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NAME
zsh - the Z shell
OVERVIEW
Because zsh contains many features, the zsh manual has been split into
a number of sections:
zsh Zsh overview (this section)
zshroadmap Informal introduction to the manual
zshmisc Anything not fitting into the other sections
zshexpn Zsh command and parameter expansion
zshparam Zsh parameters
zshoptions Zsh options
zshbuiltins Zsh built-in functions
zshzle Zsh command line editing
zshcompwid Zsh completion widgets
zshcompsys Zsh completion system
zshcompctl Zsh completion control
zshmodules Zsh loadable modules
zshcalsys Zsh built-in calendar functions
zshtcpsys Zsh built-in TCP functions
zshzftpsys Zsh built-in FTP client
zshcontrib Additional zsh functions and utilities
zshall Meta-man page containing all of the above
DESCRIPTION
Zsh is a UNIX command interpreter (shell) usable as an interactive
login shell and as a shell script command processor. Of the standard
shells, zsh most closely resembles ksh but includes many enhancements.
It does not provide compatibility with POSIX or other shells in its
default operating mode: see the section `Compatibility' below.
Zsh has command line editing, builtin spelling correction,
programmable command completion, shell functions (with autoloading), a
history mechanism, and a host of other features.
AUTHOR
Zsh was originally written by Paul Falstad. Zsh is now maintained by
the members of the zsh-workers mailing list <zsh-workers@zsh.org>.
The development is currently coordinated by Peter Stephenson
<pws@zsh.org>. The coordinator can be contacted at
<coordinator@zsh.org>, but matters relating to the code should
generally go to the mailing list.
AVAILABILITY
Zsh is available from the following HTTP and anonymous FTP site.
ftp://ftp.zsh.org/pub/
https://www.zsh.org/pub/
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The up-to-date source code is available via Git from Sourceforge. See
https://sourceforge.net/projects/zsh/ for details. A summary of
instructions for the archive can be found at
https://zsh.sourceforge.io/.
MAILING LISTS
Zsh has several mailing lists:
<zsh-announce@zsh.org>
Announcements about releases, major changes in the shell and the
monthly posting of the Zsh FAQ. (moderated)
<zsh-users@zsh.org>
User discussions.
<zsh-workers@zsh.org>
Hacking, development, bug reports and patches.
<zsh-security@zsh.org>
Private mailing list (the general public cannot subscribe to it)
for discussing bug reports with security implications, i.e.,
potential vulnerabilities.
If you find a security problem in zsh itself, please mail this
address.
To subscribe or unsubscribe, send mail to the associated
administrative address for the mailing list.
<zsh-announce-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-users-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-workers-subscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-announce-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-users-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
<zsh-workers-unsubscribe@zsh.org>
YOU ONLY NEED TO JOIN ONE OF THE MAILING LISTS AS THEY ARE NESTED.
All submissions to zsh-announce are automatically forwarded to
zsh-users. All submissions to zsh-users are automatically forwarded
to zsh-workers.
If you have problems subscribing/unsubscribing to any of the mailing
lists, send mail to <listmaster@zsh.org>.
The mailing lists are archived; the archives can be accessed via the
administrative addresses listed above. There is also a hypertext
archive available at https://www.zsh.org/mla/.
THE ZSH FAQ
Zsh has a list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ), maintained by
Peter Stephenson <pws@zsh.org>. It is regularly posted to the
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newsgroup comp.unix.shell and the zsh-announce mailing list. The
latest version can be found at any of the Zsh FTP sites, or at
https://www.zsh.org/FAQ/. The contact address for FAQ-related matters
is <faqmaster@zsh.org>.
THE ZSH WEB PAGE
Zsh has a web page which is located at https://www.zsh.org/. The
contact address for web-related matters is <webmaster@zsh.org>.
THE ZSH USERGUIDE
A userguide is currently in preparation. It is intended to complement
the manual, with explanations and hints on issues where the manual can
be cabbalistic, hierographic, or downright mystifying (for example,
the word `hierographic' does not exist). It can be viewed in its
current state at https://zsh.sourceforge.io/Guide/. At the time of
writing, chapters dealing with startup files and their contents and
the new completion system were essentially complete.
