A zsh Workshop | Hacker News Reader

A zsh Workshop

acm.uiuc.edu

62 pointsshawndumas12 comments

If you guys start using zsh, I would recommend oh-my-zsh https://github.com/robbyrussell/oh-my-zsh.

There's also a Steve Losh blogpost about that's quite cool http://stevelosh.com/blog/2010/02/my-extravagant-zsh-prompt/

I've really been considering learning zsh. The main reason I haven't bit the bullet is because bash is everywhere. I don't want to become as fluent in zsh as I am in bash, only to feel crippled when I inevitably have to work without zsh.

So, for those that frequently shift between zsh and bash (or ash, dash, etc.), what is the experience like?

Since both bash and zsh are 'sh' derived shells, it's not a huge context flip. It's analogous to flipping between your highly tuned (vim|emacs) config, vs logging into a new AWS image with the default version's config: You still know how to get around, but all the bells and whistles are turned off.

I haven't had much trouble with flipping back and forth. At my company the sys admins won't install zsh on live boxes, but are willing to put it on dev boxes. So I end up dropping to bash whenever I'm on a live box.

I used zsh from 1993 to 2009, then switched to bash in a fit of conformity, and now zsh becomes popular? Oof.

I tried zsh when it came out, but gave up (too rough then). Recently, I made the move and I am quite happy. This workshop will hopefully help me get deeper into it. (I used the oh-my-zsh linked above).

I love how you can type "vim " and press up-arrow, to get previous commands with vim. In bash, after typing "vim " i would have to erase the line, do "C-r" and then type vim again.

Well, BASH is still the defacto default. So you are ok.

Looking through the feature list, is there anything that stands out as something bash cannot do, that is useful and not superfluous(like checking the mailbox?!)?

http://www.acm.uiuc.edu/workshops/zsh/why.html

Nope, none of the cool stuff, like extended globbing or name completion, that makes me use zsh rather than bash is on that list.

Have your tried https://github.com/zsh-users/zsh-history-substring-search ? Search history using substring of earlier command. Really good.

When was this workshop from? Based on my limited experience with zsh, it feels pretty out of date.

http://www.acm.uiuc.edu/workshops/

1999, my senior year at UIUC. I remember sitting in this workshop, and I still use zsh today. Good times, great ACM student chapter.

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