1ZSHCOMPWID(1) General Commands Manual ZSHCOMPWID(1)
2
6 zshcompwid - zsh completion widgets
7
9 The shell's programmable completion mechanism can be manipulated in two
10 ways; here the low-level features supporting the newer, function-based
11 mechanism are defined. A complete set of shell functions based on
12 these features is described in zshcompsys(1), and users with no inter‐
13 est in adding to that system (or, potentially, writing their own -- see
14 dictionary entry for `hubris') should skip the current section. The
15 older system based on the compctl builtin command is described in zsh‐
16 compctl(1).
17 Completion widgets are defined by the -C option to the zle builtin com‐
19 mand provided by the zsh/zle module (see zshzle(1)). For example,
20 zle -C complete expand-or-complete completer
22 defines a widget named `complete'. The second argument is the name of
24 any of the builtin widgets that handle completions: complete-word,
25 expand-or-complete, expand-or-complete-prefix, menu-complete,
26 menu-expand-or-complete, reverse-menu-complete, list-choices, or
27 delete-char-or-list. Note that this will still work even if the widget
28 in question has been re-bound.
29 When this newly defined widget is bound to a key using the bindkey
31 builtin command defined in the zsh/zle module (see zshzle(1)), typing
32 that key will call the shell function `completer'. This function is
33 responsible for generating the possible matches using the builtins
34 described below. As with other ZLE widgets, the function is called
35 with its standard input closed.
36 Once the function returns, the completion code takes over control again
38 and treats the matches in the same manner as the specified builtin wid‐
39 get, in this case expand-or-complete.
40
42 The parameters ZLE_REMOVE_SUFFIX_CHARS and ZLE_SPACE_SUFFIX_CHARS are
43 used by the completion mechanism, but are not special. See Parameters
44 Used By The Shell in zshparam(1).
45 Inside completion widgets, and any functions called from them, some
47 parameters have special meaning; outside these functions they are not
48 special to the shell in any way. These parameters are used to pass
49 information between the completion code and the completion widget. Some
50 of the builtin commands and the condition codes use or change the cur‐
51 rent values of these parameters. Any existing values will be hidden
52 during execution of completion widgets; except for compstate, the
53 parameters are reset on each function exit (including nested function
54 calls from within the completion widget) to the values they had when
55 the function was entered.
56 CURRENT
58 This is the number of the current word, i.e. the word the cursor
59 is currently on in the words array. Note that this value is
60 only correct if the ksharrays option is not set.
61 IPREFIX
63 Initially this will be set to the empty string. This parameter
64 functions like PREFIX; it contains a string which precedes the
65 one in PREFIX and is not considered part of the list of matches.
66 Typically, a string is transferred from the beginning of PREFIX
67 to the end of IPREFIX, for example:
68 IPREFIX=${PREFIX%%\=*}=
70 PREFIX=${PREFIX#*=}
71 causes the part of the prefix up to and including the first
73 equal sign not to be treated as part of a matched string. This
74 can be done automatically by the compset builtin, see below.
75 ISUFFIX
77 As IPREFIX, but for a suffix that should not be considered part
78 of the matches; note that the ISUFFIX string follows the SUFFIX
79 string.
80 PREFIX Initially this will be set to the part of the current word from
82 the beginning of the word up to the position of the cursor; it
83 may be altered to give a common prefix for all matches.
84 QIPREFIX
86 This parameter is read-only and contains the quoted string up to
87 the word being completed. E.g. when completing `"foo', this
88 parameter contains the double quote. If the -q option of compset
89 is used (see below), and the original string was `"foo bar' with
90 the cursor on the `bar', this parameter contains `"foo '.
91 QISUFFIX
93 Like QIPREFIX, but containing the suffix.
94 SUFFIX Initially this will be set to the part of the current word from
96 the cursor position to the end; it may be altered to give a com‐
97 mon suffix for all matches. It is most useful when the option
98 COMPLETE_IN_WORD is set, as otherwise the whole word on the com‐
99 mand line is treated as a prefix.
100 compstate
102 This is an associative array with various keys and values that
103 the completion code uses to exchange information with the com‐
104 pletion widget. The keys are:
105 all_quotes
107 The -q option of the compset builtin command (see below)
108 allows a quoted string to be broken into separate words;
109 if the cursor is on one of those words, that word will be
110 completed, possibly invoking `compset -q' recursively.
111 With this key it is possible to test the types of quoted
112 strings which are currently broken into parts in this
113 fashion. Its value contains one character for each quot‐
114 ing level. The characters are a single quote or a double
115 quote for strings quoted with these characters, a dollars
116 sign for strings quoted with $'...' and a backslash for
117 strings not starting with a quote character. The first
118 character in the value always corresponds to the inner‐
119 most quoting level.
120 context
122 This will be set by the completion code to the overall
123 context in which completion is attempted. Possible values
124 are:
125 array_value
127 when completing inside the value of an array
128 parameter assignment; in this case the words array
129 contains the words inside the parentheses.
