the vcs_info expansion to replace %%b with %b, so that zsh's
prompt expansion mechanism can handle it. Similarly, to hand
down %b from branchformat, use %%%%b. Sorry for this incon-
venience, but it cannot be easily avoided. Luckily we do not
clash with a lot of prompt expansions and this only needs to
be done for those.
Quilt Support
Quilt is not a version control system, therefore this is not
implemented as a backend. It can help keeping track of a
series of patches. People use it to keep a set of changes
they want to use on top of software packages (which is
tightly integrated into the package build process - the
Debian project does this for a large number of packages).
Quilt can also help individual developers keep track of
their own patches on top of real version control systems.
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The vcs_info integration tries to support both ways of using
quilt by having two slightly different modes of operation:
`addon' mode and `standalone' mode).
For `addon' mode to become active vcs_info must have already
detected a real version control system controlling the
directory. If that is the case, a directory that holds
quilt's patches needs to be found. That directory is config-
urable via the `QUILT_PATCHES' environment variable. If that
variable exists its value is used, otherwise the value
`patches' is assumed. The value from $QUILT_PATCHES can be
overwritten using the `quilt-patches' style. (Note: you can
use vcs_info to keep the value of $QUILT_PATCHES correct all
the time via the post-quilt hook).
When the directory in question is found, quilt is assumed to
be active. To gather more information, vcs_info looks for a
directory called `.pc'; Quilt uses that directory to track
its current state. If this directory does not exist we know
that quilt has not done anything to the working directory
(read: no patches have been applied yet).
If patches are applied, vcs_info will try to find out which.
If you want to know which patches of a series are not yet
applied, you need to activate the get-unapplied style in the
appropriate context.
vcs_info allows for very detailed control over how the gath-
ered information is presented (see the below sections,
Styles and Hooks in vcs_info), all of which are documented
below. Note there are a number of other patch tracking sys-
tems that work on top of a certain version control system
(like stgit for git, or mq for hg); the configuration for
systems like that are generally configured the same way as
the quilt support.
If the quilt support is working in `addon' mode, the pro-
duced string is available as a simple format replacement (%Q
to be precise), which can be used in formats and actionfor-
mats; see below for details).
If, on the other hand, the support code is working in
`standalone' mode, vcs_info will pretend as if quilt were an
actual version control system. That means that the version
control system identifier (which otherwise would be some-
thing like `svn' or `cvs') will be set to `-quilt-'. This
has implications on the used style context where this iden-
tifier is the second element. vcs_info will have filled in a
proper value for the "repository's" root directory and the
string containing the information about quilt's state will
be available as the `misc' replacement (and %Q for compati-
bility with `addon' mode.
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What is left to discuss is how `standalone' mode is
detected. The detection itself is a series of searches for
directories. You can have this detection enabled all the
time in every directory that is not otherwise under version
control. If you know there is only a limited set of trees
where you would like vcs_info to try and look for Quilt in
`standalone' mode to minimise the amount of searching on
every call to vcs_info, there are a number of ways to do
that:
Essentially, `standalone' mode detection is controlled by a
style called `quilt-standalone'. It is a string style and
its value can have different effects. The simplest values
are: `always' to run detection every time vcs_info is run,
and `never' to turn the detection off entirely.
If the value of quilt-standalone is something else, it is
interpreted differently. If the value is the name of a
scalar variable the value of that variable is checked and
that value is used in the same `always'/`never' way as
described above.
If the value of quilt-standalone is an array, the elements
of that array are used as directory names under which you
want the detection to be active.
If quilt-standalone is an associative array, the keys are
taken as directory names under which you want the detection
to be active, but only if the corresponding value is the
string `true'.
Last, but not least, if the value of quilt-standalone is the
name of a function, the function is called without arguments
and the return value decides whether detection should be
active. A `0' return value is true; a non-zero return value
is interpreted as false.
Note, if there is both a function and a variable by the name
of quilt-standalone, the function will take precedence.
Function Descriptions (Public API)
vcs_info [user-context]
The main function, that runs all backends and assembles
all data into ${vcs_info_msg_*_}. This is the function
you want to call from precmd if you want to include
up-to-date information in your prompt (see Variable
description below). If an argument is given, that
string will be used instead of default in the user-con-
text field of the style context.
vcs_info_hookadd
Statically registers a number of functions to a given
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hook. The hook needs to be given as the first argument;
what follows is a list of hook-function names to regis-
ter to the hook. The `+vi-' prefix needs to be left out
here. See Hooks in vcs_info below for details.
vcs_info_hookdel
Remove hook-functions from a given hook. The hook needs
to be given as the first non-option argument; what fol-
lows is a list of hook-function names to un-register
from the hook. If `-a' is used as the first argument,
all occurances of the functions are unregistered. Oth-
erwise only the last occurance is removed (if a func-
tion was registered to a hook more than once) . The
`+vi-' prefix needs to be left out here. See Hooks in
vcs_info below for details.
vcs_info_lastmsg
Outputs the last ${vcs_info_msg_*_} value. Takes into
account the value of the use-prompt-escapes style in
':vcs_info:formats:command:-all-'. It also only prints
max-exports values.
vcs_info_printsys [user-context]
Prints a list of all supported version control systems.
Useful to find out possible contexts (and which of them
are enabled) or values for the disable style.
vcs_info_setsys
Initializes vcs_info's internal list of available back-
ends. With this function, you can add support for new
VCSs without restarting the shell.
All functions named VCS_INFO_* are for internal use only.
Variable Description
${vcs_info_msg_N_} (Note the trailing underscore)
Where N is an integer, e.g., vcs_info_msg_0_. These
variables are the storage for the informational message
the last vcs_info call has assembled. These are
strongly connected to the formats, actionformats and
nvcsformats styles described above. Those styles are
lists. The first member of that list gets expanded into
${vcs_info_msg_0_}, the second into ${vcs_info_msg_1_}
and the Nth into ${vcs_info_msg_N-1_}. These parameters
are exported into the environment. (See the max-exports
style above.)
All variables named VCS_INFO_* are for internal use only.
Hooks in vcs_info
Hooks are places in vcs_info where you can run your own
code. That code can communicate with the code that called it
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and through that, change the system's behaviour.
For configuration, hooks change the style context:
:vcs_info:vcs-string+hook-name:user-context:repo-root-name
To register functions to a hook, you need to list them in
the hooks style in the appropriate context.
Example:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*+foo:*' hooks bar baz
This registers functions to the hook `foo' for all backends.
In order to avoid namespace problems, all registered func-
tion names are prepended by a `+vi-', so the actual func-
tions called for the `foo' hook are `+vi-bar' and `+vi-baz'.
If you would like to register a function to a hook regard-
less of the current context, you may use the
vcs_info_hookadd function. To remove a function that was
added like that, the vcs_info_hookdel function can be used.
If something seems weird, you can enable the `debug' boolean
style in the proper context and the hook-calling code will
print what it tried to execute and whether the function in
question existed.
When you register more than one function to a hook, all
functions are executed one after another until one function
returns non-zero or until all functions have been called.
Context-sensitive hook functions are executed before stati-
cally registered ones (the ones added by vcs_info_hookadd).
You may pass data between functions via an associative
array, user_data. For example:
+vi-git-myfirsthook(){
user_data[myval]=$myval
}
+vi-git-mysecondhook(){
# do something with ${user_data[myval]}
}
There are a number of variables that are special in hook
contexts:
ret The return value that the hooks system will return to
the caller. The default is an integer `zero'. If and
how a changed ret value changes the execution of the
caller depends on the specific hook. See the hook docu-
mentation below for details.
hook_com
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An associated array which is used for bidirectional
communication from the caller to hook functions. The
used keys depend on the specific hook.
context
The active context of the hook. Functions that wish to
change this variable should make it local scope first.
vcs The current VCS after it was detected. The same values
as in the enable/disable style are used. Available in
all hooks except start-up.
Finally, the full list of currently available hooks:
start-up
Called after starting vcs_info but before the VCS in
this directory is determined. It can be used to deacti-
vate vcs_info temporarily if necessary. When ret is set
to 1, vcs_info aborts and does nothing; when set to 2,
vcs_info sets up everything as if no version control
were active and exits.
pre-get-data
Same as start-up but after the VCS was detected.
gen-hg-bookmark-string
Called in the Mercurial backend when a bookmark string
is generated; the get-revision and get-bookmarks styles
must be true.
This hook gets the names of the Mercurial bookmarks
that vcs_info collected from `hg'.
When setting ret to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[hg-bookmark-string]} will be used in the %m
escape in formats and actionformats and will be avail-
abe in the global backend_misc array as ${back-
end_misc[bookmarks]}.
gen-applied-string
Called in the git (with stgit), and hg (with mq) back-
ends and in quilt support when the applied-string is
generated; the use-quilt zstyle must be true for quilt
(the mq and stgit backends are active by default).
This hook gets the names of all applied patches which
vcs_info collected so far in the opposite order, which
means that the first argument is the top-most patch and
so forth.
When setting ret to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[applied-string]} will be used in the %m
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escape in formats and actionformats; it will be avail-
able in the global backend_misc array as $back-
end_misc[patches]}; and it will be available as %p in
the patch-format and nopatch-format styles.
gen-unapplied-string
Called in the git (with stgit), and hg (with mq) back-
end and in quilt support when the unapplied-string is
generated; the get-unapplied style must be true.
This hook gets the names of all unapplied patches which
vcs_info collected so far in the opposite order, which
mean that the first argument is the patch next-in-line
to be applied and so forth.
When setting ret to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[unapplied-string]} will be available as %u
in the patch-format and nopatch-format styles.
gen-mqguards-string
Called in the hg backend when guards-string is gener-
ated; the get-mq style must be true (default).
This hook gets the names of any active mq guards.
When setting ret to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[guards-string]} will be used in the %g
escape in the patch-format and nopatch-format styles.
no-vcs
This hooks is called when no version control system was
detected.
The `hook_com' parameter is not used.
post-quilt
Called after the quilt support is done. The following
information is passed as arguments to the hook: 1. the
quilt-support mode (`addon' or `standalone'); 2. the
directory that contains the patch series; 3. the direc-
tory that holds quilt's status information (the `.pc'
directory) or the string "-nopc-" if that directory
wasn't found.
The `hook_com' parameter is not used.
set-branch-format
Called before `branchformat' is set. The only argument
to the hook is the format that is configured at this
point.
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The `hook_com' keys considered are `branch' and `revi-
sion'. They are set to the values figured out so far
by vcs_info and any change will be used directly when
the actual replacement is done.
If ret is set to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[branch-replace]} will be used unchanged as
the `%b' replacement in the variables set by vcs_info.
set-hgrev-format
Called before a `hgrevformat' is set. The only argument
to the hook is the format that is configured at this
point.
The `hook_com' keys considered are `hash' and `local-
rev'. They are set to the values figured out so far by
vcs_info and any change will be used directly when the
actual replacement is done.
If ret is set to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[rev-replace]} will be used unchanged as the
`%i' replacement in the variables set by vcs_info.
set-message
Called each time before a `vcs_info_msg_N_' message is
set. It takes two arguments; the first being the `N'
in the message variable name, the second is the cur-
rently configured formats or actionformats.
