Zsh – How to Get Function Into PS1 Prompt

promptzsh

This works in bash (parse_git_branch is a defined function)

export PS1="\$(parse_git_branch)"

But I cannot figure out the equivalent in zsh.

Note: If I do

PROMPT="$(parse_git_branch)"

It seems to work, but in fact it's running the command when I set the prompt, which is not the point.

Best Answer

You have to include

setopt PROMPT_SUBST

in your .zshrc, man zshall explains it in the PROMPT EXPANSION section:

If the PROMPT_SUBST option is set, the prompt string is first subjected to parameter expansion, command substitution and arithmetic expansion.

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Zsh right-justify in ps1

You will find a detailed answer and an example here. The idea is to write the line before PS1 using the precmd callback, use $COLUMNS, and a bit of math to calculate the position of the text on the right side of the screen. Knowledge of escape sequences will also help you with cursor positioning and colouring.

Another solution can be to use a theme from Oh My ZSH.

ZSH: Read command fails within bash function “read:1: -p: no coprocess”

The –p option doesn’t mean the same thing to bash’s read built-in command and zsh’s read built-in command. In zsh’s read command, –p means –– guess –– “Input is read from the coprocess.” I suggest that you display your prompt with echo or printf.

You may also need to replace –n 1 with –k or –k 1.

The zsh equivalent of bash's read -p prompt is

read "?Here be dragons. Continue?"

Anything after a ? in the first argument is used as the prompt string.

And of course you can specify a variable name to read into (and this may be better style):

read "brave?Here be dragons. Continue?"
if [[ "$brave" =~ ^[Yy]$ ]]
then
    ...
fi

(Quoting shell variables is generally a good idea, too.)

Best Answer

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