130 brace_parameter
132 when completing the name of a parameter in a
133 parameter expansion beginning with ${.
134 assign_parameter
136 when completing the name of a parameter in a
137 parameter assignment.
138 command
140 when completing for a normal command (either in
141 command position or for an argument of the com‐
142 mand).
143 condition
145 when completing inside a `[[...]]' conditional
146 expression; in this case the words array contains
147 only the words inside the conditional expression.
148 math when completing in a mathematical environment such
150 as a `((...))' construct.
151 parameter
153 when completing the name of a parameter in a
154 parameter expansion beginning with $ but not ${.
155 redirect
157 when completing after a redirection operator.
158 subscript
160 when completing inside a parameter subscript.
161 value when completing the value of a parameter assign‐
163 ment.
164 exact Controls the behaviour when the REC_EXACT option is set.
166 It will be set to accept if an exact match would be
167 accepted, and will be unset otherwise.
168 If it was set when at least one match equal to the string
170 on the line was generated, the match is accepted.
171 exact_string
173 The string of an exact match if one was found, otherwise
174 unset.
175 ignored
177 The number of words that were ignored because they
178 matched one of the patterns given with the -F option to
179 the compadd builtin command.
180 insert This controls the manner in which a match is inserted
182 into the command line. On entry to the widget function,
183 if it is unset the command line is not to be changed; if
184 set to unambiguous, any prefix common to all matches is
185 to be inserted; if set to automenu-unambiguous, the com‐
186 mon prefix is to be inserted and the next invocation of
187 the completion code may start menu completion (due to the
188 AUTO_MENU option being set); if set to menu or automenu
189 menu completion will be started for the matches currently
190 generated (in the latter case this will happen because
191 the AUTO_MENU is set). The value may also contain the
192 string `tab' when the completion code would normally not
193 really do completion, but only insert the TAB character.
194 On exit it may be set to any of the values above (where
196 setting it to the empty string is the same as unsetting
197 it), or to a number, in which case the match whose number
198 is given will be inserted into the command line. Nega‐
199 tive numbers count backward from the last match (with
200 `-1' selecting the last match) and out-of-range values
201 are wrapped around, so that a value of zero selects the
202 last match and a value one more than the maximum selects
203 the first. Unless the value of this key ends in a space,
204 the match is inserted as in a menu completion, i.e. with‐
205 out automatically appending a space.
206 Both menu and automenu may also specify the the number of
208 the match to insert, given after a colon. For example,
209 `menu:2' says to start menu completion, beginning with
210 the second match.
211 Note that a value containing the substring `tab' makes
213 the matches generated be ignored and only the TAB be
214 inserted.
215 Finally, it may also be set to all, which makes all
217 matches generated be inserted into the line.
218 insert_positions
220 When the completion system inserts an unambiguous string
221 into the line, there may be multiple places where charac‐
222 ters are missing or where the character inserted differs
223 from at least one match. The value of this key contains
224 a colon separated list of all these positions, as indexes
225 into the command line.
226 last_prompt
228 If this is set to a non-empty string for every match
229 added, the completion code will move the cursor back to
230 the previous prompt after the list of completions has
231 been displayed. Initially this is set or unset according
232 to the ALWAYS_LAST_PROMPT option.
233 list This controls whether or how the list of matches will be
235 displayed. If it is unset or empty they will never be
236 listed; if its value begins with list, they will always
237 be listed; if it begins with autolist or ambiguous, they
238 will be listed when the AUTO_LIST or LIST_AMBIGUOUS
239 options respectively would normally cause them to be.
240 If the substring force appears in the value, this makes
242 the list be shown even if there is only one match. Nor‐
243 mally, the list would be shown only if there are at least
244 two matches.
245 The value contains the substring packed if the
247 LIST_PACKED option is set. If this substring is given for
248 all matches added to a group, this group will show the
249 LIST_PACKED behavior. The same is done for the
250 LIST_ROWS_FIRST option with the substring rows.
251 Finally, if the value contains the string explanations,
253 only the explanation strings, if any, will be listed and
254 if it contains messages, only the messages (added with
255 the -x option of compadd) will be listed. If it contains
256 both explanations and messages both kinds of explanation
257 strings will be listed. It will be set appropriately on
258 entry to a completion widget and may be changed there.
259 list_lines
261 This gives the number of lines that are needed to display
262 the full list of completions. Note that to calculate the
263 total number of lines to display you need to add the num‐
264 ber of lines needed for the command line to this value,
265 this is available as the value of the BUFFERLINES special
266 parameter.
267 list_max
269 Initially this is set to the value of the LISTMAX parame‐
270 ter. It may be set to any other value; when the widget
271 exits this value will be used in the same way as the
272 value of LISTMAX.
273 nmatches
275 The number of matches generated and accepted by the com‐
276 pletion code so far.
277 old_insert
279 On entry to the widget this will be set to the number of
280 the match of an old list of completions that is currently
281 inserted into the command line. If no match has been
282 inserted, this is unset.
