UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

guys

can any one help me how to set top arrow to get the history of last used commands.I am using ksh

It really depends on version of your ksh and your system/terminal (emulator) you use.

well this is what I have .I did a tty and

/dev/pts/1


but in general how do we set that option

Well... My daily English exercise

The easy way: try to put in your "~/.profile" this lines:

Code:

set -o emacs
alias __A=`echo "\020"`     # up arrow = ^p = back a command
alias __B=`echo "\016"`     # down arrow = ^n = down a command
alias __C=`echo "\006"`     # right arrow = ^f = forward a character
alias __D=`echo "\002"`     # left arrow = ^b = back a character

If this wouldn't work there is always a hard way.

1. You should know what key sequence your cursor keys send. The most terminal emulators send
<ESC>[A - up
<ESC>[B - down
<ESC>[C - right
<ESC>[D - left
But it may be different for your terminal (and they are very different, for example, for PgDn, PgUp, etc.)
Another variant they cand send <ESC>OA, <ESC>OB, etc...
You can try to check this pressing <CTRL>V key and then <Up> cursor key. If it doesn't work (but I believe it should) you can try run "cat" and use the same combination (it's necessary that your kernel supports lnext control character - maybe you can see this with "stty -a" command). The last resort is to use "vi" and use again this combination in input mode.
If you see some output after this key pressing it is should be like this: "^[[A" The first two keys are actually the one <ESC> key.

2. Then you need to learn what file you can use to write your settings. This is really depends on your shell. If you login in text console then to change ".profile" in your home directory would be enough. But if you use some kind of DE, then it may be ".kshrc" (for the latest ksh93) or ".mkshrs" (for mksh) or more likely you need to set your ENV variable to the name of your .rc (run commands) file in your .profile or something else (it depens on you system - it can be "~/.pam_environment", for example). Try to add this in your "~/.profile":

Code:

ENV="$HOME/.kshrc"
export ENV

Then relogin and see what "echo $ENV" prints.

3. Now the final part. At the first add to your "rc" or ".profile"

Code:

set -o emacs

Then your keys in ksh will act like keys in emacs editor. This mode is much more intuitive for novices. Even if you know or learn vi, emacs mode for shell is better choice. And I believe it is more hard (if possible) to assign cursor keys to work in ksh vi mode.

I assume that your attempt with "alias __A" doesn't work. So you should use some black magic:

Code:

trap '.sh.edchar=${keymap[${.sh.edchar}]:-${.sh.edchar}}' KEYBD
keymap=(
  [$'\e[A']=$'\cp'
  [$'\e[B']=$'\cn'
  [$'\e[D']=$'\cb'
  [$'\e[C']=$'\cf'
)

Of course, you should change $'\e[A' to $'\eOA' if your terminal send these key sequences for cursor keys.

Hope, this can help.
Regards, yazu.

PS You can try to learn your ksh version using this keys: <ESC> and then <CTRL>V.