There are a number of `hook_com' keys, that are used
here: `action', `branch', `base', `base-name', `sub-
dir', `staged', `unstaged', `revision', `misc', `vcs'
and one `miscN' entry for each backend-specific data
field (N starting at zero). They are set to the values
figured out so far by vcs_info and any change will be
used directly when the actual replacement is done.
Since this hook is triggered multiple times (once for
each configured formats or actionformats), each of the
`hook_com' keys mentioned above (except for the miscN
entries) has an `_orig' counterpart, so even if you
changed a value to your liking you can still get the
original value in the next run. Changing the `_orig'
values is probably not a good idea.
If ret is set to non-zero, the string in
${hook_com[message]} will be used unchanged as the mes-
sage by vcs_info.
If all of this sounds rather confusing, take a look at the
Examples section below and also in the Misc/vcs_info-exam-
ples file in the Zsh source. They contain some explanatory
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code.
Examples
Don't use vcs_info at all (even though it's in your prompt):
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' enable NONE
Disable the backends for bzr and svk:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' disable bzr svk
Disable everything but bzr and svk:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*' enable bzr svk
Provide a special formats for git:
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*' formats ' GIT, BABY! [%b]'
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*' actionformats ' GIT ACTION! [%b|%a]'
All %x expansion in all sorts of formats ("formats",
"actionformats", branchformat, you name it) are done using
the `zformat' builtin from the `zsh/zutil' module. That
means you can do everything with these %x items what zformat
supports. In particular, if you want something that is
really long to have a fixed width, like a hash in a mercu-
rial branchformat, you can do this: %12.12i. That'll shrink
the 40 character hash to its 12 leading characters. The form
is actually `%min.maxx'. More is possible. See the section
`The zsh/zutil Module' in zshmodules(1) for details.
Use the quicker bzr backend
zstyle ':vcs_info:bzr:*' use-simple true
If you do use use-simple, please report if it does
`the-right-thing[tm]'.
Display the revision number in yellow for bzr and svn:
zstyle ':vcs_info:(svn|bzr):*' branchformat '%b%{'${fg[yellow]}'%}:%r'
If you want colors, make sure you enclose the color codes in
%{...%} if you want to use the string provided by vcs_info
in prompts.
Here is how to print the VCS information as a command (not
in a prompt):
alias vcsi='vcs_info command; vcs_info_lastmsg'
This way, you can even define different formats for output
via vcs_info_lastmsg in the ':vcs_info:*:command:*' names-
pace.
Now as promised, some code that uses hooks: say, you'd like
to replace the string `svn' by `subversion' in vcs_info's %s
formats replacement.
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First, we will tell vcs_info to call a function when popu-
lating the message variables with the gathered information:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*+set-message:*' hooks svn2subversion
Nothing happens. Which is reasonable, since we didn't define
the actual function yet. To see what the hooks subsystem is
trying to do, enable the `debug' style:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*+*:*' debug true
That should give you an idea what is going on. Specifically,
the function that we are looking for is `+vi-svn2subver-
sion'. Note, the `+vi-' prefix. So, everything is in order,
just as documented. When you are done checking out the
debugging output, disable it again:
zstyle ':vcs_info:*+*:*' debug false
Now, let's define the function:
function +vi-svn2subversion() {
[[ ${hook_com[vcs_orig]} == svn ]] && hook_com[vcs]=subversion
}
Simple enough. And it could have even been simpler, if only
we had registered our function in a less generic context. If
we do it only in the `svn' backend's context, we don't need
to test which the active backend is:
zstyle ':vcs_info:svn+set-message:*' hooks svn2subversion
function +vi-svn2subversion() {
hook_com[vcs]=subversion
}
And finally a little more elaborate example, that uses a
hook to create a customised bookmark string for the hg back-
end.
Again, we start off by registering a function:
zstyle ':vcs_info:hg+gen-hg-bookmark-string:*' hooks hgbookmarks
And then we define the `+vi-hgbookmarks function:
function +vi-hgbookmarks() {
# The default is to connect all bookmark names by
# commas. This mixes things up a little.
# Imagine, there's one type of bookmarks that is
# special to you. Say, because it's *your* work.
# Those bookmarks look always like this: "sh/*"
# (because your initials are sh, for example).
# This makes the bookmarks string use only those
# bookmarks. If there's more than one, it
# concatenates them using commas.
local s i
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# The bookmarks returned by `hg' are available in
# the functions positional parameters.
(( $# == 0 )) && return 0
for i in "$@"; do
if [[ $i == sh/* ]]; then
[[ -n $s ]] && s=$s,
s=${s}$i
fi
done
# Now, the communication with the code that calls
# the hook functions is done via the hook_com[]
# hash. The key, at which the `gen-hg-bookmark-string'
# hook looks at is `hg-bookmark-string'. So:
hook_com[hg-bookmark-string]=$s
# And to signal, that we want to use the sting we
# just generated, set the special variable `ret' to
# something other than the default zero:
ret=1
return 0
}
Some longer examples and code snippets which might be useful
are available in the examples file located at
Misc/vcs_info-examples in the Zsh source directory.
This concludes our guided tour through zsh's vcs_info.
PROMPT THEMES
Installation
You should make sure all the functions from the Func-
tions/Prompts directory of the source distribution are
available; they all begin with the string `prompt_' except
for the special function`promptinit'. You also need the
`colors' function from Functions/Misc. All of these func-
tions may already have been installed on your system; if
not, you will need to find them and copy them. The direc-
tory should appear as one of the elements of the fpath array
(this should already be the case if they were installed),
and at least the function promptinit should be autoloaded;
it will autoload the rest. Finally, to initialize the use
of the system you need to call the promptinit function. The
following code in your .zshrc will arrange for this; assume
the functions are stored in the directory ~/myfns:
fpath=(~/myfns $fpath)
autoload -U promptinit
promptinit
Theme Selection
Use the prompt command to select your preferred theme. This
command may be added to your .zshrc following the call to
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promptinit in order to start zsh with a theme already
selected.
prompt [ -c | -l ]
prompt [ -p | -h ] [ theme ... ]
prompt [ -s ] theme [ arg ... ]
Set or examine the prompt theme. With no options and a
theme argument, the theme with that name is set as the
current theme. The available themes are determined at
run time; use the -l option to see a list. The special
theme `random' selects at random one of the available
themes and sets your prompt to that.
In some cases the theme may be modified by one or more
arguments, which should be given after the theme name.
See the help for each theme for descriptions of these
arguments.
Options are:
-c Show the currently selected theme and its parame-
ters, if any.
-l List all available prompt themes.
-p Preview the theme named by theme, or all themes if
no theme is given.
-h Show help for the theme named by theme, or for the
prompt function if no theme is given.
-s Set theme as the current theme and save state.
prompt_theme_setup
Each available theme has a setup function which is
called by the prompt function to install that theme.
This function may define other functions as necessary
to maintain the prompt, including functions used to
preview the prompt or provide help for its use. You
should not normally call a theme's setup function
directly.
ZLE FUNCTIONS
Widgets
These functions all implement user-defined ZLE widgets (see
zshzle(1)) which can be bound to keystrokes in interactive
shells. To use them, your .zshrc should contain lines of
the form
autoload function
zle -N function
followed by an appropriate bindkey command to associate the
function with a key sequence. Suggested bindings are
described below.
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bash-style word functions
If you are looking for functions to implement moving
over and editing words in the manner of bash, where
only alphanumeric characters are considered word char-
acters, you can use the functions described in the next
section. The following is sufficient:
autoload -U select-word-style
select-word-style bash
forward-word-match, backward-word-match
kill-word-match, backward-kill-word-match
transpose-words-match, capitalize-word-match
up-case-word-match, down-case-word-match
select-word-style, match-word-context, match-words-by-style
The eight `-match' functions are drop-in replacements
for the builtin widgets without the suffix. By default
they behave in a similar way. However, by the use of
styles and the function select-word-style, the way
words are matched can be altered.
The simplest way of configuring the functions is to use
select-word-style, which can either be called as a nor-
mal function with the appropriate argument, or invoked
as a user-defined widget that will prompt for the first
character of the word style to be used. The first time
it is invoked, the eight -match functions will automat-
ically replace the builtin versions, so they do not
need to be loaded explicitly.
The word styles available are as follows. Only the
first character is examined.
bash Word characters are alphanumeric characters only.
normal
As in normal shell operation: word characters are
alphanumeric characters plus any characters
present in the string given by the parameter
$WORDCHARS.
shell
Words are complete shell command arguments, possi-
bly including complete quoted strings, or any
tokens special to the shell.
whitespace
Words are any set of characters delimited by
whitespace.
default
Restore the default settings; this is usually the
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same as `normal'.
All but `default' can be input as an upper case charac-
ter, which has the same effect but with subword match-
ing turned on. In this case, words with upper case
characters are treated specially: each separate run of
upper case characters, or an upper case character fol-
lowed by any number of other characters, is considered
a word. The style subword-range can supply an alterna-
tive character range to the default `[:upper:]'; the
value of the style is treated as the contents of a
`[...]' pattern (note that the outer brackets should
not be supplied, only those surrounding named ranges).
More control can be obtained using the zstyle command,
as described in zshmodules(1). Each style is looked up
in the context :zle:widget where widget is the name of
the user-defined widget, not the name of the function
implementing it, so in the case of the definitions sup-
plied by select-word-style the appropriate contexts are
:zle:forward-word, and so on. The function
select-word-style itself always defines styles for the
context `:zle:*' which can be overridden by more spe-
cific (longer) patterns as well as explicit contexts.
The style word-style specifies the rules to use. This
may have the following values.
normal
Use the standard shell rules, i.e. alphanumerics
and $WORDCHARS, unless overridden by the styles
word-chars or word-class.
specified
Similar to normal, but only the specified charac-
ters, and not also alphanumerics, are considered
word characters.
unspecified
The negation of specified. The given characters
are those which will not be considered part of a
word.
shell
Words are obtained by using the syntactic rules
for generating shell command arguments. In addi-
tion, special tokens which are never command argu-
ments such as `()' are also treated as words.
whitespace
Words are whitespace-delimited strings of charac-
ters.
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The first three of those rules usually use $WORDCHARS,
but the value in the parameter can be overridden by the
style word-chars, which works in exactly the same way
as $WORDCHARS. In addition, the style word-class uses
character class syntax to group characters and takes
precedence over word-chars if both are set. The
word-class style does not include the surrounding
brackets of the character class; for example,
`-:[:alnum:]' is a valid word-class to include all
alphanumerics plus the characters `-' and `:'. Be
careful including `]', `^' and `-' as these are special
inside character classes.
word-style may also have `-subword' appended to its
value to turn on subword matching, as described above.
The style skip-chars is mostly useful for trans-
pose-words and similar functions. If set, it gives a
count of characters starting at the cursor position
which will not be considered part of the word and are
treated as space, regardless of what they actually are.
For example, if
zstyle ':zle:transpose-words' skip-chars 1
has been set, and transpose-words-match is called with
the cursor on the X of fooXbar, where X can be any
character, then the resulting expression is barXfoo.
