9. Configuring

Your sysadm has already provided you with a number of configuration files like .xinitrc, .bash_profile, .inputrc, and many others. The ones you may want to edit are:

• .bash_profile or .profile: read by the shell at login time. It's like LOGIN.COM;

• .bash_logout: read by the shell at logout. It's like LOGOUT.COM;

• .bashrc: read by non--login shells.

• .inputrc: this file customises the key bindings and the behaviour of the shell.

To give you an example, I'll include my .bash_profile (abridged):

# $HOME/.bash_profile # don't redefine the path if not necessary echo $PATH | grep $LOGNAME > /dev/null if [ $? != 0 ] then export PATH="$PATH:/home/$LOGNAME/bin" # add my dir to the PATH fi export PS1='LOGNAME:\w\$ ' export PS2='Continued...>' # aliases alias bin="cd ~/bin" ; alias cp="cp -i" ; alias d="dir" alias del="delete" ; alias dir="/bin/ls $LS_OPTIONS --format=vertical" alias ed="jed" ; alias mv='mv -i' alias u="cd .." ; alias undel="undelete" # A few useful functions inst() # Install a .tar.gz archive in current directory. { gzip -dc $1 | tar xvf - } cz() # List the contents of a .zip archive. { unzip -l $* } ctgz() # List the contents of a .tar.gz archive. { for file in $* ; do gzip -dc ${file} | tar tf - done } tgz() # Create a .tgz archive a la zip. { name=$1 ; tar -cvf $1 ; shift tar -rf ${name} $* ; gzip -S .tgz ${name} }

And this is my .inputrc:

# $HOME/.inputrc # Last modified: 16 January 1997. # # This file is read by bash and defines key bindings to be used by the shell; # what follows fixes the keys END, HOME, and DELETE, plus accented letters. # For more information, man readline. "\e[1~": beginning-of-line "\e[3~": delete-char "\e[4~": end-of-line set bell-style visible set meta-flag On set convert-meta Off set output-meta On set horizontal-scroll-mode On set show-all-if-ambiguous On # (F1 .. F5) are "\e[[A" ... "\e[[E" "\e[[A": "info "