Bash – Spawn new terminal window with the same directory as the previous window

awesomebashgnome-terminallinuxshell-script

I'm running Awesome WM on the latest Arch Linux with Gnome Terminal and the default bash. I've managed to get this working, but I wonder if any form of improvement is possible with this implementation. The question does NOT relate to opening new tabs, only to spawning new terminal windows with Awesome WM.

I have rewritten the "cd" command to save the current working directory in the ".cd_extend" file:

~/.bashrc

alias cd='source ~/.cd_extend'

~/.cd_extend

#!/bin/bash

command cd $1
echo $(pwd) > ~/.terminal_directory

When I spawn a new terminal, the ".terminal_directory" is read and appended as an argument to gnome terminal's "–working-directory" flag.

~/.dotfiles/open_terminal.sh

#!/bin/bash

DIR=$(cat ~/.terminal_directory)
gnome-terminal --working-directory=$DIR

awesomewm rc.lua

terminal   = "~/.dotfiles/open_terminal.sh"
awful.key({ modkey, }, "Return", function () awful.util.spawn(terminal) end)

I wonder if I have missed any internal bash functionality which could have simplified this and if there is room for improvement.

Best Answer

In the menu of Gnome-terminal, use:

File --> Open Terminal

That will open a new window using the pwd as the directory.

Also, you may set the open tabs:

Edit --> Preferences --> General --> Open new terminals in: --> select tab.

So new terminals will open in the same window with the same pwd.
You will still be able to open new windows if needed:

Alt-F2 --> gnome-terminal

Related Solutions

Bash – How to open a new terminal in the same directory of the last used one from a window manager keybind

I see three solutions using .last_dir. You can place the echo $PWD > ~/.last_dir either:

In a special function that would be a wrapper for cd:
```
function cd_
{
  [[ -d "$@" ]] || return 1
  echo "$@" > ~/.last_dir
  cd "$@"
}
```
Place this in your ~/.bashrc and then use cd_ instead of cd every time you want your new working directory to be stored.
In your $PROMPT_COMMAND (not recommended):
```
PROMPT_COMMAND="$PROMPT_COMMAND; pwd > ~/.last_dir"
```
You can test this directly from the terminal or place it in ~/.bashrc. This solution, however, triggers a disk write each time the prompt appears, which might cause trouble - but on the other hand, .last_dir would contain the current directory no matter how you got there.
In a custom perl extension script for rxvt. I've never created one myself, but you can find quite a few examples on the web.

Bash – Why do new terminals in Awesome spawn with SHLVL>1

I think I understand the why, but I don't have a complete fix.

The behavior of SHLVL depends on the shell. In dash and ksh (both pdksh and ksh93), only interactive instances increment SHLVL. In bash and zsh, all instances increment SHLVL, even bash -c ….

If you observed a change in behavior after this patch, it's likely that your /bin/sh is dash and your $SHELL is bash. Before , awesome was executing /bin/sh -c … which didn't change SHLVL. After the patch, it is now executing $SHELL -c …, i.e. bash -c …, which increments SHLVL.

You could cheat by changing SHLVL inside Awesome. Hook into the startup code to decrease SHLVL by 1. I'm pretty sure this is possible without recompiling the C code, though I don't know the Lua code.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Bash – How to open a new terminal in the same directory of the last used one from a window manager keybind

Bash – Why do new terminals in Awesome spawn with SHLVL>1

Related Question