Finer grained control can be obtained by setting the
style word-context to an array of pairs of entries.
Each pair of entries consists of a pattern and a sub-
context. The shell argument the cursor is on is
matched against each pattern in turn until one matches;
if it does, the context is extended by a colon and the
corresponding subcontext. Note that the test is made
against the original word on the line, with no strip-
ping of quotes. Special handling is done between
words: the current context is examined and if it con-
tains the string back, the word before the cursor is
considered, else the word after cursor is considered.
Some examples are given below.
The style skip-whitespace-first is only used with the
forward-word widget. If it is set to true, then for-
ward-word skips any non-word-characters, followed by
any non-word-characters: this is similar to the behav-
iour of other word-orientated widgets, and also that
used by other editors, however it differs from the
standard zsh behaviour. When using select-word-style
the widget is set in the context :zle:* to true if the
word style is bash and false otherwise. It may be
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overridden by setting it in the more specific context
:zle:forward-word*.
Here are some examples of use of the styles, actually
taken from the simplified interface in
select-word-style:
zstyle ':zle:*' word-style standard
zstyle ':zle:*' word-chars ''
Implements bash-style word handling for all widgets,
i.e. only alphanumerics are word characters; equivalent
to setting the parameter WORDCHARS empty for the given
context.
style ':zle:*kill*' word-style space
Uses space-delimited words for widgets with the word
`kill' in the name. Neither of the styles word-chars
nor word-class is used in this case.
Here are some examples of use of the word-context style
to extend the context.
zstyle ':zle:*' word-context "*/*" file "[[:space:]]" whitespace
zstyle ':zle:transpose-words:whitespace' word-style shell
zstyle ':zle:transpose-words:filename' word-style normal
zstyle ':zle:transpose-words:filename' word-chars ''
This provides two different ways of using trans-
pose-words depending on whether the cursor is on white-
space between words or on a filename, here any word
containing a /. On whitespace, complete arguments as
defined by standard shell rules will be transposed. In
a filename, only alphanumerics will be transposed.
Elsewhere, words will be transposed using the default
style for :zle:transpose-words.
The word matching and all the handling of zstyle set-
tings is actually implemented by the function
match-words-by-style. This can be used to create new
user-defined widgets. The calling function should set
the local parameter curcontext to :zle:widget, create
the local parameter matched_words and call
match-words-by-style with no arguments. On return,
matched_words will be set to an array with the ele-
ments: (1) the start of the line (2) the word before
the cursor (3) any non-word characters between that
word and the cursor (4) any non-word character at the
cursor position plus any remaining non-word characters
before the next word, including all characters speci-
fied by the skip-chars style, (5) the word at or
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following the cursor (6) any non-word characters fol-
lowing that word (7) the remainder of the line. Any of
the elements may be an empty string; the calling func-
tion should test for this to decide whether it can per-
form its function.
It is possible to pass options with arguments to
match-words-by-style to override the use of styles.
The options are:
-w word-style
-s skip-chars
-c word-class
-C word-chars
-r subword-range
For example, match-words-by-style -w shell -c 0 may be
used to extract the command argument around the cursor.
The word-context style is implemented by the function
match-word-context. This should not usually need to be
called directly.
copy-earlier-word
This widget works like a combination of
insert-last-word and copy-prev-shell-word. Repeated
invocations of the widget retrieve earlier words on the
relevant history line. With a numeric argument N,
insert the Nth word from the history line; N may be
negative to count from the end of the line.
If insert-last-word has been used to retrieve the last
word on a previous history line, repeated invocations
will replace that word with earlier words from the same
line.
Otherwise, the widget applies to words on the line cur-
rently being edited. The widget style can be set to
the name of another widget that should be called to
retrieve words. This widget must accept the same three
arguments as insert-last-word.
cycle-completion-positions
After inserting an unambiguous string into the command
line, the new function based completion system may know
about multiple places in this string where characters
are missing or differ from at least one of the possible
matches. It will then place the cursor on the position
it considers to be the most interesting one, i.e. the
one where one can disambiguate between as many matches
as possible with as little typing as possible.
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This widget allows the cursor to be easily moved to the
other interesting spots. It can be invoked repeatedly
to cycle between all positions reported by the comple-
tion system.
delete-whole-word-match
This is another function which works like the -match
functions described immediately above, i.e. using
styles to decide the word boundaries. However, it is
not a replacement for any existing function.
The basic behaviour is to delete the word around the
cursor. There is no numeric prefix handling; only the
single word around the cursor is considered. If the
widget contains the string kill, the removed text will
be placed in the cutbuffer for future yanking. This
can be obtained by defining kill-whole-word-match as
follows:
zle -N kill-whole-word-match delete-whole-word-match
and then binding the widget kill-whole-word-match.
up-line-or-beginning-search, down-line-or-beginning-search
These widgets are similar to the builtin functions
up-line-or-search and down-line-or-search: if in a
multiline buffer they move up or down within the
buffer, otherwise they search for a history line match-
ing the start of the current line. In this case, how-
ever, they search for a line which matches the current
line up to the current cursor position, in the manner
of history-beginning-search-backward and -forward,
rather than the first word on the line.
edit-command-line
Edit the command line using your visual editor, as in
ksh.
bindkey -M vicmd v edit-command-line
history-search-end
This function implements the widgets history-begin-
ning-search-backward-end and history-begin-
ning-search-forward-end. These commands work by first
calling the corresponding builtin widget (see `History
Control' in zshzle(1)) and then moving the cursor to
the end of the line. The original cursor position is
remembered and restored before calling the builtin wid-
get a second time, so that the same search is repeated
to look farther through the history.
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Although you autoload only one function, the commands
to use it are slightly different because it implements
two widgets.
zle -N history-beginning-search-backward-end \
history-search-end
zle -N history-beginning-search-forward-end \
history-search-end
bindkey '\e^P' history-beginning-search-backward-end
bindkey '\e^N' history-beginning-search-forward-end
history-beginning-search-menu
This function implements yet another form of history
searching. The text before the cursor is used to
select lines from the history, as for history-begin-
ning-search-backward except that all matches are shown
in a numbered menu. Typing the appropriate digits
inserts the full history line. Note that leading
zeroes must be typed (they are only shown when neces-
sary for removing ambiguity). The entire history is
searched; there is no distinction between forwards and
backwards.
With a prefix argument, the search is not anchored to
the start of the line; the string typed by the use may
appear anywhere in the line in the history.
If the widget name contains `-end' the cursor is moved
to the end of the line inserted. If the widget name
contains `-space' any space in the text typed is
treated as a wildcard and can match anything (hence a
leading space is equivalent to giving a prefix argu-
ment). Both forms can be combined, for example:
zle -N history-beginning-search-menu-space-end \
history-beginning-search-menu
history-pattern-search
The function history-pattern-search implements widgets
which prompt for a pattern with which to search the
history backwards or forwards. The pattern is in the
usual zsh format, however the first character may be ^
to anchor the search to the start of the line, and the
last character may be $ to anchor the search to the end
of the line. If the search was not anchored to the end
of the line the cursor is positioned just after the
pattern found.
The commands to create bindable widgets are similar to
those in the example immediately above:
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autoload -U history-pattern-search
zle -N history-pattern-search-backward history-pattern-search
zle -N history-pattern-search-forward history-pattern-search
incarg
Typing the keystrokes for this widget with the cursor
placed on or to the left of an integer causes that
integer to be incremented by one. With a numeric pre-
fix argument, the number is incremented by the amount
of the argument (decremented if the prefix argument is
negative). The shell parameter incarg may be set to
change the default increment to something other than
one.
bindkey '^X+' incarg
incremental-complete-word
This allows incremental completion of a word. After
starting this command, a list of completion choices can
be shown after every character you type, which you can
delete with ^H or DEL. Pressing return accepts the
completion so far and returns you to normal editing
(that is, the command line is not immediately exe-
cuted). You can hit TAB to do normal completion, ^G to
abort back to the state when you started, and ^D to
list the matches.
This works only with the new function based completion
system.
bindkey '^Xi' incremental-complete-word
insert-composed-char
This function allows you to compose characters that
don't appear on the keyboard to be inserted into the
command line. The command is followed by two keys cor-
responding to ASCII characters (there is no prompt).
For accented characters, the two keys are a base char-
acter followed by a code for the accent, while for
other special characters the two characters together
form a mnemonic for the character to be inserted. The
two-character codes are a subset of those given by RFC
1345 (see for example
http://www.faqs.org/rfcs/rfc1345.html).
The function may optionally be followed by up to two
characters which replace one or both of the characters
read from the keyboard; if both characters are sup-
plied, no input is read. For example, insert-com-
posed-char a: can be used within a widget to insert an
a with umlaut into the command line. This has the
advantages over use of a literal character that it is
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more portable.
For best results zsh should have been built with sup-
port for multibyte characters (configured with
--enable-multibyte); however, the function works for
the limited range of characters available in sin-
gle-byte character sets such as ISO-8859-1.
The character is converted into the local representa-
tion and inserted into the command line at the cursor
position. (The conversion is done within the shell,
using whatever facilities the C library provides.)
With a numeric argument, the character and its code are
previewed in the status line
The function may be run outside zle in which case it
prints the character (together with a newline) to stan-
dard output. Input is still read from keystrokes.
See insert-unicode-char for an alternative way of
inserting Unicode characters using their hexadecimal
character number.
The set of accented characters is reasonably complete
up to Unicode character U+0180, the set of special
characters less so. However, it is very sporadic from
that point. Adding new characters is easy, however;
see the function define-composed-chars. Please send
any additions to zsh-workers@zsh.org.
The codes for the second character when used to accent
the first are as follows. Note that not every charac-
ter can take every accent.
! Grave.
' Acute.
> Circumflex.
? Tilde. (This is not ~ as RFC 1345 does not assume
that character is present on the keyboard.)
- Macron. (A horizontal bar over the base charac-
ter.)
( Breve. (A shallow dish shape over the base char-
acter.)
. Dot above the base character, or in the case of i
no dot, or in the case of L and l a centered dot.
: Diaeresis (Umlaut).
c Cedilla.
_ Underline, however there are currently no under-
lined characters.
/ Stroke through the base character.
" Double acute (only supported on a few letters).
; Ogonek. (A little forward facing hook at the bot-
tom right of the character.)
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< Caron. (A little v over the letter.)
0 Circle over the base character.
2 Hook over the base character.
9 Horn over the base character.
The most common characters from the Arabic, Cyrillic,
Greek and Hebrew alphabets are available; consult RFC
1345 for the appropriate sequences. In addition, a set
of two letter codes not in RFC 1345 are available for
the double-width characters corresponding to ASCII
characters from ! to ~ (0x21 to 0x7e) by preceding the
character with ^, for example ^A for a double-width A.
The following other two-character sequences are under-
stood.
