3.2. Aliases

If you have used UNIX for any length of time you will have noticed that there are many commands available and that some of them have cryptic names. Sometimes the commands you use the most have a string of options and arguments that need to be specified. Wouldn't it be nice if there was a feature that let you rename the commands or allowed you to type in something simple instead of half a dozen options? Fortunately, bash provides such a feature: the alias.^[2]

^[2] C shell users should note that the bash alias feature does not support arguments in alias expansions, as C shell aliases do. This functionality is provided by functions, which we'll look at in Chapter 4.

Aliases can be defined on the command line, in your .bash_profile, or in your .bashrc, using this form:

alias name=command

This syntax specifies that name is an alias for command. Whenever you type name as a command, bash will substitute command in its place when it executes the line. Notice that there are no spaces on either side of the equal sign (=); this is the required syntax.

There are a few basic ways to use an alias. The first, and simplest, is as a more mnemonic name for an existing command. Many commonly used UNIX commands have names that are poor mnemonics and are therefore excellent candidates for aliasing, the classic example being:

alias search=grep

grep, the UNIX file-searching utility, was named as an acronym for something like "Generalized Regular Expression Parser."^[3] This acronym may mean something to a computer scientist, but not to the office administrator who has to find Fred in a list of phone numbers. If you have to find Fred and you have the word search defined as an alias for grep, you can type:

^[3] Another theory has it that grep stands for the command "g/re/p", in the old ed text editor, which does essentially the same thing as grep.

$ search Fred phonelist

Some people who aren't particularly good typists like to use aliases for typographical errors they make often. For example:

alias emcas=emacs

alias mali=mail

alias gerp=grep

This can be handy, but we feel you're probably better off suffering with the error message and getting the correct spelling under your fingers. Another common way to use an alias is as a shorthand for a longer command string. For example, you may have a directory to which you need to go often. It's buried deep in your directory hierarchy, so you want to set up an alias that will allow you to cd there without typing (or even remembering) the entire pathname:

alias cdvoy='cd sipp/demo/animation/voyager'

Notice the quotes around the full cd command; these are necessary if the string being aliased consists of more than one word.^[4]

^[4] This contrasts with C shell aliases, in which the quotes aren't required.

As another example, a useful option to the ls command is -F: it puts a slash (/) after directory files and an asterisk (*) after executable files. Since typing a dash followed by a capital letter is inconvenient, many people define an alias like this:

alias lf='ls -F'

A few things about aliases are important to remember. First, bash makes a textual substitution of the alias for that which it is aliasing; it may help to imagine bash passing your command through a text editor or word processor and issuing a "change" or "substitute" command before interpreting and executing it. Any special characters (such as wildcards like * and ?) that result when the alias is expanded are interpreted properly by the shell.^[5] For example, to make it easier to print all of the files in your directory, you could define the alias:

^[5] An important corollary: wildcards and other special characters cannot be used in the names of aliases, i.e., on the left side of the equal sign.

alias printall='pr * | lpr'

Second, keep in mind that aliases are recursive, which means that it is possible to alias an alias. A legitimate objection to the previous example is that the alias, while mnemonic, is too long and doesn't save enough typing. If we want to keep this alias but add a shorter abbreviation, we could define:

alias pa=printall

With recursive aliasing available it would seem possible to create an infinite loop:

alias ls='ls -l'

bash ensures that this loop cannot happen, because only the first word of the replacement text is checked for further aliasing; if that word is identical to the alias being expanded, it is not expanded a second time. The above command will work as expected (typing ls produces a long list with permissions, sizes, owners, etc.), while in more meaningless situations such as:

alias listfile=ls

alias ls=listfile

the alias listfile is ignored.

Aliases can be used only for the beginning of a command string—albeit with certain exceptions. In the cd example above, you might want to define an alias for the directory name alone, not for the entire command. But if you define:

alias anim=sipp/demo/animation/voyager

and then type cd anim, bash will probably print a message like anim: No such file or directory.

An obscure feature of bash's alias facility—one not present in the analogous C shell feature—provides a way around this problem. If the value of an alias (the right side of the equal sign) ends in a blank, then bash tries to do alias substitution on the next word on the command line. To make the value of an alias end in a blank, you need to surround it with quotes.

Here is how you would use this capability to allow aliases for directory names, at least for use with the cd command. Just define:

alias cd='cd '

This causes bash to search for an alias for the directory name argument to cd, which in the previous example would enable it to expand the alias anim correctly.

Another way to define a directory variable for use with the cd command is to use the environment variable cdable_vars, discussed later in this chapter.

Finally, there are a few useful adjuncts to the basic alias command. If you type alias name without an equal sign (=) and value, the shell will print the alias's value or alias name not found if it is undefined. If you type alias without any arguments, you get a list of all the aliases you have defined. The command unalias name removes any alias definition for its argument.

Aliases are very handy for creating a comfortable environment, but they have essentially been superseded by shell scripts and functions, which we will look at in the next chapter. These give you everything aliases do plus much more, so if you become proficient at them, you may find that you don't need aliases anymore. However, aliases are ideal for novices who find UNIX to be a rather forbidding place, full of terseness and devoid of good mnemonics. Chapter 4 shows the order of precedence when, for example, an alias and a function have the same name.