23. User Contributions

23.1 Description

The Zsh source distribution includes a number of items contributed by the user community. These are not inherently a part of the shell, and some may not be available in every zsh installation. The most significant of these are documented here. For documentation on other contributed items such as shell functions, look for comments in the function source files.

23.2 Utilities
23.3 Prompt Themes
23.4 ZLE Functions
23.5 Other Functions

23.2 Utilities

23.2.1 Accessing On-Line Help

The key sequence ESC h is normally bound by ZLE to execute the run-help widget (see 17. Zsh Line Editor). This invokes the run-help command with the command word from the current input line as its argument. By default, run-help is an alias for the man command, so this often fails when the command word is a shell builtin or a user-defined function. By redefining the run-help alias, one can improve the on-line help provided by the shell.

The helpfiles utility, found in the Util directory of the distribution, is a Perl program that can be used to process the zsh manual to produce a separate help file for each shell builtin and for many other shell features as well. The autoloadable run-help function, found in Functions/Misc, searches for these helpfiles and performs several other tests to produce the most complete help possible for the command.

There may already be a directory of help files on your system; look in /usr/share/zsh or /usr/local/share/zsh and subdirectories below those, or ask your system administrator.

To create your own help files with helpfiles, choose or create a directory where the individual command help files will reside. For example, you might choose ~/zsh_help. If you unpacked the zsh distribution in your home directory, you would use the commands:

mkdir ~/zsh_help cd ~/zsh_help man zshall | colcrt - | \ perl ~/zsh-4.0.3/Util/helpfiles

Next, to use the run-help function, you need to add lines something like the following to your .zshrc or equivalent startup file:

unalias run-help autoload run-help HELPDIR=~/zsh_help

The HELPDIR parameter tells run-help where to look for the help files. If your system already has a help file directory installed, set HELPDIR to the path of that directory instead.

Note that in order for `autoload run-help' to work, the run-help file must be in one of the directories named in your fpath array (see 14.6 Parameters Used By The Shell). This should already be the case if you have a standard zsh installation; if it is not, copy Functions/Misc/run-help to an appropriate directory.

23.2.2 Recompiling Functions

If you frequently edit your zsh functions, or periodically update your zsh installation to track the latest developments, you may find that function digests compiled with the zcompile builtin are frequently out of date with respect to the function source files. This is not usually a problem, because zsh always looks for the newest file when loading a function, but it may cause slower shell startup and function loading. Also, if a digest file is explicitly used as an element of fpath, zsh won't check whether any of its source files has changed.

The zrecompile autoloadable function, found in Functions/Misc, can be used to keep function digests up to date.

zrecompile [ -qt ] [ name ... ]

zrecompile [ -qt ] -p args [ -- args ... ]

This tries to find *.zwc files and automatically re-compile them if at least one of the original files is newer than the compiled file. This works only if the names stored in the compiled files are full paths or are relative to the directory that contains the .zwc file.

In the first form, each name is the name of a compiled file or a directory containing *.zwc files that should be checked. If no arguments are given, the directories and *.zwc files in fpath are used.

When -t is given, no compilation is performed, but a return status of zero (true) is set if there are files that need to be re-compiled and non-zero (false) otherwise. The -q option quiets the chatty output that describes what zrecompile is doing.

Without the -t option, the return status is zero if all files that needed re-compilation could be compiled and non-zero if compilation for at least one of the files failed.

If the -p option is given, the args are interpreted as one or more sets of arguments for zcompile, separated by `--'. For example:

zrecompile -p \ -R ~/.zshrc -- \ -M ~/.zcompdump -- \ ~/zsh/comp.zwc ~/zsh/Completion/*/_*

This compiles ~/.zshrc into ~/.zshrc.zwc if that doesn't exist or if it is older than ~/.zshrc. The compiled file will be marked for reading instead of mapping. The same is done for ~/.zcompdump and ~/.zcompdump.zwc, but this compiled file is marked for mapping. The last line re-creates the file ~/zsh/comp.zwc if any of the files matching the given pattern is newer than it.

Without the -p option, zrecompile does not create function digests that do not already exist, nor does it add new functions to the digest.