ASCII characters
These are already present on most keyboards:
<( Left square bracket
// Backslash (solidus)
)> Right square bracket
(! Left brace (curly bracket)
!! Vertical bar (pipe symbol)
!) Right brace (curly bracket)
'? Tilde
Special letters
Characters found in various variants of the Latin
alphabet:
ss Eszett (scharfes S)
D-, d-
Eth
TH, th
Thorn
kk Kra
'n 'n
NG, ng
Ng
OI, oi
Oi
yr yr
ED ezh
Currency symbols
Ct Cent
Pd Pound sterling (also lira and others)
Cu Currency
Ye Yen
Eu Euro (N.B. not in RFC 1345)
Punctuation characters
References to "right" quotes indicate the shape
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(like a 9 rather than 6) rather than their gram-
matical use. (For example, a "right" low double
quote is used to open quotations in German.)
!I Inverted exclamation mark
BB Broken vertical bar
SE Section
Co Copyright
-a Spanish feminine ordinal indicator
<< Left guillemet
-- Soft hyphen
Rg Registered trade mark
PI Pilcrow (paragraph)
-o Spanish masculine ordinal indicator
>> Right guillemet
?I Inverted question mark
-1 Hyphen
-N En dash
-M Em dash
-3 Horizontal bar
:3 Vertical ellipsis
.3 Horizontal midline ellipsis
!2 Double vertical line
=2 Double low line
'6 Left single quote
'9 Right single quote
.9 "Right" low quote
9' Reversed "right" quote
"6 Left double quote
"9 Right double quote
:9 "Right" low double quote
9" Reversed "right" double quote
/- Dagger
/= Double dagger
Mathematical symbols
DG Degree
-2, +-, -+
- sign, +/- sign, -/+ sign
2S Superscript 2
3S Superscript 3
1S Superscript 1
My Micro
.M Middle dot
14 Quarter
12 Half
34 Three quarters
*X Multiplication
-: Division
%0 Per mille
FA, TE, /0
For all, there exists, empty set
dP, DE, NB
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Partial derivative, delta (increment), del (nabla)
(-, -)
Element of, contains
*P, +Z
Product, sum
*-, Ob, Sb
Asterisk, ring, bullet
RT, 0(, 00
Root sign, proportional to, infinity
Other symbols
cS, cH, cD, cC
Card suits: spades, hearts, diamonds, clubs
Md, M8, M2, Mb, Mx, MX
Musical notation: crotchet (quarter note), quaver
(eighth note), semiquavers (sixteenth notes), flag
sign, natural sign, sharp sign
Fm, Ml
Female, male
Accents on their own
'> Circumflex (same as caret, ^)
'! Grave (same as backtick, `)
', Cedilla
': Diaeresis (Umlaut)
'm Macron
'' Acute
insert-files
This function allows you type a file pattern, and see
the results of the expansion at each step. When you
hit return, all expansions are inserted into the com-
mand line.
bindkey '^Xf' insert-files
insert-unicode-char
When first executed, the user inputs a set of hexadeci-
mal digits. This is terminated with another call to
insert-unicode-char. The digits are then turned into
the corresponding Unicode character. For example, if
the widget is bound to ^XU, the character sequence `^XU
4 c ^XU' inserts L (Unicode U+004c).
See insert-composed-char for a way of inserting charac-
ters using a two-character mnemonic.
narrow-to-region [ -p pre ] [ -P post ]
[ -S statepm | -R statepm ] [ -n ] [ start end ])
narrow-to-region-invisible
Narrow the editable portion of the buffer to the region
between the cursor and the mark, which may be in either
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order. The region may not be empty.
narrow-to-region may be used as a widget or called as a
function from a user-defined widget; by default, the
text outside the editable area remains visible. A
recursive-edit is performed and the original widening
status is then restored. Various options and arguments
are available when it is called as a function.
The options -p pretext and -P posttext may be used to
replace the text before and after the display for the
duration of the function; either or both may be an
empty string.
If the option -n is also given, pretext or posttext
will only be inserted if there is text before or after
the region respectively which will be made invisible.
Two numeric arguments may be given which will be used
instead of the cursor and mark positions.
The option -S statepm is used to narrow according to
the other options while saving the original state in
the parameter with name statepm, while the option -R
statepm is used to restore the state from the parame-
ter; note in both cases the name of the parameter is
required. In the second case, other options and argu-
ments are irrelevant. When this method is used, no
recursive-edit is performed; the calling widget should
call this function with the option -S, perform its own
editing on the command line or pass control to the user
via `zle recursive-edit', then call this function with
the option -R. The argument statepm must be a suitable
name for an ordinary parameter, except that parameters
beginning with the prefix _ntr_ are reserved for use
within narrow-to-region. Typically the parameter will
be local to the calling function.
narrow-to-region-invisible is a simple widget which
calls narrow-to-region with arguments which replace any
text outside the region with `...'.
The display is restored (and the widget returns) upon
any zle command which would usually cause the line to
be accepted or aborted. Hence an additional such com-
mand is required to accept or abort the current line.
The return status of both widgets is zero if the line
was accepted, else non-zero.
Here is a trivial example of a widget using this fea-
ture.
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local state
narrow-to-region -p $'Editing restricted region\n' \
-P '' -S state
zle recursive-edit
narrow-to-region -R state
predict-on
This set of functions implements predictive typing
using history search. After predict-on, typing charac-
ters causes the editor to look backward in the history
for the first line beginning with what you have typed
so far. After predict-off, editing returns to normal
for the line found. In fact, you often don't even need
to use predict-off, because if the line doesn't match
something in the history, adding a key performs stan-
dard completion, and then inserts itself if no comple-
tions were found. However, editing in the middle of a
line is liable to confuse prediction; see the toggle
style below.
With the function based completion system (which is
needed for this), you should be able to type TAB at
almost any point to advance the cursor to the next
``interesting'' character position (usually the end of
the current word, but sometimes somewhere in the middle
of the word). And of course as soon as the entire line
is what you want, you can accept with return, without
needing to move the cursor to the end first.
The first time predict-on is used, it creates several
additional widget functions:
delete-backward-and-predict
Replaces the backward-delete-char widget. You do
not need to bind this yourself.
insert-and-predict
Implements predictive typing by replacing the
self-insert widget. You do not need to bind this
yourself.
predict-off
Turns off predictive typing.
Although you autoload only the predict-on function, it
is necessary to create a keybinding for predict-off as
well.
zle -N predict-on
zle -N predict-off
bindkey '^X^Z' predict-on
bindkey '^Z' predict-off
read-from-minibuffer
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This is most useful when called as a function from
inside a widget, but will work correctly as a widget in
its own right. It prompts for a value below the cur-
rent command line; a value may be input using all of
the standard zle operations (and not merely the
restricted set available when executing, for example,
execute-named-cmd). The value is then returned to the
calling function in the parameter $REPLY and the edit-
ing buffer restored to its previous state. If the read
was aborted by a keyboard break (typically ^G), the
function returns status 1 and $REPLY is not set.
If one argument is supplied to the function it is taken
as a prompt, otherwise `? ' is used. If two arguments
are supplied, they are the prompt and the initial value
of $LBUFFER, and if a third argument is given it is the
initial value of $RBUFFER. This provides a default
value and starting cursor placement. Upon return the
entire buffer is the value of $REPLY.
One option is available: `-k num' specifies that num
characters are to be read instead of a whole line. The
line editor is not invoked recursively in this case, so
depending on the terminal settings the input may not be
visible, and only the input keys are placed in $REPLY,
not the entire buffer. Note that unlike the read
builtin num must be given; there is no default.
The name is a slight misnomer, as in fact the shell's
own minibuffer is not used. Hence it is still possible
to call executed-named-cmd and similar functions while
reading a value.
replace-string, replace-pattern
replace-string-again, replace-pattern-again
The function replace-string implements three widgets.
If defined under the same name as the function, it
prompts for two strings; the first (source) string will
be replaced by the second everywhere it occurs in the
line editing buffer.
If the widget name contains the word `pattern', for
example by defining the widget using the command `zle
-N replace-pattern replace-string', then the matching
is performed using zsh patterns. All zsh extended
globbing patterns can be used in the source string;
note that unlike filename generation the pattern does
not need to match an entire word, nor do glob quali-
fiers have any effect. In addition, the replacement
string can contain parameter or command substitutions.
Furthermore, a `&' in the replacement string will be
replaced with the matched source string, and a
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backquoted digit `\N' will be replaced by the Nth
parenthesised expression matched. The form `\{N}' may
be used to protect the digit from following digits.
If the widget instead contains the word `regex' (or
`regexp'), then the matching is performed using regular
expressions, respecting the setting of the option
RE_MATCH_PCRE (see the description of the function reg-
exp-replace below). The special replacement facilities
described above for pattern matching are available.
By default the previous source or replacement string
will not be offered for editing. However, this feature
can be activated by setting the style edit-previous in
the context :zle:widget (for example,
:zle:replace-string) to true. In addition, a positive
numeric argument forces the previous values to be
offered, a negative or zero argument forces them not to
be.
The function replace-string-again can be used to repeat
the previous replacement; no prompting is done. As
with replace-string, if the name of the widget contains
the word `pattern' or `regex', pattern or regular
expression matching is performed, else a literal string
replacement. Note that the previous source and
replacement text are the same whether pattern, regular
expression or string matching is used.
In addition, replace-string shows the previous replace-
ment above the prompt, so long as there was one during
the current session; if the source string is empty,
that replacement will be repeated without the widget
prompting for a replacement string.
For example, starting from the line:
print This line contains fan and fond
and invoking replace-pattern with the source string
`f(?)n' and the replacement string `c\1r' produces the
not very useful line:
print This line contains car and cord
The range of the replacement string can be limited by
using the narrow-to-region-invisible widget. One limi-
tation of the current version is that undo will cycle
through changes to the replacement and source strings
before undoing the replacement itself.
send-invisible
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This is similar to read-from-minibuffer in that it may
be called as a function from a widget or as a widget of
its own, and interactively reads input from the key-
board. However, the input being typed is concealed and
a string of asterisks (`*') is shown instead. The
value is saved in the parameter $INVISIBLE to which a
reference is inserted into the editing buffer at the
restored cursor position. If the read was aborted by a
keyboard break (typically ^G) or another escape from
editing such as push-line, $INVISIBLE is set to empty
and the original buffer is restored unchanged.
If one argument is supplied to the function it is taken
as a prompt, otherwise `Non-echoed text: ' is used (as
in emacs). If a second and third argument are supplied
they are used to begin and end the reference to $INVIS-
IBLE that is inserted into the buffer. The default is
to open with ${, then INVISIBLE, and close with }, but
many other effects are possible.
smart-insert-last-word
This function may replace the insert-last-word widget,
like so:
zle -N insert-last-word smart-insert-last-word
With a numeric prefix, or when passed command line
arguments in a call from another widget, it behaves
like insert-last-word, except that words in comments
are ignored when INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS is set.
Otherwise, the rightmost ``interesting'' word from the
previous command is found and inserted. The default
definition of ``interesting'' is that the word contains
at least one alphabetic character, slash, or backslash.
