zshcompwid
(1)
名称
zshcompwid - zsh completion widgets
用法概要
Please see following description for synopsis
描述
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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User Commands ZSHCOMPWID(1)
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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User Commands ZSHCOMPWID(1)
`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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User Commands ZSHCOMPWID(1)
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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User Commands ZSHCOMPWID(1)
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/.
zsh 5.0.5 Last change: January 5, 2014 23