INVOCATION
The following flags are interpreted by the shell when invoked to
determine where the shell will read commands from:
-c Take the first argument as a command to execute, rather than
reading commands from a script or standard input. If any further
arguments are given, the first one is assigned to $0, rather than
being used as a positional parameter.
-i Force shell to be interactive. It is still possible to specify a
script to execute.
-s Force shell to read commands from the standard input. If the -s
flag is not present and an argument is given, the first argument
is taken to be the pathname of a script to execute.
If there are any remaining arguments after option processing, and
neither of the options -c or -s was supplied, the first argument is
taken as the file name of a script containing shell commands to be
executed. If the option PATH_SCRIPT is set, and the file name does
not contain a directory path (i.e. there is no `/' in the name), first
the current directory and then the command path given by the variable
PATH are searched for the script. If the option is not set or the
file name contains a `/' it is used directly.
After the first one or two arguments have been appropriated as
described above, the remaining arguments are assigned to the
positional parameters.
For further options, which are common to invocation and the set
builtin, see zshoptions(1).
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The long option `--emulate' followed (in a separate word) by an
emulation mode may be passed to the shell. The emulation modes are
those described for the emulate builtin, see zshbuiltins(1). The
`--emulate' option must precede any other options (which might
otherwise be overridden), but following options are honoured, so may
be used to modify the requested emulation mode. Note that certain
extra steps are taken to ensure a smooth emulation when this option is
used compared with the emulate command within the shell: for example,
variables that conflict with POSIX usage such as path are not defined
within the shell.
Options may be specified by name using the -o option. -o acts like a
single-letter option, but takes a following string as the option name.
For example,
zsh -x -o shwordsplit scr
runs the script scr, setting the XTRACE option by the corresponding
letter `-x' and the SH_WORD_SPLIT option by name. Options may be
turned off by name by using +o instead of -o. -o can be stacked up
with preceding single-letter options, so for example `-xo shwordsplit'
or `-xoshwordsplit' is equivalent to `-x -o shwordsplit'.
Options may also be specified by name in GNU long option style,
`--option-name'. When this is done, `-' characters in the option name
are permitted: they are translated into `_', and thus ignored. So,
for example, `zsh --sh-word-split' invokes zsh with the SH_WORD_SPLIT
option turned on. Like other option syntaxes, options can be turned
off by replacing the initial `-' with a `+'; thus `+-sh-word-split' is
equivalent to `--no-sh-word-split'. Unlike other option syntaxes,
GNU-style long options cannot be stacked with any other options, so
for example `-x-shwordsplit' is an error, rather than being treated
like `-x --shwordsplit'.
The special GNU-style option `--version' is handled; it sends to
standard output the shell's version information, then exits
successfully. `--help' is also handled; it sends to standard output a
list of options that can be used when invoking the shell, then exits
successfully.
Option processing may be finished, allowing following arguments that
start with `-' or `+' to be treated as normal arguments, in two ways.
Firstly, a lone `-' (or `+') as an argument by itself ends option
processing. Secondly, a special option `--' (or `+-'), which may be
specified on its own (which is the standard POSIX usage) or may be
stacked with preceding options (so `-x-' is equivalent to `-x --').
Options are not permitted to be stacked after `--' (so `-x-f' is an
error), but note the GNU-style option form discussed above, where
`--shwordsplit' is permitted and does not end option processing.
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Except when the sh/ksh emulation single-letter options are in effect,
the option `-b' (or `+b') ends option processing. `-b' is like `--',
except that further single-letter options can be stacked after the
`-b' and will take effect as normal.
COMPATIBILITY
Zsh tries to emulate sh or ksh when it is invoked as sh or ksh
respectively; more precisely, it looks at the first letter of the name
by which it was invoked, excluding any initial `r' (assumed to stand
for `restricted'), and if that is `b', `s' or `k' it will emulate sh
or ksh. Furthermore, if invoked as su (which happens on certain
systems when the shell is executed by the su command), the shell will
try to find an alternative name from the SHELL environment variable
and perform emulation based on that.