283 As with old_list, the value of this key will only be used
285 if it is the string keep. If it was set to this value by
286 the widget and there was an old match inserted into the
287 command line, this match will be kept and if the value of
288 the insert key specifies that another match should be
289 inserted, this will be inserted after the old one.
290 old_list
292 This is set to yes if there is still a valid list of com‐
293 pletions from a previous completion at the time the wid‐
294 get is invoked. This will usually be the case if and
295 only if the previous editing operation was a completion
296 widget or one of the builtin completion functions. If
297 there is a valid list and it is also currently shown on
298 the screen, the value of this key is shown.
299 After the widget has exited the value of this key is only
301 used if it was set to keep. In this case the completion
302 code will continue to use this old list. If the widget
303 generated new matches, they will not be used.
304 parameter
306 The name of the parameter when completing in a subscript
307 or in the value of a parameter assignment.
308 pattern_insert
310 Normally this is set to menu, which specifies that menu
311 completion will be used whenever a set of matches was
312 generated using pattern matching. If it is set to any
313 other non-empty string by the user and menu completion is
314 not selected by other option settings, the code will
315 instead insert any common prefix for the generated
316 matches as with normal completion.
317 pattern_match
319 Locally controls the behaviour given by the GLOB_COMPLETE
320 option. Initially it is set to `*' if and only if the
321 option is set. The completion widget may set it to this
322 value, to an empty string (which has the same effect as
323 unsetting it), or to any other non-empty string. If it
324 is non-empty, unquoted metacharacters on the command line
325 will be treated as patterns; if it is `*', then addition‐
326 ally a wildcard `*' is assumed at the cursor position; if
327 it is empty or unset, metacharacters will be treated lit‐
328 erally.
329 Note that the matcher specifications given to the compadd
331 builtin command are not used if this is set to a
332 non-empty string.
333 quote When completing inside quotes, this contains the quota‐
335 tion character (i.e. either a single quote, a double
336 quote, or a backtick). Otherwise it is unset.
337 quoting
339 When completing inside single quotes, this is set to the
340 string single; inside double quotes, the string double;
341 inside backticks, the string backtick. Otherwise it is
342 unset.
343 redirect
345 The redirection operator when completing in a redirection
346 position, i.e. one of <, >, etc.
347 restore
349 This is set to auto before a function is entered, which
350 forces the special parameters mentioned above (words,
351 CURRENT, PREFIX, IPREFIX, SUFFIX, and ISUFFIX) to be
352 restored to their previous values when the function
353 exits. If a function unsets it or sets it to any other
354 string, they will not be restored.
355 to_end Specifies the occasions on which the cursor is moved to
357 the end of a string when a match is inserted. On entry
358 to a widget function, it may be single if this will hap‐
359 pen when a single unambiguous match was inserted or match
360 if it will happen any time a match is inserted (for exam‐
361 ple, by menu completion; this is likely to be the effect
362 of the ALWAYS_TO_END option).
363 On exit, it may be set to single as above. It may also
365 be set to always, or to the empty string or unset; in
366 those cases the cursor will be moved to the end of the
367 string always or never respectively. Any other string is
368 treated as match.
369 unambiguous
371 This key is read-only and will always be set to the com‐
372 mon (unambiguous) prefix the completion code has gener‐
373 ated for all matches added so far.
374 unambiguous_cursor
376 This gives the position the cursor would be placed at if
377 the common prefix in the unambiguous key were inserted,
378 relative to the value of that key. The cursor would be
379 placed before the character whose index is given by this
380 key.
381 unambiguous_positions
383 This contains all positions where characters in the unam‐
384 biguous string are missing or where the character
385 inserted differs from at least one of the matches. The
386 positions are given as indexes into the string given by
387 the value of the unambiguous key.
388 vared If completion is called while editing a line using the
390 vared builtin, the value of this key is set to the name
391 of the parameter given as an argument to vared. This key
392 is only set while a vared command is active.
393 words This array contains the words present on the command line cur‐
395 rently being edited.
396
398 compadd [ -akqQfenUld12C ] [ -F array ]
399 [ -P prefix ] [ -S suffix ]
400 [ -p hidden-prefix ] [ -s hidden-suffix ]
401 [ -i ignored-prefix ] [ -I ignored-suffix ]
402 [ -W file-prefix ] [ -d array ]
403 [ -J name ] [ -V name ] [ -X explanation ] [ -x message ]
404 [ -r remove-chars ] [ -R remove-func ]
405 [ -D array ] [ -O array ] [ -A array ]
406 [ -E number ]
407 [ -M match-spec ] [ -- ] [ words ... ]
408 This builtin command can be used to add matches directly and
410 control all the information the completion code stores with each
411 possible match. The return status is zero if at least one match
412 was added and non-zero if no matches were added.
