Re: Handling of Zero-Width escapes in PS1

[Chet Ramey]

On 5/4/19 1:38 PM, benbe1987@gmx.net wrote:

> Bash Version: 4.4
> Patch Level: 19
> Release Status: release
> 
> Description:
>       When setting up a complex PS1 prompt where parts of the
>       prompt is expanded on every new prompt displayed by bash
>       the escape sequences that are generated by that dynamic
>       part are handled improperly (read: not at all).
> 
>       The desired behaviour should treat such escapes for e.g.
>       the sequences \[ and \] equal both when the prompt expands
>       to stuff\[stuff\]stuff, regardless of whether this was
>       reached by "stuff$(echo \[stuff\])stuff" (\[\] handled) or
>       reached by 'stuff$(echo \[stuff\])stuff' (not handled) being
>       set as the value of PS1.

The PS1 escape sequences, including \[ and \], are processed before the
word expansions (which are optional). You could assemble the dynamic parts
of PS1 using multiple assignments with `eval' or use PROMPT_COMMAND as
Dennis suggested.

I don't have any plans to change the evaluation order.

-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
                 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    chet@case.edu    http://tiswww.cwru.edu/~chet/