CODEWITHSUNDEEP
command-promptzsh
clearlight
clearlight

Reputation: 12615

How do I make my zsh prompt look like sh/bash end with $ instead of %?

Can anyone show how to modify the following zsh prompt environment var assignment to make its emitted string end with $ (followed by a space), instead of %? 

export PROMPT='%F{111}%m:%F{2}%~ %#%f '

macOS Catalina changed the default shell to zsh, and I saw an article that encouraged a switch. I assumed backward compatibility but prompt logic changed.

Upvotes: 3

Views: 2224

Answers (2)

lindes
lindes

Reputation: 10250

Short answer: use %(!.#.$)

Long answer:

The portion of your prompt string that's generating the % is %# -- which generates # if the shell is a privileged (root) shell, and % otherwise.

If you still want that general class of behavior, just with $ instead of %, you can do %(!.#.$) in place of %#. This is a conditional, with three parts (each separated by .): ! checks to see if the shell is privileged, the # is the expansion value if the check comes back true, and the $ is the expansion value if it's false.

A demonstration session (in a shell with a starting prompt of simply % (PROMPT='%% ')):

% PROMPT=': %#; '          ;: # the default %# (unwanted %, just to show it)
: %; sudo -s               ;: # prompt is % now -- until we switch to root
: #; exit                  ;: # prompt is # now -- exit to return to user
: %; PROMPT=': %(!.#.$); ' ;: # set new prompt string with conditional for #/$
: $; sudo -s               ;: # prompt is $ now -- what we wanted
: #; exit                  ;: # prompt is # for root shells, still
: $;                       ;: # back to user shell, prompt back to $

Folding this in to your prior settings, we have:

export PROMPT='%F{111}%m:%F{2}%~ %(!.#.$)%f '

Should do the trick!



(As a random side-note, I'm using ; and the builtin : command to effect comments where they might not otherwise be allowed -- and in particular, to treat the prompt itself as a comment, so it can be copy/pasted along with a command to re-run the command -- at the expense of some noise in your shell where you paste it. Also, the above example assumes sudo has been run recently enough, and/or is otherwise configured, to not require a password -- of course, if it did, this would all still work, it would just be extra noise in the example.)

Upvotes: 2

rootkonda
rootkonda

Reputation: 1743

export PROMPT='%F{111}%m:%F{2}%~ $%f '

For more options on zsh prompt string customization - http://zsh.sourceforge.net/Doc/Release/Prompt-Expansion.html#Login-information

Upvotes: 2

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