In sh and ksh compatibility modes the following parameters are not
special and not initialized by the shell: ARGC, argv, cdpath, fignore,
fpath, HISTCHARS, mailpath, MANPATH, manpath, path, prompt, PROMPT,
PROMPT2, PROMPT3, PROMPT4, psvar, status.
The usual zsh startup/shutdown scripts are not executed. Login shells
source /etc/profile followed by $HOME/.profile. If the ENV
environment variable is set on invocation, $ENV is sourced after the
profile scripts. The value of ENV is subjected to parameter
expansion, command substitution, and arithmetic expansion before being
interpreted as a pathname. Note that the PRIVILEGED option also
affects the execution of startup files.
The following options are set if the shell is invoked as sh or ksh:
NO_BAD_PATTERN, NO_BANG_HIST, NO_BG_NICE, NO_EQUALS,
NO_FUNCTION_ARGZERO, GLOB_SUBST, NO_GLOBAL_EXPORT, NO_HUP,
INTERACTIVE_COMMENTS, KSH_ARRAYS, NO_MULTIOS, NO_NOMATCH, NO_NOTIFY,
POSIX_BUILTINS, NO_PROMPT_PERCENT, RM_STAR_SILENT, SH_FILE_EXPANSION,
SH_GLOB, SH_OPTION_LETTERS, SH_WORD_SPLIT. Additionally the BSD_ECHO
and IGNORE_BRACES options are set if zsh is invoked as sh. Also, the
KSH_OPTION_PRINT, LOCAL_OPTIONS, PROMPT_BANG, PROMPT_SUBST and
SINGLE_LINE_ZLE options are set if zsh is invoked as ksh.
Please note that, whilst reasonable efforts are taken to address
incompatibilities when they arise, zsh does not guarantee complete
emulation of other shells, nor POSIX compliance. For more information
on the differences between zsh and other shells, please refer to
chapter2 of the shell FAQ, https://www.zsh.org/FAQ/.
RESTRICTED SHELL
When the basename of the command used to invoke zsh starts with the
letter `r' or the `-r' command line option is supplied at invocation,
the shell becomes restricted. Emulation mode is determined after
stripping the letter `r' from the invocation name. The following are
disabled in restricted mode:
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+ changing directories with the cd builtin
+ changing or unsetting the EGID, EUID, GID, HISTFILE, HISTSIZE,
IFS, LD_AOUT_LIBRARY_PATH, LD_AOUT_PRELOAD, LD_LIBRARY_PATH,
LD_PRELOAD, MODULE_PATH, module_path, PATH, path, SHELL, UID and
USERNAME parameters
+ specifying command names containing /
+ specifying command pathnames using hash
+ redirecting output to files
+ using the exec builtin command to replace the shell with another
command
+ using jobs -Z to overwrite the shell process' argument and
environment space
+ using the ARGV0 parameter to override argv[0] for external
commands
+ turning off restricted mode with set +r or unsetopt RESTRICTED
These restrictions are enforced after processing the startup files.
The startup files should set up PATH to point to a directory of
commands which can be safely invoked in the restricted environment.
They may also add further restrictions by disabling selected builtins.
Restricted mode can also be activated any time by setting the
RESTRICTED option. This immediately enables all the restrictions
described above even if the shell still has not processed all startup
files.
A shell Restricted Mode is an outdated way to restrict what users may
do: modern systems have better, safer and more reliable ways to
confine user actions, such as chroot jails, containers and zones.
A restricted shell is very difficult to implement safely. The feature
may be removed in a future version of zsh.
It is important to realise that the restrictions only apply to the
shell, not to the commands it runs (except for some shell builtins).
While a restricted shell can only run the restricted list of commands
accessible via the predefined `PATH' variable, it does not prevent
those commands from running any other command.
As an example, if `env' is among the list of allowed commands, then it
allows the user to run any command as `env' is not a shell builtin
command and can run arbitrary executables.