This definition may be overridden by use of the match
style. The context used to look up the style is the
widget name, so usually the context is
:insert-last-word. However, you can bind this function
to different widgets to use different patterns:
zle -N insert-last-assignment smart-insert-last-word
zstyle :insert-last-assignment match '[[:alpha:]][][[:alnum:]]#=*'
bindkey '\e=' insert-last-assignment
If no interesting word is found and the auto-previous
style is set to a true value, the search continues
upward through the history. When auto-previous is
unset or false (the default), the widget must be
invoked repeatedly in order to search earlier history
lines.
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transpose-lines
Only useful with a multi-line editing buffer; the lines
here are lines within the current on-screen buffer, not
history lines. The effect is similar to the function
of the same name in Emacs.
Transpose the current line with the previous line and
move the cursor to the start of the next line. Repeat-
ing this (which can be done by providing a positive
numeric prefix argument) has the effect of moving the
line above the cursor down by a number of lines.
With a negative numeric prefix argument, requires two
lines above the cursor. These two lines are transposed
and the cursor moved to the start of the previous line.
Using a numeric prefix less than -1 has the effect of
moving the line above the cursor up by minus that num-
ber of lines.
which-command
This function is a drop-in replacement for the builtin
widget which-command. It has enhanced behaviour, in
that it correctly detects whether or not the command
word needs to be expanded as an alias; if so, it con-
tinues tracing the command word from the expanded alias
until it reaches the command that will be executed.
The style whence is available in the context :zle:$WID-
GET; this may be set to an array to give the command
and options that will be used to investigate the com-
mand word found. The default is whence -c.
Utility Functions
These functions are useful in constructing widgets. They
should be loaded with `autoload -U function' and called as
indicated from user-defined widgets.
split-shell-arguments
This function splits the line currently being edited
into shell arguments and whitespace. The result is
stored in the array reply. The array contains all the
parts of the line in order, starting with any white-
space before the first argument, and finishing with any
whitespace after the last argument. Hence (so long as
the option KSH_ARRAYS is not set) whitespace is given
by odd indices in the array and arguments by even
indices. Note that no stripping of quotes is done;
joining together all the elements of reply in order is
guaranteed to produce the original line.
The parameter REPLY is set to the index of the word in
reply which contains the character after the cursor,
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where the first element has index 1. The parameter
REPLY2 is set to the index of the character under the
cursor in that word, where the first character has
index 1.
Hence reply, REPLY and REPLY2 should all be made local
to the enclosing function.
See the function modify-current-argument, described
below, for an example of how to call this function.
modify-current-argument [ expr-using-$ARG | func ]
This function provides a simple method of allowing
user-defined widgets to modify the command line argu-
ment under the cursor (or immediately to the left of
the cursor if the cursor is between arguments).
The argument can be an expression which when evaluated
operates on the shell parameter ARG, which will have
been set to the command line argument under the cursor.
The expression should be suitably quoted to prevent it
being evaluated too early.
Alternatively, if the argument does not contain the
string ARG, it is assumed to be a shell function, to
which the current command line argument is passed as
the only argument. The function should set the vari-
able REPLY to the new value for the command line argu-
ment. If the function returns non-zero status, so does
the calling function.
For example, a user-defined widget containing the fol-
lowing code converts the characters in the argument
under the cursor into all upper case:
modify-current-argument '${(U)ARG}'
The following strips any quoting from the current word
(whether backslashes or one of the styles of quotes),
and replaces it with single quoting throughout:
modify-current-argument '${(qq)${(Q)ARG}}'
The following performs directory expansion on the com-
mand line argument and replaces it by the absolute
path:
expand-dir() {
REPLY=${~1}
REPLY=${REPLY:a}
}
modify-current-argument expand-dir
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In practice the function expand-dir would probably not
be defined within the widget where modify-current-argu-
ment is called.
Styles
The behavior of several of the above widgets can be con-
trolled by the use of the zstyle mechanism. In particular,
widgets that interact with the completion system pass along
their context to any completions that they invoke.
break-keys
This style is used by the incremental-complete-word
widget. Its value should be a pattern, and all keys
matching this pattern will cause the widget to stop
incremental completion without the key having any fur-
ther effect. Like all styles used directly by incremen-
tal-complete-word, this style is looked up using the
context `:incremental'.
completer
The incremental-complete-word and insert-and-predict
widgets set up their top-level context name before
calling completion. This allows one to define differ-
ent sets of completer functions for normal completion
and for these widgets. For example, to use completion,
approximation and correction for normal completion,
completion and correction for incremental completion
and only completion for prediction one could use:
zstyle ':completion:*' completer \
_complete _correct _approximate
zstyle ':completion:incremental:*' completer \
_complete _correct
zstyle ':completion:predict:*' completer \
_complete
It is a good idea to restrict the completers used in
prediction, because they may be automatically invoked
as you type. The _list and _menu completers should
never be used with prediction. The _approximate, _cor-
rect, _expand, and _match completers may be used, but
be aware that they may change characters anywhere in
the word behind the cursor, so you need to watch care-
fully that the result is what you intended.
cursor
The insert-and-predict widget uses this style, in the
context `:predict', to decide where to place the cursor
after completion has been tried. Values are:
complete
The cursor is left where it was when completion
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finished, but only if it is after a character
equal to the one just inserted by the user. If it
is after another character, this value is the same
as `key'.
key The cursor is left after the nth occurrence of the
character just inserted, where n is the number of
times that character appeared in the word before
completion was attempted. In short, this has the
effect of leaving the cursor after the character
just typed even if the completion code found out
that no other characters need to be inserted at
that position.
Any other value for this style unconditionally leaves
the cursor at the position where the completion code
left it.
list When using the incremental-complete-word widget, this
style says if the matches should be listed on every key
press (if they fit on the screen). Use the context
prefix `:completion:incremental'.
The insert-and-predict widget uses this style to decide
if the completion should be shown even if there is only
one possible completion. This is done if the value of
this style is the string always. In this case the con-
text is `:predict' (not `:completion:predict').
match
This style is used by smart-insert-last-word to provide
a pattern (using full EXTENDED_GLOB syntax) that
matches an interesting word. The context is the name
of the widget to which smart-insert-last-word is bound
(see above). The default behavior of
smart-insert-last-word is equivalent to:
zstyle :insert-last-word match '*[[:alpha:]/\\]*'
However, you might want to include words that contain
spaces:
zstyle :insert-last-word match '*[[:alpha:][:space:]/\\]*'
Or include numbers as long as the word is at least two
characters long:
zstyle :insert-last-word match '*([[:digit:]]?|[[:alpha:]/\\])*'
The above example causes redirections like "2>" to be
included.
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prompt
The incremental-complete-word widget shows the value of
this style in the status line during incremental com-
pletion. The string value may contain any of the fol-
lowing substrings in the manner of the PS1 and other
prompt parameters:
%c Replaced by the name of the completer function
that generated the matches (without the leading
underscore).
%l When the list style is set, replaced by `...' if
the list of matches is too long to fit on the
screen and with an empty string otherwise. If the
list style is `false' or not set, `%l' is always
removed.
%n Replaced by the number of matches generated.
%s Replaced by `-no match-', `-no prefix-', or an
empty string if there is no completion matching
the word on the line, if the matches have no com-
mon prefix different from the word on the line, or
if there is such a common prefix, respectively.
%u Replaced by the unambiguous part of all matches,
if there is any, and if it is different from the
word on the line.
Like `break-keys', this uses the `:incremental' con-
text.
stop-keys
This style is used by the incremental-complete-word
widget. Its value is treated similarly to the one for
the break-keys style (and uses the same context:
`:incremental'). However, in this case all keys match-
ing the pattern given as its value will stop incremen-
tal completion and will then execute their usual func-
tion.
toggle
This boolean style is used by predict-on and its
related widgets in the context `:predict'. If set to
one of the standard `true' values, predictive typing is
automatically toggled off in situations where it is
unlikely to be useful, such as when editing a
multi-line buffer or after moving into the middle of a
line and then deleting a character. The default is to
leave prediction turned on until an explicit call to
predict-off.
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verbose
This boolean style is used by predict-on and its
related widgets in the context `:predict'. If set to
one of the standard `true' values, these widgets dis-
play a message below the prompt when the predictive
state is toggled. This is most useful in combination
with the toggle style. The default does not display
these messages.
widget
This style is similar to the command style: For widget
functions that use zle to call other widgets, this
style can sometimes be used to override the widget
which is called. The context for this style is the
name of the calling widget (not the name of the calling
function, because one function may be bound to multiple
widget names).
zstyle :copy-earlier-word widget smart-insert-last-word
Check the documentation for the calling widget or func-
tion to determine whether the widget style is used.
EXCEPTION HANDLING
Two functions are provided to enable zsh to provide excep-
tion handling in a form that should be familiar from other
languages.
throw exception
The function throw throws the named exception. The
name is an arbitrary string and is only used by the
throw and catch functions. An exception is for the
most part treated the same as a shell error, i.e. an
unhandled exception will cause the shell to abort all
processing in a function or script and to return to the
top level in an interactive shell.
catch exception-pattern
The function catch returns status zero if an exception
was thrown and the pattern exception-pattern matches
its name. Otherwise it returns status 1. excep-
tion-pattern is a standard shell pattern, respecting
the current setting of the EXTENDED_GLOB option. An
alias catch is also defined to prevent the argument to
the function from matching filenames, so patterns may
be used unquoted. Note that as exceptions are not fun-
damentally different from other shell errors it is pos-
sible to catch shell errors by using an empty string as
the exception name. The shell variable CAUGHT is set
by catch to the name of the exception caught. It is
possible to rethrow an exception by calling the throw
function again once an exception has been caught.
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The functions are designed to be used together with the
always construct described in zshmisc(1). This is important
as only this construct provides the required support for
exceptions. A typical example is as follows.
{
# "try" block
# ... nested code here calls "throw MyExcept"
} always {
# "always" block
if catch MyExcept; then
print "Caught exception MyExcept"
elif catch ''; then
print "Caught a shell error. Propagating..."
throw ''
fi
# Other exceptions are not handled but may be caught further
# up the call stack.
}
If all exceptions should be caught, the following idiom
might be preferable.
{
# ... nested code here throws an exception
} always {
if catch *; then
case $CAUGHT in
(MyExcept)
print "Caught my own exception"
;;
(*)
print "Caught some other exception"
;;
esac
fi
}
In common with exception handling in other languages, the
exception may be thrown by code deeply nested inside the
`try' block. However, note that it must be thrown inside
the current shell, not in a subshell forked for a pipeline,
parenthesised current-shell construct, or some form of com-
mand or process substitution.
The system internally uses the shell variable EXCEPTION to
record the name of the exception between throwing and catch-
ing. One drawback of this scheme is that if the exception
is not handled the variable EXCEPTION remains set and may be
incorrectly recognised as the name of an exception if a
shell error subsequently occurs. Adding unset EXCEPTION at
the start of the outermost layer of any code that uses
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exception handling will eliminate this problem.
MIME FUNCTIONS
Three functions are available to provide handling of files
recognised by extension, for example to dispatch a file
text.ps when executed as a command to an appropriate viewer.
zsh-mime-setup [ -fv ] [ -l [ suffix ... ] ]
zsh-mime-handler [-l] command arguments ...
