lc-listcommands-bash

A bash script for providing a "list commands previously used in this directory" command.

The Problem and Solution

I can never remember the exact commands I need to run whenever I'm in certain directories. Things like virtualenv/bin/activate, apache/bin/restart, ./manage.py runserver, git clone git@github.com:obscure-git-repository.git and hundreds of other miscellaneous commands that I do during development and sysadmining. I could look in my bash_history, but it would list all commands and not filter it by my current directory.

I routintely type 'ls' when I enter directories, and I wished I could do something like 'lc' for "list commands I've used in this directory". Finally, at the Seattle beer&&code meetup, a small script was born.

Usage

Do some commands:

$ cd lc-listcommands-bash/
$ ls
$ vim README.md
$ git status
$ git add listcommands.sh README.md
$ git status

List commands previously executed in that directory, without duplicates:

$ lc
List commands run in /Users/peterconerly/code/lc-listcommands-bash
ls
vim README.md
git status
git add listcommands.sh

Installation

In your .bashrc or .bash_profile, add the line:

source /path/to/listcommands.sh

and reload your shell.

How does it work?

listcommands.sh uses PROMPT_COMMAND to make a seperate ~/.lc_history file, which records any new commands and what location it's in. The custom history in PROMPT_COMMAND was inspired by this stackoverflow answer by Dennis Williamson.

If you are already using PROMPT_COMMAND then this may not work for you.

Because listcommands.sh is recording a new history with location, the 'lc' command will only populate commands you have executed after installing listcommands.sh.

listcommands.sh has been tested on OSX 10.7.4 with bash version: GNU bash, version 3.2.48(1)-release (x86_64-apple-darwin11)

Upcoming Features

I'm all ears for suggestions on how to impliment these, or for other features that should be added. I'm a bash scripting novice and could use all the advice I can get!

1. Limit lc to x most recent commands, such as:

    $ lc 2
    List 2 most recent command(s) run in /Users/peterconerly/code/lc-listcommands-bash
    git add listcommands.sh README.md
    git status
   

2. Allow users to cycle through recent commands used in their local directory, similar to how bash history works.
   Usage would be: [Shift] (or another meta key) + [Up] to cycle to the most recent command.

3. Make listcommands.sh's PROMPT_COMMAND play nice with other custom PROMPT_COMMAND.

4. Add a 10k line limit to ~/.lc_history file