Changing loging shell and/or terminal prompt

Changing loging shell and/or terminal prompt - Printable Version

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Changing loging shell and/or terminal prompt - Moltke - 09-17-2018

Hi everyone! Hope you're all having a nice life! Smile

Today I'd like to share with you some basics on how to change the login shell and/or terminal prompt. It's a completely and entirely safe procedure which will make no harm to your system, because that's how smart Linux is Smile

However, if it makes you feel better/safer, you can make a backup of your .bashrc file located in your home folder

Code:
$ cp ~.bashrc .bashrc.bak

but it's really not neccesary. Like I said, Linux's smart enough not to let you screw things up ;D

In order to change your login shell simply type in your terminal:

Code:
$ chsh -l

If the command above doesn't work you may use:

Code:
$ cat /etc/shells

One or the other will list all installed/available shells in your system, to change the current shell for one of those available type:

Code:
$ chsh -s desired shell's name

for example

Code:
chsh -s /bin/zsh

You'll be asked to type your password, do so then logout/login back, open a terminal and type:

Code:
echo $SHELL

your new shell's name should be displayed. In our example it'd show:

Code:
$ /bin/zsh

Changing the terminal prompt is quite easy using the command

Code:
$ PS1=ARGS

for example, this is how my terminal prompt is configured:

Code:
$ PS1='\[\e[1;36m\][\t \u \[\e[0m\]\W \$]'

where; \e= An ASCII escape character (033), 1;36m\= bold font and cyan color, \t= current time, \u= current logged user, \W= current working directory, \$= current prompt symbol.
resulting in this:

[Image: 25ewhhh.jpg]

However, this is only temporary and it will be back to defaults in your next login, if you want to make it permanent edit your .bashrc file to make it so:

Code:
$ nano .bashrc #change nano for your preferred editor, i.e; vi

and add something like this: export PS1='\[\e[1;36m\][\t \u \[\e[0m\]\W \$] '

Well, that's it. This is the basics for changing the login shell and/or terminal prompt. Here's a couple of links to some very instructional sites/articles on these topics
https://bash.cyberciti.biz/guide/Changing_bash_prompt
https://wiki.archlinux.org/index.php/Command-line_shell#Alternative_shells

Hope you find this helpful! Smile

Re: Changing loging shell and/or terminal prompt - does not work - thomasd - 06-26-2019

I've started using Linux Lite and the "pretty" bash prompt is driving me crazy because I cannot change it.

The instructions in this post don't work, no mater what I do, PS1 stays set.

Code:
 thomasd  ~  PS1="Foo : "

 thomasd  ~  echo $PS1

\[\] thomasd \[\] \[\]~ \[\] \[\]

 thomasd  ~  

doing export has the same effect:

Code:
 thomasd  ~  export PS1="Foo : "

 thomasd  ~  echo $PS1

\[\] thomasd \[\] \[\]~ \[\] \[\]

 thomasd  ~  

Re: Changing loging shell and/or terminal prompt - valtam - 06-27-2019

Paste your .bashrc please.