The following shell loop is an example of a method for creating function digests for all functions in your fpath, assuming that you have write permission to the directories:

for ((i=1; i <= $#fpath; ++i)); do dir=$fpath[i] zwc=${dir:t}.zwc if [[ $dir == (.|..) || $dir == (.|..)/* ]]; then continue fi files=($dir/*(N-.)) if [[ -w $dir:h && -n $files ]]; then files=(${${(M)files%/*/*}#/}) if ( cd $dir:h && zrecompile -p -U -z $zwc $files ); then fpath[i]=$fpath[i].zwc fi fi done

The -U and -z options are appropriate for functions in the default zsh installation fpath; you may need to use different options for your personal function directories.

Once the digests have been created and your fpath modified to refer to them, you can keep them up to date by running zrecompile with no arguments.

23.2.3 Keyboard Definition

The large number of possible combinations of keyboards, workstations, terminals, emulators, and window systems makes it impossible for zsh to have built-in key bindings for every situation. The zkbd utility, found in Functions/Misc, can help you quickly create key bindings for your configuration.

Run zkbd either as an autoloaded function, or as a shell script:

zsh -f ~/zsh-4.0.3/Functions/Misc/zkbd

When you run zkbd, it first asks you to enter your terminal type; if the default it offers is correct, just press return. It then asks you to press a number of different keys to determine characteristics of your keyboard and terminal; zkbd warns you if it finds anything out of the ordinary, such as a Delete key that sends neither ^H nor ^?.

The keystrokes read by zkbd are recorded as a definition for an associative array named key, written to a file in the subdirectory .zkbd within either your HOME or ZDOTDIR directory. The name of the file is composed from the TERM, VENDOR and OSTYPE parameters, joined by hyphens.

You may read this file into your .zshrc or another startup file with the "source" or "." commands, then reference the key parameter in bindkey commands, like this:

source ${ZDOTDIR:-$HOME}/.zkbd/$TERM-$VENDOR-$OSTYPE [[ -n ${key[Left]} ]] && bindkey "${key[Left]}" backward-char [[ -n ${key[Right]} ]] && bindkey "${key[Right]}" forward-char # etc.

Note that in order for `autoload zkbd' to work, the zkdb file must be in one of the directories named in your fpath array (see 14.6 Parameters Used By The Shell). This should already be the case if you have a standard zsh installation; if it is not, copy Functions/Misc/zkbd to an appropriate directory.

23.2.4 Dumping Shell State

Occasionally you may encounter what appears to be a bug in the shell, particularly if you are using a beta version of zsh or a development release. Usually it is sufficient to send a description of the problem to one of the zsh mailing lists (see 2.3 Mailing Lists), but sometimes one of the zsh developers will need to recreate your environment in order to track the problem down.

The script named reporter, found in the Util directory of the distribution, is provided for this purpose. (It is also possible to autoload reporter, but reporter is not installed in fpath by default.) This script outputs a detailed dump of the shell state, in the form of another script that can be read with `zsh -f' to recreate that state.

To use reporter, read the script into your shell with the `.' command and redirect the output into a file:

. ~/zsh-4.0.3/Util/reporter > zsh.report

You should check the zsh.report file for any sensitive information such as passwords and delete them by hand before sending the script to the developers. Also, as the output can be voluminous, it's best to wait for the developers to ask for this information before sending it.

You can also use reporter to dump only a subset of the shell state. This is sometimes useful for creating startup files for the first time. Most of the output from reporter is far more detailed than usually is necessary for a startup file, but the aliases, options, and zstyles states may be useful because they include only changes from the defaults. The bindings state may be useful if you have created any of your own keymaps, because reporter arranges to dump the keymap creation commands as well as the bindings for every keymap.

As is usual with automated tools, if you create a startup file with reporter, you should edit the results to remove unnecessary commands. Note that if you're using the new completion system, you should not dump the functions state to your startup files with reporter; use the compdump function instead (see 19. Completion System).

reporter [ state ... ]

Print to standard output the indicated subset of the current shell state. The state arguments may be one or more of:

all

Output everything listed below.

aliases

Output alias definitions.

bindings

Output ZLE key maps and bindings.

completion

Output old-style compctl commands. New completion is covered by functions and zstyles.

functions

Output autoloads and function definitions.

limits

Output limit commands.

options

Output setopt commands.

styles

Same as zstyles.

variables

Output shell parameter assignments, plus export commands for any environment variables.

zstyles

Output zstyle commands.

If the state is omitted, all is assumed.

With the exception of `all', every state can be abbreviated by any prefix, even a single letter; thus a is the same as aliases, z is the same as zstyles, etc.