These two functions use the files ~/.mime.types and
/etc/mime.types, which associate types and extensions,
as well as ~/.mailcap and /etc/mailcap files, which as-
sociate types and the programs that handle them. These
are provided on many systems with the Multimedia Inter-
net Mail Extensions.
To enable the system, the function zsh-mime-setup
should be autoloaded and run. This allows files with
extensions to be treated as executable; such files be
completed by the function completion system. The func-
tion zsh-mime-handler should not need to be called by
the user.
The system works by setting up suffix aliases with
`alias -s'. Suffix aliases already installed by the
user will not be overwritten.
For suffixes defined in lower case, upper case variants
will also automatically be handled (e.g. PDF is auto-
matically handled if handling for the suffix pdf is
defined), but not vice versa.
Repeated calls to zsh-mime-setup do not override the
existing mapping between suffixes and executable files
unless the option -f is given. Note, however, that
this does not override existing suffix aliases assigned
to handlers other than zsh-mime-handler.
Calling zsh-mime-setup with the option -l lists the
existing mappings without altering them. Suffixes to
list (which may contain pattern characters that should
be quoted from immediate interpretation on the command
line) may be given as additional arguments, otherwise
all suffixes are listed.
Calling zsh-mime-setup with the option -v causes ver-
bose output to be shown during the setup operation.
The system respects the mailcap flags needsterminal and
copiousoutput, see mailcap(4).
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The functions use the following styles, which are
defined with the zstyle builtin command (see zshmod-
ules(1)). They should be defined before zsh-mime-setup
is run. The contexts used all start with :mime:, with
additional components in some cases. It is recommended
that a trailing * (suitably quoted) be appended to
style patterns in case the system is extended in
future. Some examples are given below.
For files that have multiple suffixes, e.g. .pdf.gz,
where the context includes the suffix it will be looked
up starting with the longest possible suffix until a
match for the style is found. For example, if .pdf.gz
produces a match for the handler, that will be used;
otherwise the handler for .gz will be used. Note that,
owing to the way suffix aliases work, it is always
required that there be a handler for the shortest pos-
sible suffix, so in this example .pdf.gz can only be
handled if .gz is also handled (though not necessarily
in the same way). Alternatively, if no handling for
.gz on its own is needed, simply adding the command
alias -s gz=zsh-mime-handler
to the initialisation code is sufficient; .gz will not
be handled on its own, but may be in combination with
other suffixes.
current-shell
If this boolean style is true, the mailcap handler
for the context in question is run using the eval
builtin instead of by starting a new sh process.
This is more efficient, but may not work in the
occasional cases where the mailcap handler uses
strict POSIX syntax.
disown
If this boolean style is true, mailcap handlers
started in the background will be disowned, i.e.
not subject to job control within the parent
shell. Such handlers nearly always produce their
own windows, so the only likely harmful side
effect of setting the style is that it becomes
harder to kill jobs from within the shell.
execute-as-is
This style gives a list of patterns to be matched
against files passed for execution with a handler
program. If the file matches the pattern, the
entire command line is executed in its current
form, with no handler. This is useful for files
which might have suffixes but nonetheless be
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executable in their own right. If the style is
not set, the pattern *(*) *(/) is used; hence exe-
cutable files are executed directly and not passed
to a handler, and the option AUTO_CD may be used
to change to directories that happen to have MIME
suffixes.
execute-never
This style is useful in combination with exe-
cute-as-is. It is set to an array of patterns
corresponding to full paths to files that should
never be treated as executable, even if the file
passed to the MIME handler matches execute-as-is.
This is useful for file systems that don't handle
execute permission or that contain executables
from another operating system. For example, if
/mnt/windows is a Windows mount, then
zstyle ':mime:*' execute-never '/mnt/windows/*'
will ensure that any files found in that area will
be executed as MIME types even if they are exe-
cutable. As this example shows, the complete file
name is matched against the pattern, regardless of
how the file was passed to the handler. The file
is resolved to a full path using the :A modifier
described in the subsection Modifers in zsh-
expn(1).RE; this means that symbolic links are
resolved where possible, so that links into other
file systems behave in the correct fashion.
file-path
Used if the style find-file-in-path is true for
the same context. Set to an array of directories
that are used for searching for the file to be
handled; the default is the command path given by
the special parameter path. The shell option
PATH_DIRS is respected; if that is set, the appro-
priate path will be searched even if the name of
the file to be handled as it appears on the com-
mand line contains a `/'. The full context is
:mime:.suffix:, as described for the style han-
dler.
find-file-in-path
If set, allows files whose names do not contain
absolute paths to be searched for in the command
path or the path specified by the file-path style.
If the file is not found in the path, it is looked
for locally (whether or not the current directory
is in the path); if it is not found locally, the
handler will abort unless the handle-nonexistent
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style is set. Files found in the path are tested
as described for the style execute-as-is. The
full context is :mime:.suffix:, as described for
the style handler.
flags
Defines flags to go with a handler; the context is
as for the handler style, and the format is as for
the flags in mailcap.
handle-nonexistent
By default, arguments that don't correspond to
files are not passed to the MIME handler in order
to prevent it from intercepting commands found in
the path that happen to have suffixes. This style
may be set to an array of extended glob patterns
for arguments that will be passed to the handler
even if they don't exist. If it is not explicitly
set it defaults to [[:alpha:]]#:/* which allows
URLs to be passed to the MIME handler even though
they don't exist in that format in the file sys-
tem. The full context is :mime:.suffix:, as
described for the style handler.
handler
Specifies a handler for a suffix; the suffix is
given by the context as :mime:.suffix:, and the
format of the handler is exactly that in mailcap.
Note in particular the `.' and trailing colon to
distinguish this use of the context. This over-
rides any handler specified by the mailcap files.
If the handler requires a terminal, the flags
style should be set to include the word needster-
minal, or if the output is to be displayed through
a pager (but not if the handler is itself a
pager), it should include copiousoutput.
mailcap
A list of files in the format of ~/.mailcap and
/etc/mailcap to be read during setup, replacing
the default list which consists of those two
files. The context is :mime:. A + in the list
will be replaced by the default files.
mailcap-priorities
This style is used to resolve multiple mailcap
entries for the same MIME type. It consists of an
array of the following elements, in descending
order of priority; later entries will be used if
earlier entries are unable to resolve the entries
being compared. If none of the tests resolve the
entries, the first entry encountered is retained.
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files
The order of files (entries in the mailcap
style) read. Earlier files are preferred.
(Note this does not resolve entries in the
same file.)
priority
The priority flag from the mailcap entry.
The priority is an integer from 0 to 9 with
the default value being 5.
flags
The test given by the mailcap-prio-flags
option is used to resolve entries.
place
Later entries are preferred; as the entries
are strictly ordered, this test always suc-
ceeds.
Note that as this style is handled during initial-
isation, the context is always :mime:, with no
discrimination by suffix.
mailcap-prio-flags
This style is used when the keyword flags is
encountered in the list of tests specified by the
mailcap-priorities style. It should be set to a
list of patterns, each of which is tested against
the flags specified in the mailcap entry (in other
words, the sets of assignments found with some
entries in the mailcap file). Earlier patterns in
the list are preferred to later ones, and matched
patterns are preferred to unmatched ones.
mime-types
A list of files in the format of ~/.mime.types and
/etc/mime.types to be read during setup, replacing
the default list which consists of those two
files. The context is :mime:. A + in the list
will be replaced by the default files.
never-background
If this boolean style is set, the handler for the
given context is always run in the foreground,
even if the flags provided in the mailcap entry
suggest it need not be (for example, it doesn't
require a terminal).
pager
If set, will be used instead of $PAGER or more to
handle suffixes where the copiousoutput flag is
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set. The context is as for handler, i.e.
:mime:.suffix: for handling a file with the given
suffix.
Examples:
zstyle ':mime:*' mailcap ~/.mailcap /usr/local/etc/mailcap
zstyle ':mime:.txt:' handler less %s
zstyle ':mime:.txt:' flags needsterminal
When zsh-mime-setup is subsequently run, it will look
for mailcap entries in the two files given. Files of
suffix .txt will be handled by running `less file.txt'.
The flag needsterminal is set to show that this program
must run attached to a terminal.
As there are several steps to dispatching a command,
the following should be checked if attempting to exe-
cute a file by extension .ext does not have the
expected effect.
The command `alias -s ext' should show
`ps=zsh-mime-handler'. If it shows something else,
another suffix alias was already installed and was not
overwritten. If it shows nothing, no handler was
installed: this is most likely because no handler was
found in the .mime.types and mailcap combination for
.ext files. In that case, appropriate handling should
be added to ~/.mime.types and mailcap.
If the extension is handled by zsh-mime-handler but the
file is not opened correctly, either the handler
defined for the type is incorrect, or the flags associ-
ated with it are in appropriate. Running zsh-mime-set-
up -l will show the handler and, if there are any, the
flags. A %s in the handler is replaced by the file
(suitably quoted if necessary). Check that the handler
program listed lists and can be run in the way shown.
Also check that the flags needsterminal or copiousout-
put are set if the handler needs to be run under a ter-
minal; the second flag is used if the output should be
sent to a pager. An example of a suitable mailcap
entry for such a program is:
text/html; /usr/bin/lynx '%s'; needsterminal
Running `zsh-mime-handler -l command line' prints the
command line that would be executed, simplified to
remove the effect of any flags, and quoted so that the
output can be run as a complete zsh command line. This
is used by the completion system to decide how to com-
plete after a file handled by zsh-mime-setup. )
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pick-web-browser
This function is separate from the two MIME func-
tions described above and can be assigned directly
to a suffix:
autoload -U pick-web-browser
alias -s html=pick-web-browser
It is provided as an intelligent front end to dis-
patch a web browser. It may be run as either a
function or a shell script. The status 255 is
returned if no browser could be started.
Various styles are available to customize the
choice of browsers:
browser-style
The value of the style is an array giving
preferences in decreasing order for the type
of browser to use. The values of elements
may be
running
Use a GUI browser that is already run-
ning when an X Window display is avail-
able. The browsers listed in the
x-browsers style are tried in order
until one is found; if it is, the file
will be displayed in that browser, so
the user may need to check whether it
has appeared. If no running browser is
found, one is not started. Browsers
other than Firefox, Opera and Konqueror
are assumed to understand the Mozilla
syntax for opening a URL remotely.
x Start a new GUI browser when an X Window
display is available. Search for the
availability of one of the browsers
listed in the x-browsers style and start
the first one that is found. No check
is made for an already running browser.
tty Start a terminal-based browser. Search
for the availability of one of the
browsers listed in the tty-browsers
style and start the first one that is
found.
If the style is not set the default running x
tty is used.
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x-browsers
An array in decreasing order of preference of
browsers to use when running under the X Win-
dow System. The array consists of the com-
mand name under which to start the browser.
They are looked up in the context :mime:
(which may be extended in future, so append-
ing `*' is recommended). For example,
zstyle ':mime:*' x-browsers opera konqueror firefox
specifies that pick-web-browser should first
look for a running instance of Opera, Kon-
queror or Firefox, in that order, and if it
fails to find any should attempt to start
Opera. The default is firefox mozilla
netscape opera konqueror.
tty-browsers
An array similar to x-browsers, except that
it gives browsers to use when no X Window
display is available. The default is elinks
links lynx.
command
If it is set this style is used to pick the
command used to open a page for a browser.
