Hacker News Reader

Comment by mturmon | Hacker News Reader

A usage pattern with !$ is:

  % mkdir foo
  % chmod g+s !$
  % ls -ld !$   # (make sure it's correct)
  % cd !$

View on HN

Alternatively, you can add ':p' to the third line. This will print out the command rather than executing it. Additionally, it's also added to your bash history, so you can add it by pressing the up arrow.

  $ chmod 755 foo
  $ cd !$:p
  cd foo
  $ cd foo

There are some similar "tricks" here:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5337558

I have found "magic-space" more useful than ":p". This auto-expands history substitutions (like !$) when you press the space bar. You can bind it to the space key in tcsh or bash. It also works for !!, !vi, and other substitutions.

So, when you press ! $ <space>, it expands out to "foo" in place, so you can be sure that's what you wanted, and edit it in place.

I think :p predates magic-space. They're both decades old at this point though.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com