413 The completion code breaks the string to complete into seven
415 fields in the order:
416 <ipre><apre><hpre><word><hsuf><asuf><isuf>
418 The first field is an ignored prefix taken from the command
420 line, the contents of the IPREFIX parameter plus the string
421 given with the -i option. With the -U option, only the string
422 from the -i option is used. The field <apre> is an optional pre‐
423 fix string given with the -P option. The <hpre> field is a
424 string that is considered part of the match but that should not
425 be shown when listing completions, given with the -p option; for
426 example, functions that do filename generation might specify a
427 common path prefix this way. <word> is the part of the match
428 that should appear in the list of completions, i.e. one of the
429 words given at the end of the compadd command line. The suffixes
430 <hsuf>, <asuf> and <isuf> correspond to the prefixes <hpre>,
431 <apre> and <ipre> and are given by the options -s, -S and -I,
432 respectively.
433 The supported flags are:
435 -P prefix
437 This gives a string to be inserted before the given
438 words. The string given is not considered as part of the
439 match and any shell metacharacters in it will not be
440 quoted when the string is inserted.
441 -S suffix
443 Like -P, but gives a string to be inserted after the
444 match.
445 -p hidden-prefix
447 This gives a string that should be inserted into the com‐
448 mand line before the match but that should not appear in
449 the list of matches. Unless the -U option is given, this
450 string must be matched as part of the string on the com‐
451 mand line.
452 -s hidden-suffix
454 Like `-p', but gives a string to insert after the match.
455 -i ignored-prefix
457 This gives a string to insert into the command line just
458 before any string given with the `-P' option. Without
459 `-P' the string is inserted before the string given with
460 `-p' or directly before the match.
461 -I ignored-suffix
463 Like -i, but gives an ignored suffix.
464 -a With this flag the words are taken as names of arrays and
466 the possible matches are their values. If only some ele‐
467 ments of the arrays are needed, the words may also con‐
468 tain subscripts, as in `foo[2,-1]'.
469 -k With this flag the words are taken as names of associa‐
471 tive arrays and the possible matches are their keys. As
472 for -a, the words may also contain subscripts, as in
473 `foo[(R)*bar*]'.
474 -d array
476 This adds per-match display strings. The array should
477 contain one element per word given. The completion code
478 will then display the first element instead of the first
479 word, and so on. The array may be given as the name of an
480 array parameter or directly as a space-separated list of
481 words in parentheses.
482 If there are fewer display strings than words, the left‐
484 over words will be displayed unchanged and if there are
485 more display strings than words, the leftover display
486 strings will be silently ignored.
487 -l This option only has an effect if used together with the
489 -d option. If it is given, the display strings are listed
490 one per line, not arrayed in columns.
491 -o This option only has an effect if used together with the
493 -d option. If it is given, the order of the output is
494 determined by the match strings; otherwise it is deter‐
495 mined by the display strings (i.e. the strings given by
496 the -d option).
497 -J name
499 Gives the name of the group of matches the words should
500 be stored in.
501 -V name
503 Like -J but naming a unsorted group. These are in a dif‐
504 ferent name space than groups created with the -J flag.
505 -1 If given together with the -V option, makes only consecu‐
507 tive duplicates in the group be removed. If combined with
508 the -J option, this has no visible effect. Note that
509 groups with and without this flag are in different name
510 spaces.
511 -2 If given together with the -J or -V option, makes all
513 duplicates be kept. Again, groups with and without this
514 flag are in different name spaces.
515 -X explanation
517 The explanation string will be printed with the list of
518 matches, above the group currently selected.
519 -x message
521 Like -X, but the message will be printed even if there
522 are no matches in the group.
523 -q The suffix given with -S will be automatically removed if
525 the next character typed is a blank or does not insert
526 anything, or if the suffix consists of only one character
527 and the next character typed is the same character.
528 -r remove-chars
530 This is a more versatile form of the -q option. The suf‐
531 fix given with -S or the slash automatically added after
532 completing directories will be automatically removed if
533 the next character typed inserts one of the characters
534 given in the remove-chars. This string is parsed as a
535 characters class and understands the backslash sequences
536 used by the print command. For example, `-r "a-z\t"'
537 removes the suffix if the next character typed inserts a
538 lower case character or a TAB, and `-r "^0-9"' removes
539 the suffix if the next character typed inserts anything
540 but a digit. One extra backslash sequence is understood
541 in this string: `\-' stands for all characters that
542 insert nothing. Thus `-S "=" -q' is the same as `-S "="
543 -r "= \t\n\-"'.
544 This option may also be used without the -S option; then
546 any automatically added space will be removed when one of
547 the characters in the list is typed.
548 -R remove-func
550 This is another form of the -r option. When a suffix has
551 been inserted and the completion accepted, the function
552 remove-func will be called after the next character
553 typed. It is passed the length of the suffix as an argu‐
554 ment and can use the special parameters available in
555 ordinary (non-completion) zle widgets (see zshzle(1)) to
556 analyse and modify the command line.