23.3 Prompt Themes

23.3.1 Installation

You should make sure all the functions from the Functions/Prompts directory of the source distribution are available; they all begin with the string `prompt_' except for the special function`promptinit'. You also need the `colors' function from Functions/Misc. All of these functions may already have been installed on your system; if not, you will need to find them and copy them. The directory should appear as one of the elements of the fpath array (this should already be the case if they were installed), and at least the function promptinit should be autoloaded; it will autoload the rest. Finally, to initialize the use of the system you need to call the promptinit function. The following code in your .zshrc will arrange for this; assume the functions are stored in the directory ~/myfns:

fpath=(~/myfns $fpath) autoload -U promptinit promptinit

23.3.2 Theme Selection

Use the prompt command to select your preferred theme. This command may be added to your .zshrc following the call to promptinit in order to start zsh with a theme already selected.

prompt [ -c | -l ]

prompt [ -p | -h ] [ theme ... ]

prompt [ -s ] theme [ arg ... ]

Set or examine the prompt theme. With no options and a theme argument, the theme with that name is set as the current theme. The available themes are determined at run time; use the -l option to see a list. The special theme `random' selects at random one of the available themes and sets your prompt to that.

In some cases the theme may be modified by one or more arguments, which should be given after the theme name. See the help for each theme for descriptions of these arguments.

Options are:

-c

Show the currently selected theme and its parameters, if any.

-l

List all available prompt themes.

-p

Preview the theme named by theme, or all themes if no theme is given.

-h

Show help for the theme named by theme, or for the prompt function if no theme is given.

-s

Set theme as the current theme and save state.

prompt_theme_setup

Each available theme has a setup function which is called by the prompt function to install that theme. This function may define other functions as necessary to maintain the prompt, including functions used to preview the prompt or provide help for its use. You should not normally call a theme's setup function directly.

23.4 ZLE Functions

23.4.1 Widgets

These functions all implement user-defined ZLE widgets (see 17. Zsh Line Editor) which can be bound to keystrokes in interactive shells. To use them, your .zshrc should contain lines of the form

autoload function zle -N function

followed by an appropriate bindkey command to associate the function with a key sequence. Suggested bindings are described below.

cycle-completion-positions

After inserting an unambiguous string into the command line, the new function based completion system may know about multiple places in this string where characters are missing or differ from at least one of the possible matches. It will then place the cursor on the position it considers to be the most interesting one, i.e. the one where one can disambiguate between as many matches as possible with as little typing as possible.

This widget allows the cursor to be easily moved to the other interesting spots. It can be invoked repeatedly to cycle between all positions reported by the completion system.

edit-command-line

Edit the command line using your visual editor, as in ksh.

bindkey -M vicmd v edit-command-line

history-search-end

This function implements the widgets history-beginning-search-backward-end and history-beginning-search-forward-end. These commands work by first calling the corresponding builtin widget (see 17.6.2 History Control) and then moving the cursor to the end of the line. The original cursor position is remembered and restored before calling the builtin widget a second time, so that the same search is repeated to look farther through the history.

Although you autoload only one function, the commands to use it are slightly different because it implements two widgets.

zle -N history-beginning-search-backward-end \ history-search-end zle -N history-beginning-search-forward-end \ history-search-end bindkey '\e^P' history-beginning-search-backward-end bindkey '\e^N' history-beginning-search-forward-end

incarg

Typing the keystrokes for this widget with the cursor placed on or to the left of an integer causes that integer to be incremented by one. With a numeric prefix argument, the number is incremented by the amount of the argument (decremented if the prefix argument is negative). The shell parameter incarg may be set to change the default increment something other than one.

bindkey '^X+' incarg

incremental-complete-word

This allows incremental completion of a word. After starting this command, a list of completion choices can be shown after every character you type, which you can delete with ^H or DEL. Pressing return accepts the completion so far and returns you to normal editing (that is, the command line is not immediately executed). You can hit TAB to do normal completion, ^G to abort back to the state when you started, and ^D to list the matches.

This works only with the new function based completion system.

bindkey '^Xi' incremental-complete-word

insert-files

This function allows you type a file pattern, and see the results of the expansion at each step. When you hit return, all expansions are inserted into the command line.

bindkey '^Xf' insert-files

predict-on

This set of functions implements predictive typing using history search. After predict-on, typing characters causes the editor to look backward in the history for the first line beginning with what you have typed so far. After predict-off, editing returns to normal for the line found. In fact, you often don't even need to use predict-off, because if the line doesn't match something in the history, adding a key performs standard completion, and then inserts itself if no completions were found. However, editing in the middle of a line is liable to confuse prediction; see the toggle style below.