The context is :mime:browser:new:$browser: to
start a new browser or :mime:browser:run-
ning:$browser: to open a URL in a browser
already running on the current X display,
where $browser is the value matched in the
x-browsers or tty-browsers style. The escape
sequence %b in the style's value will be
replaced by the browser, while %u will be
replaced by the URL. If the style is not
set, the default for all new instances is
equivalent to %b %u and the defaults for
using running browsers are equivalent to the
values kfmclient openURL %u for Konqueror,
firefox -new-tab %u for Firefox, opera -new-
page %u for Opera, and %b -remote
"openUrl(%u)" for all others.
MATHEMATICAL FUNCTIONS
zcalc [ -ef ] [ expression ... ]
A reasonably powerful calculator based on zsh's arith-
metic evaluation facility. The syntax is similar to
that of formulae in most programming languages; see the
section `Arithmetic Evaluation' in zshmisc(1) for
details. The mathematical library zsh/mathfunc will be
loaded if it is available; see the section `The
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zsh/mathfunc Module' in zshmodules(1). The mathemati-
cal functions correspond to the raw system libraries,
so trigonometric functions are evaluated using radians,
and so on.
Each line typed is evaluated as an expression. The
prompt shows a number, which corresponds to a posi-
tional parameter where the result of that calculation
is stored. For example, the result of the calculation
on the line preceded by `4> ' is available as $4. The
last value calculated is available as ans. Full com-
mand line editing, including the history of previous
calculations, is available; the history is saved in the
file ~/.zcalc_history. To exit, enter a blank line or
type `:q' on its own (`q' is allowed for historical
compatibility).
A line ending with a single backslash is treated in the
same fashion as it is in command line editing: the
backslash is removed, the function prompts for more
input (the prompt is preceded by `...' to indicate
this), and the lines are combined into one to get the
final result. In addition, if the input so far con-
tains more open than close parentheses zcalc will
prompt for more input.
If arguments are given to zcalc on start up, they are
used to prime the first few positional parameters. A
visual indication of this is given when the calculator
starts.
The constants PI (3.14159...) and E (2.71828...) are
provided. Parameter assignment is possible, but note
that all parameters will be put into the global names-
pace.
The output base can be initialised by passing the
option `-#base', for example `zcalc -#16' (the `#' may
have to be quoted, depending on the globbing options
set).
If the option `-e' is set, the function runs non-inter-
actively: the arguments are treated as expressions to
be evaluated as if entered interactively line by line.
If the option `-f' is set, all numbers are treated as
floating point, hence for example the expression `3/4'
evaluates to 0.75 rather than 0. Options must appear
in separate words.
The prompt is configurable via the parameter ZCAL-
CPROMPT, which undergoes standard prompt expansion.
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The index of the current entry is stored locally in the
first element of the array psvar, which can be referred
to in ZCALCPROMPT as `%1v'. The default prompt is
`%1v> '.
A few special commands are available; these are intro-
duced by a colon. For backward compatibility, the
colon may be omitted for certain commands. Completion
is available if compinit has been run.
The output precision may be specified within zcalc by
special commands familiar from many calculators.
:norm
The default output format. It corresponds to the
printf %g specification. Typically this shows six
decimal digits.
:sci digits
Scientific notation, corresponding to the printf
%g output format with the precision given by dig-
its. This produces either fixed point or exponen-
tial notation depending on the value output.
:fix digits
Fixed point notation, corresponding to the printf
%f output format with the precision given by dig-
its.
:eng digits
Exponential notation, corresponding to the printf
%E output format with the precision given by dig-
its.
:raw Raw output: this is the default form of the out-
put from a math evaluation. This may show more
precision than the number actually possesses.
Other special commands:
:!line...
Execute line... as a normal shell command line.
Note that it is executed in the context of the
function, i.e. with local variables. Space is
optional after :!.
:local arg ...
Declare variables local to the function. Note
that certain variables are used by the function
for its own purposes. Other variables may be
used, too, but they will be taken from or put into
the global scope.
:function name [ body ]
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Define a mathematical function or (with no body)
delete it. :function may be abbreviated to :func
or simply :f. The name may contain the same char-
acters as a shell function name. The function is
defined using zmathfuncdef, see below.
Note that zcalc takes care of all quoting. Hence
for example:
:f cube $1 * $1 * $1
defines a function to cube the sole argument.
[#base]
This is not a special command, rather part of nor-
mal arithmetic syntax; however, when this form
appears on a line by itself the default output
radix is set to base. Use, for example, `[#16]'
to display hexadecimal output preceded by an indi-
cation of the base, or `[##16]' just to display
the raw number in the given base. Bases them-
selves are always specified in decimal. `[#]'
restores the normal output format. Note that set-
ting an output base suppresses floating point out-
put; use `[#]' to return to normal operation.
See the comments in the function for a few extra tips.
zmathfuncdef [ mathfunc [ body ] ]
A convenient front end to functions -M.
With two arguments, define a mathematical function
named mathfunc which can be used in any form of arith-
metic evaluation. body is a mathematical expression to
implement the function. It may contain references to
position parameters $1, $2, ... to refer to mandatory
parameters and ${1:-defvalue} ... to refer to optional
parameters. Note that the forms must be strictly
adhered to for the function to calculate the correct
number of arguments. The implementation is held in a
shell function named zsh_math_func_mathfunc; usually
the user will not need to refer to the shell function
directly. Any existing function of the same name is
silently replaced.
With one argument, remove the mathematical function
mathfunc as well as the shell function implementation.
With no arguments, list all mathfunc functions in a
form suitable for restoring the definition. The func-
tions have not necessarily been defined by zmath-
funcdef.
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USER CONFIGURATION FUNCTIONS
The zsh/newuser module comes with a function to aid in con-
figuring shell options for new users. If the module is
installed, this function can also be run by hand. It is
available even if the module's default behaviour, namely
running the function for a new user logging in without
startup files, is inhibited.
zsh-newuser-install [ -f ]
The function presents the user with various options for
customizing their initialization scripts. Currently
only ~/.zshrc is handled. $ZDOTDIR/.zshrc is used
instead if the parameter ZDOTDIR is set; this provides
a way for the user to configure a file without altering
an existing .zshrc.
By default the function exits immediately if it finds
any of the files .zshenv, .zprofile, .zshrc, or .zlogin
in the appropriate directory. The option -f is
required in order to force the function to continue.
Note this may happen even if .zshrc itself does not
exist.
As currently configured, the function will exit immedi-
ately if the user has root privileges; this behaviour
cannot be overridden.
Once activated, the function's behaviour is supposed to
be self-explanatory. Menus are present allowing the
user to alter the value of options and parameters.
Suggestions for improvements are always welcome.
When the script exits, the user is given the opportu-
nity to save the new file or not; changes are not irre-
versible until this point. However, the script is
careful to restrict changes to the file only to a group
marked by the lines `# Lines configured by
zsh-newuser-install' and `# End of lines configured by
zsh-newuser-install'. In addition, the old version of
.zshrc is saved to a file with the suffix .zni
appended.
If the function edits an existing .zshrc, it is up to
the user to ensure that the changes made will take
effect. For example, if control usually returns early
from the existing .zshrc the lines will not be exe-
cuted; or a later initialization file may override
options or parameters, and so on. The function itself
does not attempt to detect any such conflicts.
OTHER FUNCTIONS
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There are a large number of helpful functions in the Func-
tions/Misc directory of the zsh distribution. Most are very
simple and do not require documentation here, but a few are
worthy of special mention.
Descriptions
colors
This function initializes several associative arrays to
map color names to (and from) the ANSI standard
eight-color terminal codes. These are used by the
prompt theme system (see above). You seldom should
need to run colors more than once.
The eight base colors are: black, red, green, yellow,
blue, magenta, cyan, and white. Each of these has
codes for foreground and background. In addition there
are eight intensity attributes: bold, faint, standout,
underline, blink, reverse, and conceal. Finally, there
are six codes used to negate attributes: none (reset
all attributes to the defaults), normal (neither bold
nor faint), no-standout, no-underline, no-blink, and
no-reverse.
Some terminals do not support all combinations of col-
ors and intensities.
The associative arrays are:
color
colour
Map all the color names to their integer codes,
and integer codes to the color names. The eight
base names map to the foreground color codes, as
do names prefixed with `fg-', such as `fg-red'.
Names prefixed with `bg-', such as `bg-blue',
refer to the background codes. The reverse map-
ping from code to color yields base name for fore-
ground codes and the bg- form for backgrounds.
Although it is a misnomer to call them `colors',
these arrays also map the other fourteen
attributes from names to codes and codes to names.
fg
fg_bold
fg_no_bold
Map the eight basic color names to ANSI terminal
escape sequences that set the corresponding fore-
ground text properties. The fg sequences change
the color without changing the eight intensity
attributes.
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bg
bg_bold
bg_no_bold
Map the eight basic color names to ANSI terminal
escape sequences that set the corresponding back-
ground properties. The bg sequences change the
color without changing the eight intensity
attributes.
In addition, the scalar parameters reset_color and
bold_color are set to the ANSI terminal escapes that
turn off all attributes and turn on bold intensity,
respectively.
fned name
Same as zed -f. This function does not appear in the
zsh distribution, but can be created by linking zed to
the name fned in some directory in your fpath.
is-at-least needed [ present ]
Perform a greater-than-or-equal-to comparison of two
strings having the format of a zsh version number; that
is, a string of numbers and text with segments sepa-
rated by dots or dashes. If the present string is not
provided, $ZSH_VERSION is used. Segments are paired
left-to-right in the two strings with leading non-num-
ber parts ignored. If one string has fewer segments
than the other, the missing segments are considered
zero.
This is useful in startup files to set options and
other state that are not available in all versions of
zsh.
is-at-least 3.1.6-15 && setopt NO_GLOBAL_RCS
is-at-least 3.1.0 && setopt HIST_REDUCE_BLANKS
is-at-least 2.6-17 || print "You can't use is-at-least here."
nslookup [ arg ... ]
This wrapper function for the nslookup command requires
the zsh/zpty module (see zshmodules(1)). It behaves
exactly like the standard nslookup except that it pro-
vides customizable prompts (including a right-side
prompt) and completion of nslookup commands, host
names, etc. (if you use the function-based completion
system). Completion styles may be set with the context
prefix `:completion:nslookup'.
See also the pager, prompt and rprompt styles below.
regexp-replace var regexp replace
Use regular expressions to perform a global search and
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replace operation on a variable. If the option
RE_MATCH_PCRE is not set, POSIX extended regular
expressions are used, else Perl-compatible regular
expressions (this requires the shell to be linked
against the pcre library).
var is the name of the variable containing the string
to be matched. The variable will be modified directly
by the function. The variables MATCH, MBEGIN, MEND,
match, mbegin, mend should be avoided as these are used
by the regular expression code.
regexp is the regular expression to match against the
string.
replace is the replacement text. This can contain
parameter, command and arithmetic expressions which
will be replaced: in particular, a reference to $MATCH
will be replaced by the text matched by the pattern.