557 -f If this flag is given, all of the matches built from
559 words are marked as being the names of files. They are
560 not required to be actual filenames, but if they are, and
561 the option LIST_TYPES is set, the characters describing
562 the types of the files in the completion lists will be
563 shown. This also forces a slash to be added when the name
564 of a directory is completed.
565 -e This flag can be used to tell the completion code that
567 the matches added are parameter names for a parameter
568 expansion. This will make the AUTO_PARAM_SLASH and
569 AUTO_PARAM_KEYS options be used for the matches.
570 -W file-prefix
572 This string is a pathname that will be prepended to each
573 of the matches formed by the given words together with
574 any prefix specified by the -p option to form a complete
575 filename for testing. Hence it is only useful if com‐
576 bined with the -f flag, as the tests will not otherwise
577 be performed.
578 -F array
580 Specifies an array containing patterns. Words matching
581 one of these patterns are ignored, i.e. not considered to
582 be possible matches.
583 The array may be the name of an array parameter or a list
585 of literal patterns enclosed in parentheses and quoted,
586 as in `-F "(*?.o *?.h)"'. If the name of an array is
587 given, the elements of the array are taken as the pat‐
588 terns.
589 -Q This flag instructs the completion code not to quote any
591 metacharacters in the words when inserting them into the
592 command line.
593 -M match-spec
595 This gives local match specifications as described below
596 in the section `Completion Matching Control'. This option
597 may be given more than once. In this case all
598 match-specs given are concatenated with spaces between
599 them to form the specification string to use. Note that
600 they will only be used if the -U option is not given.
601 -n Specifies that the words added are to be used as possible
603 matches, but are not to appear in the completion listing.
604 -U If this flag is given, all words given will be accepted
606 and no matching will be done by the completion code. Nor‐
607 mally this is used in functions that do the matching
608 themselves.
609 -O array
611 If this option is given, the words are not added to the
612 set of possible completions. Instead, matching is done
613 as usual and all of the words given as arguments that
614 match the string on the command line will be stored in
615 the array parameter whose name is given as array.
616 -A array
618 As the -O option, except that instead of those of the
619 words which match being stored in array, the strings gen‐
620 erated internally by the completion code are stored. For
621 example, with a matching specification of `-M "L:|no="',
622 the string `nof' on the command line and the string `foo'
623 as one of the words, this option stores the string
624 `nofoo' in the array, whereas the -O option stores the
625 `foo' originally given.
626 -D array
628 As with -O, the words are not added to the set of possi‐
629 ble completions. Instead, the completion code tests
630 whether each word in turn matches what is on the line.
631 If the n'th word does not match, the n'th element of the
632 array is removed. Elements for which the corresponding
633 word is matched are retained.
634 -C This option adds a special match which expands to all
636 other matches when inserted into the line, even those
637 that are added after this option is used. Together with
638 the -d option it is possible to specify a string that
639 should be displayed in the list for this special match.
640 If no string is given, it will be shown as a string con‐
641 taining the strings that would be inserted for the other
642 matches, truncated to the width of the screen.
643 -E This option adds number empty matches after the words
645 have been added. An empty match takes up space in com‐
646 pletion listings but will never be inserted in the line
647 and can't be selected with menu completion or menu selec‐
648 tion. This makes empty matches only useful to format
649 completion lists and to make explanatory string be shown
650 in completion lists (since empty matches can be given
651 display strings with the -d option). And because all but
652 one empty string would otherwise be removed, this option
653 implies the -V and -2 options (even if an explicit -J
654 option is given).
655 -
657 -- This flag ends the list of flags and options. All argu‐
658 ments after it will be taken as the words to use as
659 matches even if they begin with hyphens.
660 Except for the -M flag, if any of these flags is given more than
662 once, the first one (and its argument) will be used.
663 compset -p number
665 compset -P [ number ] pattern
666 compset -s number
667 compset -S [ number ] pattern
668 compset -n begin [ end ]
669 compset -N beg-pat [ end-pat ]
670 compset -q
671 This command simplifies modification of the special parameters,
672 while its return status allows tests on them to be carried out.
673 The options are:
675 -p number
677 If the contents of the PREFIX parameter is longer than
678 number characters, the first number characters are
679 removed from it and appended to the contents of the
680 IPREFIX parameter.
681 -P [ number ] pattern
683 If the value of the PREFIX parameter begins with anything
684 that matches the pattern, the matched portion is removed
685 from PREFIX and appended to IPREFIX.
686 Without the optional number, the longest match is taken,
688 but if number is given, anything up to the number'th
689 match is moved. If the number is negative, the number'th
690 longest match is moved. For example, if PREFIX contains
691 the string `a=b=c', then compset -P '*\=' will move the
692 string `a=b=' into the IPREFIX parameter, but compset -P
693 1 '*\=' will move only the string `a='.
694 -s number
696 As -p, but transfer the last number characters from the
697 value of SUFFIX to the front of the value of ISUFFIX.
698 -S [ number ] pattern
700 As -P, but match the last portion of SUFFIX and transfer
701 the matched portion to the front of the value of ISUFFIX.