With the function based completion system (which is needed for this), you should be able to type TAB at almost any point to advance the cursor to the next "interesting" character position (usually the end of the current word, but sometimes somewhere in the middle of the word). And of course as soon as the entire line is what you want, you can accept with return, without needing to move the cursor to the end first.

The first time predict-on is used, it creates several additional widget functions:

delete-backward-and-predict

Replaces the backward-delete-char widget. You do not need to bind this yourself.

insert-and-predict

Implements predictive typing by replacing the self-insert widget. You do not need to bind this yourself.

predict-off

Turns off predictive typing.

Although you autoload only the predict-on function, it is necessary to create a keybinding for predict-off as well.

zle -N predict-on zle -N predict-off bindkey '^X^Z' predict-on bindkey '^Z' predict-off

smart-insert-last-word

This function may replace the insert-last-word widget, like so:

zle -N insert-last-word smart-insert-last-word

With a numeric prefix, it behaves like insert-last-word, except that words in comments are ignored when INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS is set.

Otherwise, the rightmost "interesting" word from the previous command is found and inserted. The default definition of "interesting" is that the word contains at least one alphabetic character, slash, or backslash. This definition may be overridden by use of the match style. The context used to look up the style is the widget name, so usually the context is :insert-last-word. However, you can bind this function to different widgets to use different patterns:

zle -N insert-last-assignment smart-insert-last-word zstyle :insert-last-assignment match '[[:alpha:]][][[:alnum:]]#=*' bindkey '\e=' insert-last-assignment

23.4.2 Styles

The behavior of several of the above widgets can be controlled by the use of the zstyle mechanism. In particular, widgets that interact with the completion system pass along their context to any completions that they invoke.

break-keys

This style is used by the incremental-complete-word widget. Its value should be a pattern, and all keys matching this pattern will cause the widget to stop incremental completion without the key having any further effect. Like all styles used directly by incremental-complete-word, this style is looked up using the context `:incremental'.

completer

The incremental-complete-word and insert-and-predict widgets set up their top-level context name before calling completion. This allows one to define different sets of completer functions for normal completion and for these widgets. For example, to use completion, approximation and correction for normal completion, completion and correction for incremental completion and only completion for prediction one could use:

zstyle ':completion:*' completer \ _complete _correct _approximate zstyle ':completion:incremental:*' completer \ _complete _correct zstyle ':completion:predict:*' completer \ _complete

It is a good idea to restrict the completers used in prediction, because they may be automatically invoked as you type. The _list and _menu completers should never be used with prediction. The _approximate, _correct, _expand, and _match completers may be used, but be aware that they may change characters anywhere in the word behind the cursor, so you need to watch carefully that the result is what you intended.

cursor

The insert-and-predict widget uses this style, in the context `:predict', to decide where to place the cursor after completion has been tried. Values are:

complete

The cursor is left where it was when completion finished, but only if it is after a character equal to the one just inserted by the user. If it is after another character, this value is the same as `key'.

key

The cursor is left after the nth occurrence of the character just inserted, where n is the number of times that character appeared in the word before completion was attempted. In short, this has the effect of leaving the cursor after the character just typed even if the completion code found out that no other characters need to be inserted at that position.

Any other value for this style unconditionally leaves the cursor at the position where the completion code left it.

list

When using the incremental-complete-word widget, this style says if the matches should be listed on every key press (if they fit on the screen). Use the context prefix `:completion:incremental'.

The insert-and-predict widget uses this style to decide if the completion should be shown even if there is only one possible completion. This is done if the value of this style is the string always. In this case the context is `:predict' (not `:completion:predict').

match

This style is used by smart-insert-last-word to provide a pattern (using full EXTENDED_GLOB syntax) that matches an interesting word. The context is the name of the widget to which smart-insert-last-word is bound (see above). The default behavior of smart-insert-last-word is equivalent to:

zstyle :insert-last-word match '*[[:alpha:]/\\]*'

However, you might want to include words that contain spaces:

zstyle :insert-last-word match '*[[:alpha:][:space:]/\\]*'

Or include numbers as long as the word is at least two characters long:

zstyle :insert-last-word match '*([[:digit:]]?|[[:alpha:]/\\])*'

The above example causes redirections like "2>" to be included.

prompt

The incremental-complete-word widget shows the value of this style in the status line during incremental completion. The string value may contain any of the following substrings in the manner of the PS1 and other prompt parameters:

%c

Replaced by the name of the completer function that generated the matches (without the leading underscore).

