Minishell

Overview

Minishell is a minimalistic yet powerful shell designed to provide an intuitive and efficient command-line interface. The project is crafted in C, emphasizing simplicity and performance while incorporating creative features that enhance the user experience.

Key Features

• Custom Command Parsing: The lexer and parser components have been meticulously designed to handle a variety of command inputs, providing robust error handling and feedback.
• Built-in Commands: Includes a set of built-in commands that replicate the functionality of common shell commands, ensuring users have access to essential tools directly within Minishell.
• Pipeline and Redirection: Support for command pipelines and I/O redirection allows users to chain commands and manage input/output streams seamlessly.
• Signal Handling: Minishell gracefully handles signals, ensuring that processes can be managed effectively without disrupting the user experience.

Creative Aspects

• User-Centric Design: Every aspect of Minishell is tailored to enhance usability. From the intuitive command syntax to the responsive error messages, the user experience is at the forefront.
• Modular Code Structure: The project is organized into well-defined modules, making it easy to extend and maintain. This modularity also encourages contributions and experimentation.
• Educational Value: Minishell serves as an excellent learning tool for those interested in system programming and shell development. The codebase is well-documented, providing insights into the inner workings of a shell. Also, this project was built using libft as a foundational library, which adds an extra layer of challenge compared to relying on native C library functions. By using libft, we worked within a custom, limited set of functions, requiring careful adaptation and creative problem-solving to implement features typically handled by standard C libraries. You can explore the full libft repository to understand the foundational tools we used to build minishell: Libft repository.
• Aesthetic Touches: While functionality is paramount, Minishell also pays attention to aesthetics. The command prompt and output are designed to be visually appealing, making the user interaction pleasant.

Getting Started

Prerequisites

• A C compiler (e.g., GCC)
• Make

Installation

Clone the repository and compile the source code using Make:

git clone https://github.com/Gillian-Delvigne/minishell.git
cd minishell
make

Usage

Run the shell:

./minishell

Start experimenting with commands and explore the built-in functionalities.