702 -n begin [ end ]
704 If the current word position as specified by the parame‐
705 ter CURRENT is greater than or equal to begin, anything
706 up to the begin'th word is removed from the words array
707 and the value of the parameter CURRENT is decremented by
708 begin.
709 If the optional end is given, the modification is done
711 only if the current word position is also less than or
712 equal to end. In this case, the words from position end
713 onwards are also removed from the words array.
714 Both begin and end may be negative to count backwards
716 from the last element of the words array.
717 -N beg-pat [ end-pat ]
719 If one of the elements of the words array before the one
720 at the index given by the value of the parameter CURRENT
721 matches the pattern beg-pat, all elements up to and
722 including the matching one are removed from the words
723 array and the value of CURRENT is changed to point to the
724 same word in the changed array.
725 If the optional pattern end-pat is also given, and there
727 is an element in the words array matching this pattern,
728 the parameters are modified only if the index of this
729 word is higher than the one given by the CURRENT parame‐
730 ter (so that the matching word has to be after the cur‐
731 sor). In this case, the words starting with the one
732 matching end-pat are also removed from the words array.
733 If words contains no word matching end-pat, the testing
734 and modification is performed as if it were not given.
735 -q The word currently being completed is split on spaces
737 into separate words, respecting the usual shell quoting
738 conventions. The resulting words are stored in the words
739 array, and CURRENT, PREFIX, SUFFIX, QIPREFIX, and QISUF‐
740 FIX are modified to reflect the word part that is com‐
741 pleted.
742 In all the above cases the return status is zero if the test
744 succeeded and the parameters were modified and non-zero other‐
745 wise. This allows one to use this builtin in tests such as:
746 if compset -P '*\='; then ...
748 This forces anything up to and including the last equal sign to
750 be ignored by the completion code.
751 compcall [ -TD ]
753 This allows the use of completions defined with the compctl
754 builtin from within completion widgets. The list of matches
755 will be generated as if one of the non-widget completion func‐
756 tion (complete-word, etc.) had been called, except that only
757 compctls given for specific commands are used. To force the code
758 to try completions defined with the -T option of compctl and/or
759 the default completion (whether defined by compctl -D or the
760 builtin default) in the appropriate places, the -T and/or -D
761 flags can be passed to compcall.
762 The return status can be used to test if a matching compctl def‐
764 inition was found. It is non-zero if a compctl was found and
765 zero otherwise.
766 Note that this builtin is defined by the zsh/compctl module.
768
770 The following additional condition codes for use within the [[ ... ]]
771 construct are available in completion widgets. These work on the spe‐
772 cial parameters. All of these tests can also be performed by the
773 compset builtin, but in the case of the condition codes the contents of
774 the special parameters are not modified.
775 -prefix [ number ] pattern
777 true if the test for the -P option of compset would succeed.
778 -suffix [ number ] pattern
780 true if the test for the -S option of compset would succeed.
781 -after beg-pat
783 true if the test of the -N option with only the beg-pat given
784 would succeed.
785 -between beg-pat end-pat
787 true if the test for the -N option with both patterns would suc‐
788 ceed.
789
791 It is possible by use of the -M option of the compadd builtin command
792 to specify how the characters in the string to be completed (referred
793 to here as the command line) map onto the characters in the list of
794 matches produced by the completion code (referred to here as the trial
795 completions). Note that this is not used if the command line contains a
796 glob pattern and the GLOB_COMPLETE option is set or the pattern_match
797 of the compstate special association is set to a non-empty string.
798 The match-spec given as the argument to the -M option (see `Completion
800 Builtin Commands' above) consists of one or more matching descriptions
801 separated by whitespace. Each description consists of a letter fol‐
802 lowed by a colon and then the patterns describing which character
803 sequences on the line match which character sequences in the trial com‐
804 pletion. Any sequence of characters not handled in this fashion must
805 match exactly, as usual.
806 The forms of match-spec understood are as follows. In each case, the
808 form with an upper case initial character retains the string already
809 typed on the command line as the final result of completion, while with
810 a lower case initial character the string on the command line is
811 changed into the corresponding part of the trial completion.
812 m:lpat=tpat
814 M:lpat=tpat
815 Here, lpat is a pattern that matches on the command line, corre‐
816 sponding to tpat which matches in the trial completion.
817 l:lanchor|lpat=tpat
819 L:lanchor|lpat=tpat
820 l:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
821 L:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
822 b:lpat=tpat
823 B:lpat=tpat
824 These letters are for patterns that are anchored by another pat‐
825 tern on the left side. Matching for lpat and tpat is as for m
826 and M, but the pattern lpat matched on the command line must be
827 preceded by the pattern lanchor. The lanchor can be blank to
828 anchor the match to the start of the command line string; other‐
829 wise the anchor can occur anywhere, but must match in both the
830 command line and trial completion strings.
831 If no lpat is given but a ranchor is, this matches the gap
833 between substrings matched by lanchor and ranchor. Unlike lan‐
834 chor, the ranchor only needs to match the trial completion
835 string.