The return status is 0 if at least one match was per-
formed, else 1.
run-help cmd
This function is designed to be invoked by the run-help
ZLE widget, in place of the default alias. See
`Accessing On-Line Help' above for setup instructions.
In the discussion which follows, if cmd is a file sys-
tem path, it is first reduced to its rightmost compo-
nent (the file name).
Help is first sought by looking for a file named cmd in
the directory named by the HELPDIR parameter. If no
file is found, an assistant function, alias, or command
named run-help-cmd is sought. If found, the assistant
is executed with the rest of the current command line
(everything after the command name cmd) as its argu-
ments. When neither file nor assistant is found, the
external command `man cmd' is run.
An example assistant for the "ssh" command:
run-help-ssh() {
emulate -LR zsh
local -a args
# Delete the "-l username" option
zparseopts -D -E -a args l:
# Delete other options, leaving: host command
args=(${@:#-*})
if [[ ${#args} -lt 2 ]]; then
man ssh
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else
run-help $args[2]
fi
}
Several of these assistants are provided in the Func-
tions/Misc directory. These must be autoloaded, or
placed as executable scripts in your search path, in
order to be found and used by run-help.
run-help-git
run-help-svk
run-help-svn
Assistant functions for the git, svk, and svn com-
mands.
tetris
Zsh was once accused of not being as complete as Emacs,
because it lacked a Tetris game. This function was
written to refute this vicious slander.
This function must be used as a ZLE widget:
autoload -U tetris
zle -N tetris
bindkey keys tetris
To start a game, execute the widget by typing the keys.
Whatever command line you were editing disappears tem-
porarily, and your keymap is also temporarily replaced
by the Tetris control keys. The previous editor state
is restored when you quit the game (by pressing `q') or
when you lose.
If you quit in the middle of a game, the next invoca-
tion of the tetris widget will continue where you left
off. If you lost, it will start a new game.
zargs [ option ... -- ] [ input ... ] [ -- command [ arg ...
] ]
This function has a similar purpose to GNU xargs.
Instead of reading lines of arguments from the standard
input, it takes them from the command line. This is
useful because zsh, especially with recursive glob
operators, often can construct a command line for a
shell function that is longer than can be accepted by
an external command.
The option list represents options of the zargs command
itself, which are the same as those of xargs. The
input list is the collection of strings (often file
names) that become the arguments of the command,
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analogous to the standard input of xargs. Finally, the
arg list consists of those arguments (usually options)
that are passed to the command each time it runs. The
arg list precedes the elements from the input list in
each run. If no command is provided, then no arg list
may be provided, and in that event the default command
is `print' with arguments `-r --'.
For example, to get a long ls listing of all plain
files in the current directory or its subdirectories:
autoload -U zargs
zargs -- **/*(.) -- ls -l
Note that `--' is used both to mark the end of the
option list and to mark the end of the input list, so
it must appear twice whenever the input list may be
empty. If there is guaranteed to be at least one input
and the first input does not begin with a `-', then the
first `--' may be omitted.
In the event that the string `--' is or may be an
input, the -e option may be used to change the
end-of-inputs marker. Note that this does not change
the end-of-options marker. For example, to use `..' as
the marker:
zargs -e.. -- **/*(.) .. ls -l
This is a good choice in that example because no plain
file can be named `..', but the best end-marker depends
on the circumstances.
The options -i, -I, -l, -L, and -n differ slightly from
their usage in xargs. There are no input lines for
zargs to count, so -l and -L count through the input
list, and -n counts the number of arguments passed to
each execution of command, including any arg list.
Also, any time -i or -I is used, each input is pro-
cessed separately as if by `-L 1'.
For details of the other zargs options, see xargs(1)
(but note the difference in function between zargs and
xargs) or run zargs with the --help option.
zed [ -f ] name
zed -b
This function uses the ZLE editor to edit a file or
function.
Only one name argument is allowed. If the -f option is
given, the name is taken to be that of a function; if
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the function is marked for autoloading, zed searches
for it in the fpath and loads it. Note that functions
edited this way are installed into the current shell,
but not written back to the autoload file.
Without -f, name is the path name of the file to edit,
which need not exist; it is created on write, if neces-
sary.
While editing, the function sets the main keymap to zed
and the vi command keymap to zed-vicmd. These will be
copied from the existing main and vicmd keymaps if they
do not exist the first time zed is run. They can be
used to provide special key bindings used only in zed.
If it creates the keymap, zed rebinds the return key to
insert a line break and `^X^W' to accept the edit in
the zed keymap, and binds `ZZ' to accept the edit in
the zed-vicmd keymap.
The bindings alone can be installed by running `zed
-b'. This is suitable for putting into a startup file.
Note that, if rerun, this will overwrite the existing
zed and zed-vicmd keymaps.
Completion is available, and styles may be set with the
context prefix `:completion:zed'.
A zle widget zed-set-file-name is available. This can
be called by name from within zed using `\ex
zed-set-file-name' (note, however, that because of
zed's rebindings you will have to type ^j at the end
instead of the return key), or can be bound to a key in
either of the zed or zed-vicmd keymaps after `zed -b'
has been run. When the widget is called, it prompts
for a new name for the file being edited. When zed
exits the file will be written under that name and the
original file will be left alone. The widget has no
effect with `zed -f'.
While zed-set-file-name is running, zed uses the keymap
zed-normal-keymap, which is linked from the main keymap
in effect at the time zed initialised its bindings.
(This is to make the return key operate normally.) The
result is that if the main keymap has been changed, the
widget won't notice. This is not a concern for most
users.
zcp [ -finqQvwW ] srcpat dest
zln [ -finqQsvwW ] srcpat dest
Same as zmv -C and zmv -L, respectively. These func-
tions do not appear in the zsh distribution, but can be
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created by linking zmv to the names zcp and zln in some
directory in your fpath.
zkbd See `Keyboard Definition' above.
string ] srcpat dest
zmv [ -finqQsvwW ] [ -C | -L | -M | -[pP] program ] [ -o
opt-
Move (usually, rename) files matching the pattern src-
pat to corresponding files having names of the form
given by dest, where srcpat contains parentheses sur-
rounding patterns which will be replaced in turn by $1,
$2, ... in dest. For example,
zmv '(*).lis' '$1.txt'
renames `foo.lis' to `foo.txt', `my.old.stuff.lis' to
`my.old.stuff.txt', and so on.
The pattern is always treated as an EXTENDED_GLOB pat-
tern. Any file whose name is not changed by the sub-
stitution is simply ignored. Any error (a substitution
resulted in an empty string, two substitutions gave the
same result, the destination was an existing regular
file and -f was not given) causes the entire function
to abort without doing anything.
Options:
-f Force overwriting of destination files. Not cur-
rently passed down to the mv/cp/ln command due to
vagaries of implementations (but you can use -o-f
to do that).
-i Interactive: show each line to be executed and ask
the user whether to execute it. `Y' or `y' will
execute it, anything else will skip it. Note that
you just need to type one character.
-n No execution: print what would happen, but don't
do it.
-q Turn bare glob qualifiers off: now assumed by
default, so this has no effect.
-Q Force bare glob qualifiers on. Don't turn this on
unless you are actually using glob qualifiers in a
pattern.
-s Symbolic, passed down to ln; only works with -L.
-v Verbose: print each command as it's being exe-
cuted.
-w Pick out wildcard parts of the pattern, as
described above, and implicitly add parentheses
for referring to them.
-W Just like -w, with the addition of turning wild-
cards in the replacement pattern into sequential
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${1} .. ${N} references.
-C
-L
-M Force cp, ln or mv, respectively, regardless of
the name of the function.
-p program
Call program instead of cp, ln or mv. Whatever it
does, it should at least understand the form `pro-
gram -- oldname newname' where oldname and newname
are filenames generated by zmv. program will be
split into words, so might be e.g. the name of an
archive tool plus a copy or rename subcommand.
-P program
As -p program, except that program does not accept
a following -- to indicate the end of options. In
this case filenames must already be in a sane form
for the program in question.
-o optstring
The optstring is split into words and passed down
verbatim to the cp, ln or mv command called to
perform the work. It should probably begin with a
`-'.
Further examples:
zmv -v '(* *)' '${1// /_}'
For any file in the current directory with at least one
space in the name, replace every space by an underscore
and display the commands executed.
For more complete examples and other implementation
details, see the zmv source file, usually located in
one of the directories named in your fpath, or in Func-
tions/Misc/zmv in the zsh distribution.
zrecompile
See `Recompiling Functions' above.
zstyle+ context style value [ + subcontext style value ... ]
This makes defining styles a bit simpler by using a
single `+' as a special token that allows you to append
a context name to the previously used context name.
Like this:
zstyle+ ':foo:bar' style1 value1 \
+ ':baz' style2 value2 \
+ ':frob' style3 value3
This defines `style1' with `value1' for the context
:foo:bar as usual, but it also defines `style2' with
`value2' for the context :foo:bar:baz and `style3' with
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`value3' for :foo:bar:frob. Any subcontext may be the
empty string to re-use the first context unchanged.
Styles
insert-tab
The zed function sets this style in context `:comple-
tion:zed:*' to turn off completion when TAB is typed at
the beginning of a line. You may override this by set-
ting your own value for this context and style.
pager
The nslookup function looks up this style in the con-
text `:nslookup' to determine the program used to dis-
play output that does not fit on a single screen.
prompt
rprompt
The nslookup function looks up this style in the con-
text `:nslookup' to set the prompt and the right-side
prompt, respectively. The usual expansions for the PS1
and RPS1 parameters may be used (see EXPANSION OF
PROMPT SEQUENCES in zshmisc(1)).
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 76
User Commands ZSHALL(1)
FILES
$ZDOTDIR/.zshenv
$ZDOTDIR/.zprofile
$ZDOTDIR/.zshrc
$ZDOTDIR/.zlogin
$ZDOTDIR/.zlogout
${TMPPREFIX}* (default is /tmp/zsh*)
/etc/zshenv
/etc/zprofile
/etc/zshrc
/etc/zlogin
/etc/zlogout (installation-specific - /etc is the
default)
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following
attributes:
+---------------+------------------+
|ATTRIBUTE TYPE | ATTRIBUTE VALUE |
+---------------+------------------+
|Availability | shell/zsh |
+---------------+------------------+
|Stability | Volatile |
+---------------+------------------+
SEE ALSO
sh(1), csh(1), tcsh(1), rc(1), bash(1), ksh(1)
IEEE Standard for information Technology - Portable Operat-
ing System Interface (POSIX) - Part 2: Shell and Utilities,
IEEE Inc, 1993, ISBN 1-55937-255-9.
NOTES
This software was built from source available at
https://java.net/projects/solaris-userland. The original
community source was downloaded from http://down-
loads.source-
forge.net/project/zsh/zsh/5.0.5/zsh-5.0.5.tar.bz2
Further information about this software can be found on the
open source community website at http://www.zsh.org/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 1