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So when implementing a restricted shell framework it is important to
be fully aware of what actions each of the allowed commands or
features (which may be regarded as modules) can perform.
Many commands can have their behaviour affected by environment
variables. Except for the few listed above, zsh does not restrict the
setting of environment variables.
If a `perl', `python', `bash', or other general purpose interpreted
script it treated as a restricted command, the user can work around
the restriction by setting specially crafted `PERL5LIB', `PYTHONPATH',
`BASHENV' (etc.) environment variables. On GNU systems, any command
can be made to run arbitrary code when performing character set
conversion (including zsh itself) by setting a `GCONV_PATH'
environment variable. Those are only a few examples.
Bear in mind that, contrary to some other shells, `readonly' is not a
security feature in zsh as it can be undone and so cannot be used to
mitigate the above.
A restricted shell only works if the allowed commands are few and
carefully written so as not to grant more access to users than
intended. It is also important to restrict what zsh module the user
may load as some of them, such as `zsh/system', `zsh/mapfile' and
`zsh/files', allow bypassing most of the restrictions.
STARTUP/SHUTDOWN FILES
Commands are first read from /etc/zshenv; this cannot be overridden.
Subsequent behaviour is modified by the RCS and GLOBAL_RCS options;
the former affects all startup files, while the second only affects
global startup files (those shown here with an path starting with a
/). If one of the options is unset at any point, any subsequent
startup file(s) of the corresponding type will not be read. It is
also possible for a file in $ZDOTDIR to re-enable GLOBAL_RCS. Both RCS
and GLOBAL_RCS are set by default.
Commands are then read from $ZDOTDIR/.zshenv. If the shell is a login
shell, commands are read from /etc/zprofile and then
$ZDOTDIR/.zprofile. Then, if the shell is interactive, commands are
read from /etc/zshrc and then $ZDOTDIR/.zshrc. Finally, if the shell
is a login shell, /etc/zlogin and $ZDOTDIR/.zlogin are read.
When a login shell exits, the files $ZDOTDIR/.zlogout and then
/etc/zlogout are read. This happens with either an explicit exit via
the exit or logout commands, or an implicit exit by reading
end-of-file from the terminal. However, if the shell terminates due
to exec'ing another process, the logout files are not read. These are
also affected by the RCS and GLOBAL_RCS options. Note also that the
RCS option affects the saving of history files, i.e. if RCS is unset
when the shell exits, no history file will be saved.
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If ZDOTDIR is unset, HOME is used instead. Files listed above as
being in /etc may be in another directory, depending on the
installation.
As /etc/zshenv is run for all instances of zsh, it is important that
it be kept as small as possible. In particular, it is a good idea to
put code that does not need to be run for every single shell behind a
test of the form `if [[ -o rcs ]]; then ...' so that it will not be
executed when zsh is invoked with the `-f' option.
Any of these files may be pre-compiled with the zcompile builtin
command (see zshbuiltins(1)). If a compiled file exists (named for
the original file plus the .zwc extension) and it is newer than the
original file, the compiled file will be used instead.
FILES
$ZDOTDIR/.zshenv
$ZDOTDIR/.zprofile
$ZDOTDIR/.zshrc
$ZDOTDIR/.zlogin
$ZDOTDIR/.zlogout
${TMPPREFIX}* (default is /tmp/zsh*)
/etc/zshenv
/etc/zprofile
/etc/zshrc
/etc/zlogin
/etc/zlogout (installation-specific - /etc is the default)
SEE ALSO
sh(1), csh(1), tcsh(1), rc(1), bash(1), ksh(1), zshall(1),
zshbuiltins(1), zshcalsys(1), zshcompwid(1), zshcompsys(1),
zshcompctl(1), zshcontrib(1), zshexpn(1), zshmisc(1), zshmodules(1),
zshoptions(1), zshparam(1), zshroadmap(1), zshtcpsys(1),
zshzftpsys(1), zshzle(1)
IEEE Standard for information Technology - Portable Operating System
Interface (POSIX) - Part 2: Shell and Utilities, IEEE Inc, 1993, ISBN
1-55937-255-9.
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