836 The b and B forms are similar to l and L with an empty anchor,
838 but need to match only the beginning of the trial completion or
839 the word on the command line, respectively.
840 r:lpat|ranchor=tpat
842 R:lpat|ranchor=tpat
843 r:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
844 R:lanchor||ranchor=tpat
845 e:lpat=tpat
846 E:lpat=tpat
847 As l, L, b and B, with the difference that the command line and
848 trial completion patterns are anchored on the right side. Here
849 an empty ranchor and the e and E forms force the match to the
850 end of the trial completion or command line string.
851 Each lpat, tpat or anchor is either an empty string or consists of a
853 sequence of literal characters (which may be quoted with a backslash),
854 question marks, character classes, and correspondence classes; ordinary
855 shell patterns are not used. Literal characters match only themselves,
856 question marks match any character, and character classes are formed as
857 for globbing and match any character in the given set.
858 Correspondence classes are defined like character classes, but with two
860 differences: they are delimited by a pair of braces, and negated
861 classes are not allowed, so the characters ! and ^ have no special
862 meaning directly after the opening brace. They indicate that a range
863 of characters on the line match a range of characters in the trial com‐
864 pletion, but (unlike ordinary character classes) paired according to
865 the corresponding position in the sequence. For example, to make any
866 ASCII lower case letter on the line match the corresponding upper case
867 letter in the trial completion, you can use `m:{a-z}={A-Z}' (however,
868 see below for the recommended form for this). More than one pair of
869 classes can occur, in which case the first class before the = corre‐
870 sponds to the first after it, and so on. If one side has more such
871 classes than the other side, the superfluous classes behave like normal
872 character classes. In anchor patterns correspondence classes also
873 behave like normal character classes.
874 The standard `[:name:]' forms described for standard shell patterns,
876 see the section FILENAME GENERATION in zshexpn(1), may appear in corre‐
877 spondence classes as well as normal character classes. The only spe‐
878 cial behaviour in correspondence classes is if the form on the left and
879 the form on the right are each one of [:upper:], [:lower:]. In these
880 cases the character in the word and the character on the line must be
881 the same up to a difference in case. Hence to make any lower case
882 character on the line match the corresponding upper case character in
883 the trial completion you can use `m:{[:lower:]}={[:upper:]}'. Although
884 the matching system does not yet handle multibyte characters, this is
885 likely to be a future extension, at which point this syntax will handle
886 arbitrary alphabets; hence this form, rather than the use of explicit
887 ranges, is the recommended form. In other cases `[:name:]' forms are
888 allowed. If the two forms on the left and right are the same, the
889 characters must match exactly. In remaining cases, the corresponding
890 tests are applied to both characters, but they are not otherwise con‐
891 strained; any matching character in one set goes with any matching
892 character in the other set: this is equivalent to the behaviour of
893 ordinary character classes.
894 The pattern tpat may also be one or two stars, `*' or `**'. This means
896 that the pattern on the command line can match any number of characters
897 in the trial completion. In this case the pattern must be anchored (on
898 either side); in the case of a single star, the anchor then determines
899 how much of the trial completion is to be included -- only the charac‐
900 ters up to the next appearance of the anchor will be matched. With two
901 stars, substrings matched by the anchor can be matched, too.
902 Examples:
904 The keys of the options association defined by the parameter module are
906 the option names in all-lower-case form, without underscores, and with‐
907 out the optional no at the beginning even though the builtins setopt
908 and unsetopt understand option names with upper case letters, under‐
909 scores, and the optional no. The following alters the matching rules
910 so that the prefix no and any underscore are ignored when trying to
911 match the trial completions generated and upper case letters on the
912 line match the corresponding lower case letters in the words:
913 compadd -M 'L:|[nN][oO]= M:_= M:{[:upper:]}={[:lower:]}' - \
915 ${(k)options}
916 The first part says that the pattern `[nN][oO]' at the beginning (the
918 empty anchor before the pipe symbol) of the string on the line matches
919 the empty string in the list of words generated by completion, so it
920 will be ignored if present. The second part does the same for an under‐
921 score anywhere in the command line string, and the third part uses cor‐
922 respondence classes so that any upper case letter on the line matches
923 the corresponding lower case letter in the word. The use of the upper
924 case forms of the specification characters (L and M) guarantees that
925 what has already been typed on the command line (in particular the pre‐
926 fix no) will not be deleted.
927 Note that the use of L in the first part means that it matches only
929 when at the beginning of both the command line string and the trial
930 completion. I.e., the string `_NO_f' would not be completed to
931 `_NO_foo', nor would `NONO_f' be completed to `NONO_foo' because of the
932 leading underscore or the second `NO' on the line which makes the pat‐
933 tern fail even though they are otherwise ignored. To fix this, one
934 would use `B:[nN][oO]=' instead of the first part. As described above,
935 this matches at the beginning of the trial completion, independent of
936 other characters or substrings at the beginning of the command line
937 word which are ignored by the same or other match-specs.
