I have a script named
din my PATH and it contains this:("$@" > /dev/null 2>&1 &)It allows me to run any program in a fully detached state in a way that works even if the terminal that started the program closes, and it’s as simple as
d <command>.good idea, I’ve been manually typing out variations of this as needed for years.
How does this even work? I get the redirection part, but how is the command executed in a detached state?
()creates a subshell, and&runs the command in background. The$@means everything after the first argument, so the<command>is executed like a normal command. I am not sure why this works, but it has worked more consistently thannohup,disown, and it’s a lot shorter than most other solutions.
Shouldn’t you end with
& disownto fully detach?IIRC
disownis a shell built-in command, so its use is a bit limited. Not sure if&is also a built-in, but I founddisownto not work in some situations. Besides, it’s shorter.shell built-in command
After looking into it a bit more, its at least a builtin for
bashbut is otherwise not POSIX. I guessnohup ... &would be the POSIX compliant equivalent, though still not a builtin.Its my understanding that
&backgrounds, not necessarily detaches, a process – if the parent process closes, I think the background tasks would still bewait()ed on, if only using&.
xkill :-(
grep, sed, awk, and find
What do y’all use awk for really? 20 of using Linux, I’ve never had to use awk. And I’ve done a looot of scripting in my days. Anything from building my own clone of polybar using eww (with loads of scripts underneath), to automated systems for bulk handling of student assignments back at uni when I used to help out with grading and such.
What’s awk good for that other standard utilities can’t do?
I’ve been using Linux for 25 years,
awkis a more recent addition to my arsenal, but rapidly becoming more and more useful.For example,
awkis extremely helpful if you want to rearrange columns, do math on columns, essentially do things that would take multiple lines ofbashwithcutandread.
When I’m in some subdirectory of a git repository, I use this command to jump to the repo root:
alias gtop="cd \$(git rev-parse --show-toplevel)"What I do with all git related aliases is I alias git to just
gin the shell. Then for any alias I want that uses git I just put that alias in the global git config under the alias section.This avoids polluting the shell with a bunch of git-specific aliases. Just the one,
g.I certainly see the value in this strategy! But I’m not going to give up my top-level aliases. I enjoy saving two keystrokes too much!
Here are my most used aliases (these ones use Nushell syntax):
alias st = git status alias sw = git switch alias ci = git commit alias lg = git log --color --graph '--pretty=format:%Cred%h%Creset -%C(yellow)%d%Creset %s %Cgreen(%cr) %C(bold blue)<%an>%Creset' --abbrev-commit alias push = git pushI was also delighted to learn that I could get the same short aliases for corresponding fugitive commands in vim/neovim using the vim-alias plugin:
-- This is a lazy.nvim plugin module return { 'Konfekt/vim-alias', config = function() -- Shortcuts for git operations to match some of the shell aliases I have. -- For example, `:sw ` expands to `:Git switch ` vim.cmd [[Alias sw Git\ switch]] vim.cmd [[Alias ci Git\ commit]] vim.cmd [[Alias pull Git\ pull]] vim.cmd [[Alias push Git\ push]] vim.cmd [[Alias show Git\ show]] vim.cmd [[Alias re Git\ restore]] vim.cmd [[Alias lg GV]] end, }Fugitive is very nice for integrating git workflows in the editor, and its commands have very nice tab completion for branches and such.
two keystrokes
For me I’d be saving one keystroke. Status for me would be
g s,g cfor commit, and so on. Single letter aliases for the most common commands, two letters for less common in a conflict. 😁But these days since a few years back I just use lazygit (aliased to
lgbtw, lol).Everything in lazygit is basically just single keystrokes also.
cfor commit, etc. Very handy.Fugitive
Cool beans, sounds like a good tool! I’m on team Helix since a few years, after being a vim/nvim user for about a decade, and emacs a couple years before that. Helix’s paradigm just makes so much sense. 🎯👌 Jumping around symbols intra-file and inter-file, and LSP support built-in, no fussing. Worth a try for a few weeks if you ask me.







