bash-fzf

Enhance GNU Bash with FZF Matching

About

This is an elaborated GNU Bash run-command script which enhances interactive shell sessions with the following features, all based on the excellent FZF searching utility:

• improved command history searching with overwritten FZF-based CTRL+r functionality, based on the built-in history command and its underlying standard $HOME/.bash_history file.

• additional command bookmarking with new FZF-based CTRL+b (bookmark) functionality, based on a new bookmark command and its underlying custom .bash_bookmark files in current, parent and $HOME directories.

• additional directory changing with new FZF-based CTRL+g (goto) functionality, based on a new cdpaths command and its underlying custom .bash_cdpaths files in current, parent and $HOME directories.

• improved directory changing with an overwritten cd command, using the built-in pushd functionality and its built-in forward directory stack, plus the additional cd - (go backward in directory stack), and the additional cd + (go forward in directory stack) commands and its underlying custom reverse directory stack.

FZF Cheatsheet

In all FZF sessions, the following inputs are available:

• Searching: enter one or more words for searching through the list of shell commands. The words are AND-combined, i.e., all the words have to match. In case a word begins with !, it is negated, i.e., it has to NOT match.

• Editing: press LEFT/RIGHT for positioning the cursor on the line, press CTRL+a for jumping to the beginning of the line, press CTRL+w for deleting the word before the current cursor position, press CTRL+k for deleting everthing after the current cursor position.

• Selection: press UP/DOWN to select a command.

• Execution: press RETURN for terminating the FZF session and executing the selected command.

• Editing: press CTRL+e for termining the FZF session and picking up the selected command for subsequent editing on the shell prompt,

• Termination: press CTRL+c/CTRL-g/ESC for terminating the FZF session without executing any command at all.

For more details on the usage of the underlying FZF, please see the FZF documentation.

Usage

source bash-fzf.rc

Hint

In practice, this optimally should be combined with my Unix dotfiles project which provides a reasonable GNU Bash shell environment. It automatically enables bash-fzf if you copy the bash-fzf.rc script to ~/.bash-fzf.rc.

History

The functionality was orginally invented in 1997 and was originally based on iselect(1), an interactive selection tool by the author, a little bit similar to FZF but without the search functionality. In 2017 the functionality was migrated to the excellent FZF utility and the result released as Open Source.

License

Copyright (c) 1997-2023 Dr. Ralf S. Engelschall (http://engelschall.com/)

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:

The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all copies or substantial portions of the Software.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY, FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM, OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE SOFTWARE.