938 The second example makes completion case insensitive. This is just the
940 same as in the option example, except here we wish to retain the char‐
941 acters in the list of completions:
942 compadd -M 'm:{[:lower:]}={[:upper:]}' ...
944 This makes lower case letters match their upper case counterparts. To
946 make upper case letters match the lower case forms as well:
947 compadd -M 'm:{[:lower:][:upper:]}={[:upper:][:lower:]}' ...
949 A nice example for the use of * patterns is partial word completion.
951 Sometimes you would like to make strings like `c.s.u' complete to
952 strings like `comp.source.unix', i.e. the word on the command line con‐
953 sists of multiple parts, separated by a dot in this example, where each
954 part should be completed separately -- note, however, that the case
955 where each part of the word, i.e. `comp', `source' and `unix' in this
956 example, is to be completed from separate sets of matches is a differ‐
957 ent problem to be solved by the implementation of the completion wid‐
958 get. The example can be handled by:
959 compadd -M 'r:|.=* r:|=*' \
961 - comp.sources.unix comp.sources.misc ...
962 The first specification says that lpat is the empty string, while
964 anchor is a dot; tpat is *, so this can match anything except for the
965 `.' from the anchor in the trial completion word. So in `c.s.u', the
966 matcher sees `c', followed by the empty string, followed by the anchor
967 `.', and likewise for the second dot, and replaces the empty strings
968 before the anchors, giving `c[omp].s[ources].u[nix]', where the last
969 part of the completion is just as normal.
970 With the pattern shown above, the string `c.u' could not be completed
972 to `comp.sources.unix' because the single star means that no dot
973 (matched by the anchor) can be skipped. By using two stars as in
974 `r:|.=**', however, `c.u' could be completed to `comp.sources.unix'.
975 This also shows that in some cases, especially if the anchor is a real
976 pattern, like a character class, the form with two stars may result in
977 more matches than one would like.
978 The second specification is needed to make this work when the cursor is
980 in the middle of the string on the command line and the option COM‐
981 PLETE_IN_WORD is set. In this case the completion code would normally
982 try to match trial completions that end with the string as typed so
983 far, i.e. it will only insert new characters at the cursor position
984 rather then at the end. However in our example we would like the code
985 to recognise matches which contain extra characters after the string on
986 the line (the `nix' in the example). Hence we say that the empty
987 string at the end of the string on the line matches any characters at
988 the end of the trial completion.
989 More generally, the specification
991 compadd -M 'r:|[.,_-]=* r:|=*' ...
993 allows one to complete words with abbreviations before any of the char‐
995 acters in the square brackets. For example, to complete veryverylong‐
996 file.c rather than veryverylongheader.h with the above in effect, you
997 can just type very.c before attempting completion.
998 The specifications with both a left and a right anchor are useful to
1000 complete partial words whose parts are not separated by some special
1001 character. For example, in some places strings have to be completed
1002 that are formed `LikeThis' (i.e. the separate parts are determined by a
1003 leading upper case letter) or maybe one has to complete strings with
1004 trailing numbers. Here one could use the simple form with only one
1005 anchor as in:
1006 compadd -M 'r:|[[:upper:]0-9]=* r:|=*' LikeTHIS FooHoo 5foo123 5bar234
1008 But with this, the string `H' would neither complete to `FooHoo' nor to
1010 `LikeTHIS' because in each case there is an upper case letter before
1011 the `H' and that is matched by the anchor. Likewise, a `2' would not be
1012 completed. In both cases this could be changed by using
1013 `r:|[[:upper:]0-9]=**', but then `H' completes to both `LikeTHIS' and
1014 `FooHoo' and a `2' matches the other strings because characters can be
1015 inserted before every upper case letter and digit. To avoid this one
1016 would use:
1017 compadd -M 'r:[^[:upper:]0-9]||[[:upper:]0-9]=** r:|=*' \
1019 LikeTHIS FooHoo foo123 bar234
1020 By using these two anchors, a `H' matches only upper case `H's that are
1022 immediately preceded by something matching the left anchor
1023 `[^[:upper:]0-9]'. The effect is, of course, that `H' matches only the
1024 string `FooHoo', a `2' matches only `bar234' and so on.
1025 When using the completion system (see zshcompsys(1)), users can define
1027 match specifications that are to be used for specific contexts by using
1028 the matcher and matcher-list styles. The values for the latter will be
1029 used everywhere.
1030
1032 The first step is to define the widget:
1033 zle -C complete complete-word complete-files
1035 Then the widget can be bound to a key using the bindkey builtin com‐
1037 mand:
1038 bindkey '^X\t' complete
1040 After that the shell function complete-files will be invoked after typ‐
1042 ing control-X and TAB. The function should then generate the matches,
1043 e.g.:
1044 complete-files () { compadd - * }
1046 This function will complete files in the current directory matching the
1048 current word.
1049zsh 4.3.10 June 1, 2009 ZSHCOMPWID(1)