%l

When the list style is set, replaced by `...' if the list of matches is too long to fit on the screen and with an empty string otherwise. If the list style is `false' or not set, `%l' is always removed.

%n

Replaced by the number of matches generated.

%s

Replaced by `-no match-', `-no prefix-', or an empty string if there is no completion matching the word on the line, if the matches have no common prefix different from the word on the line, or if there is such a common prefix, respectively.

%u

Replaced by the unambiguous part of all matches, if there is any, and if it is different from the word on the line.

Like `break-keys', this uses the `:incremental' context.

stop-keys

This style is used by the incremental-complete-word widget. Its value is treated similarly to the one for the break-keys style (and uses the same context: `:incremental'). However, in this case all keys matching the pattern given as its value will stop incremental completion and will then execute their usual function.

toggle

This boolean style is used by predict-on and its related widgets in the context `:predict'. If set to one of the standard `true' values, predictive typing is automatically toggled off in situations where it is unlikely to be useful, such as when editing a multi-line buffer or after moving into the middle of a line and then deleting a character. The default is to leave prediction turned on until an explicit call to predict-off.

verbose

This boolean style is used by predict-on and its related widgets in the context `:predict'. If set to one of the standard `true' values, these widgets display a message below the prompt when the predictive state is toggled. This is most useful in combination with the toggle style. The default does not display these messages.

23.5 Other Functions

There are a large number of helpful functions in the Functions/Misc directory of the zsh distribution. Most are very simple and do not require documentation here, but a few are worthy of special mention.

23.5.1 Descriptions

colors

This function initializes several associative arrays to map color names to (and from) the ANSI standard eight-color terminal codes. These are used by the prompt theme system (23.3 Prompt Themes). You seldom should need to run colors more than once.

The eight base colors are: black, red, green, yellow, blue, magenta, cyan, and white. Each of these has codes for foreground and background. In addition there are eight intensity attributes: bold, faint, standout, underline, blink, reverse, and conceal. Finally, there are six codes used to negate attributes: none (reset all attributes to the defaults), normal (neither bold nor faint), no-standout, no-underline, no-blink, and no-reverse.

Some terminals do not support all combinations of colors and intensities.

The associative arrays are:

color

colour

Map all the color names to their integer codes, and integer codes to the color names. The eight base names map to the foreground color codes, as do names prefixed with `fg-', such as `fg-red'. Names prefixed with `bg-', such as `bg-blue', refer to the background codes. The reverse mapping from code to color yields base name for foreground codes and the bg- form for backgrounds.

Although it is a misnomer to call them `colors', these arrays also map the other fourteen attributes from names to codes and codes to names.

fg

fg_bold

fg_no_bold

Map the eight basic color names to ANSI terminal escape sequences that set the corresponding foreground text properties. The fg sequences change the color without changing the eight intensity attributes.

bg

bg_bold

bg_no_bold

Map the eight basic color names to ANSI terminal escape sequences that set the corresponding background properties. The bg sequences change the color without changing the eight intensity attributes.

In addition, the scalar parameters reset_color and bold_color are set to the ANSI terminal escapes that turn off all attributes and turn on bold intensity, respectively.

fned name

Same as zed -f. This function does not appear in the zsh distribution, but can be created by linking zed to the name fned in some directory in your fpath.

is-at-least needed [ present ]

Perform a greater-than-or-equal-to comparison of two strings having the format of a zsh version number; that is, a string of numbers and text with segments separated by dots or dashes. If the present string is not provided, $ZSH_VERSION is used. Segments are paired left-to-right in the two strings with leading non-number parts ignored. If one string has fewer segments than the other, the missing segments are considered zero.

This is useful in startup files to set options and other state that are not available in all versions of zsh.

is-at-least 3.1.6-15 && setopt NO_GLOBAL_RCS is-at-least 3.1.0 && setopt HIST_REDUCE_BLANKS is-at-least 2.6-17 || print "You can't use is-at-least here."

nslookup [ arg ... ]

This wrapper function for the nslookup command requires the zsh/zpty module (see 21.22 The zsh/zpty Module). It behaves exactly like the standard nslookup except that it provides customizable prompts (including a right-side prompt) and completion of nslookup commands, host names, etc. (if you use the function-based completion system). Completion styles may be set with the context prefix `:completion:nslookup'.

See also the pager, prompt and rprompt styles below.

run-help

See `Accessing On-Line Help' (23.2 Utilities).

zed [ -f ] name

This function uses the ZLE editor to edit a file or function. It rebinds the return key to insert a line break, and adds bindings for `^X^W' in the emacs keymap and `ZZ' in the vicmd keymap to accept (and therefore write, in the case of a file) the edited file or function. Keybindings are otherwise the standard ones; completion is available, and styles may be set with the context prefix `:completion:zed'.

Only one name argument is recognized (additional arguments are ignored). If the -f option is given, the name is taken to be that of a function; if the function is marked for autoloading, zed searches for it in the fpath and loads it. Note that functions edited this way are installed into the current shell, but not written back to the autoload file.

Without -f, name is the path name of the file to edit, which need not exist; it is created on write, if necessary.

zcp [ -finqQvw ] srcpat dest

zln [ -finqQsvw ] srcpat dest

Same as zmv -C and zmv -L, respectively. These functions do not appear in the zsh distribution, but can be created by linking zmv to the names zcp and zln in some directory in your fpath.

zkbd

See `Keyboard Definition' (23.2 Utilities).

zmv [ -finqQsvw ] [ -C | -L | -M | -p program ] [ -o optstring ] srcpat dest

Move (usually, rename) files matching the pattern srcpat to corresponding files having names of the form given by dest, where srcpat contains parentheses surrounding patterns which will be replaced in turn by $1, $2, ... in dest. For example,

zmv '(*).lis' '$1.txt'

renames `foo.lis' to `foo.txt', `my.old.stuff.lis' to `my.old.stuff.txt', and so on.

The pattern is always treated as an EXTENDED_GLOB pattern. Any file whose name is not changed by the substitution is simply ignored. Any error (a substitution resulted in an empty string, two substitutions gave the same result, the destination was an existing regular file and -f was not given) causes the entire function to abort without doing anything.

Options:

-f

Force overwriting of destination files. Not currently passed down to the mv/cp/ln command due to vagaries of implementations (but you can use -o-f to do that).

-i

Interactive: show each line to be executed and ask the user whether to execute it. `Y' or `y' will execute it, anything else will skip it. Note that you just need to type one character.

-n

No execution: print what would happen, but don't do it.

-q

Turn bare glob qualifiers off: now assumed by default, so this has no effect.

-Q

Force bare glob qualifiers on. Don't turn this on unless you are actually using glob qualifiers in a pattern.

-s

Symbolic, passed down to ln; only works with -L.

-v

Verbose: print each command as it's being executed.

-w

Pick out wildcard parts of the pattern, as described above, and implicitly add parentheses for referring to them.

-C

-L

-M

Force cp, ln or mv, respectively, regardless of the name of the function.

-p program

Call program instead of cp, ln or mv. Whatever it does, it should at least understand the form

program -- oldname newname

where oldname and newname are filenames generated by zmv.

-o optstring

The optstring is split into words and passed down verbatim to the cp, ln or mv command called to perform the work. It should probably begin with a `-'.

For more complete examples and other implementation details, see the zmv source file, usually located in one of the directories named in your fpath, or in Functions/Misc/zmv in the zsh distribution.

zrecompile

See `Recompiling Functions' (23.2 Utilities).

zstyle+ context style value [ + subcontext style value ... ]

This makes defining styles a bit simpler by using a single `+' as a special token that allows you to append a context name to the previously used context name. Like this:

zstyle+ ':foo:bar' style1 value1 \ + ':baz' style2 value2 \ + ':frob' style3 value3

This defines `style1' with `value1' for the context :foo:bar as usual, but it also defines `style2' with `value2' for the context :foo:bar:baz and `style3' with `value3' for :foo:bar:frob. Any subcontext may be the empty string to re-use the first context unchanged.

23.5.2 Styles

insert-tab

The zed function sets this style in context `:completion:zed:*' to turn off completion when TAB is typed at the beginning of a line. You may override this by setting your own value for this context and style.

pager

The nslookup function looks up this style in the context `:nslookup' to determine the program used to display output that does not fit on a single screen.

prompt

rprompt

The nslookup function looks up this style in the context `:nslookup' to set the prompt and the right-side prompt, respectively. The usual expansions for the PS1 and RPS1 parameters may be used (see 12. Prompt Expansion).