Awesome

<div align="center">Shell-Color-Prompt-Tool</div>

Customize your Zsh/Bash terminal prompt with a menu-style selection guide. Choose what info you want the prompt to display (username, hostname, symbols, etc.) and customize their foreground and background colors—all from the command line. Use brighter colors for extra pop!

Install as a Command - "scpt" (man page included):

URL="https://github.com/kyletimmermans/shell-color-prompt-tool/releases/download/latest"; curl -q -s -S -LJO "$URL/shell-color-prompt-tool.sh" && chmod a+x shell-color-prompt-tool.sh && sudo mv shell-color-prompt-tool.sh /usr/local/bin/scpt && curl -q -s -S -LJO "$URL/scpt.1" && sudo mv scpt.1 /usr/local/share/man/man1/

Temporary Use in Current Directory:

curl -q -s -S -LJO "https://github.com/kyletimmermans/shell-color-prompt-tool/releases/download/latest/shell-color-prompt-tool.sh" && chmod +x shell-color-prompt-tool.sh

Dependencies (For the --comment-out and --omz flags to work, if you choose to use them):

Linux (Debian-based)

sudo apt install -y gawk

macOS (Homebrew)

brew install gawk gnu-sed

macOS (MacPorts)

sudo port install gawk gsed

Sample Program Walkthrough

Resulting Prompt

Demo Video

Demo Resulting Prompt

Program Flags

-u, --usage, -h, --help      Show usage/help menu

-v, --version                Get program version. Reveal if a newer version is available on
                             GitHub

--uninstall                  Undoes the "Install as a Command" installation option. It will
                             delete /usr/local/bin/scpt (program) and the associated
                             man page

--comment-out                Comment out older prompt lines in .zshrc / .bashrc
                             e.g. PROMPT= / PS1= to help prevent conflicting prompt
                             definitions

--omz                        Disables your 'Oh My Zsh' theme if you have one, which could
                             get in the way of applying your new prompt

--light-mode                 Better color contrast for the color picker menu and other
                             various portions on white/light-colored terminal backgrounds.
                             If you plan on using this flag, always put it first, before
                             all other flags/args

--no-extras                  Don't automatically add a newline to the start of the prompt
                             and a space to the end of the prompt

--separate-file              Place the prompt string in a separate file instead of putting
                             it in .zshrc / .bashrc for any reason
                             E.g. --separate-file="~/test.txt"

--no-watermarks              Don't add the "# Added by Shell-Color-Prompt-Tool" comment to
                             .zshrc / .bashrc when adding the prompt string and don't add the
                             "# Commented out by Shell-Color-Prompt-Tool" comment when
                             using --comment-out or --omz

--char-table                 Display a table of cool UTF-8 characters for copy-and-pasting
                             into prompt part choices. If you can't see the characters or
                             if they show up incorrectly, ensure that your terminal supports
                             the UTF-8 charset

Char Table

Usage Notes

[!NOTE]

• To add a number as a raw string and to not get it recognized as a menu-number choice, or to add 'n'/'N' and not exit the part selector, add a '!' before the number or 'n'/'N' e.g. '!14' yields '14' and '!n' yields 'n'

• You don't need to add a newline character at the beginning of your prompt for spacing between actual prompts, one will be added for you. Same with a space after the prompt so there's space between the prompt and inputted commands, one will automatically be added for you. This feature can be disabled with the --no-extras flag

• If you want to use the --comment-out or --omz flags, you must have 'gawk' and 'gsed' installed. On Mac, you'll need to install both. On Linux, you just need gawk, as gsed should already be your default sed version

• --comment-out and --omz can break the config if the variables that are getting commented out, are defined within things like if-statements or case-statements

• For the actual prompt string in the .zshrc / .bashrc file, some text editors like Sublime Text will show the ANSI escape characters like "\e[0;30m" as "<0x1b>". Use a text editor like Vim to show the raw text

• Fullscreen terminals will be able to fit the spacing and styling of the interactive prompt the best

• Colors may vary from system to system. When using the Custom RGB option, make sure your terminal supports TRUECOLOR (See here)

• Some terminals may not display the background color for the "Tab" part, either in the preview or the actual prompt

• If your command is too long, $RPROMPT will visually be temporarily overwritten

• $RPROMPT cannot contain newlines (\n)

• For part option "Custom Datetime", the datetime string is formatted using the 'strftime' function. See strftime(3) for more details. E.g.'%Y-%m-%d %k:%M:%S' would become: '2024-11-09 14:37:34'

• For more prompt expansion variables not listed in this program: Zsh & Bash

Reset Prompt Back to Default

Security Warning

[!CAUTION] Exercise caution when copy and pasting code from someone else and/or code that you do not understand, into any of the parts option picker. Which includes, but is not limited to, the "Custom Datetime", "Other Zsh/Bash Prompt Expansion Variable", and "Other Environment Variable" choices.

Shell prompts are fully capable of running commands and entire command pipelines.

Bad code can break your host (e.g. rm -rf something), and malicious code (e.g. reverse shell), can harm your host.

Program Workflow

graph TD;
    CST(Choose Shell Type)-- Zsh --->ZSH(Choose Prompt Type: $PROMPT, $RPROMPT, or Both)
    ZSH-->CHP(Choose Parts #40;Variables, Symbols, etc.#41;)
    CST-- Bash ---CHP
    CHP-->CSC(Choose Colors #40;Foreground and Background#41; for the Chosen Parts)
    CSC-->Preview(Preview the Prompt Before Saving)
    Preview-->Save(Save Prompt #40;Y/n#41;?)

    style CST stroke:#e81416
    style ZSH stroke:#ffa500
    style CHP stroke:#faeb36
    style CSC stroke:#79c314
    style Preview stroke:#487de7
    style Save stroke:#70369d

Changelog

Prompt Inspiration

Need inspiration and ideas for cool prompts? Check out this list!

<ins>Zsh:</ins>

• https://github.com/ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh/wiki/Themes
• https://github.com/romkatv/powerlevel10k

<ins>Bash</ins>:

• https://github.com/ohmybash/oh-my-bash/wiki/Themes
• https://github.com/win0err/aphrodite-terminal-theme

FAQ

<ins>What’s the point of making this, hasn’t this been done already?</ins>

I've seen a few programs, mainly web-based ones, that help you to build out and customize shell prompts. I wanted to make something that was native to the shell environment, no need to copy from the website and then needing to paste into your config on the command line. I wanted it to be all in one place. There's a few other features I wanted to see in a prompt customization program as well:

• Show the user all of the options they have for customizing their prompt, which includes all of the terminal variables (username, hostname, etc.) and many of the colors available
• Simple menu-style system for choosing which components and colors you'd like to be in the prompt
• No additional software required (besides for 2 flags, potentially) - Most Unix-based systems (Linux, macOS) already have Bash pre-installed, so there’s no need to install any additional interpreters or libraries
• No need to edit the .bashrc / .zshrc file at all, no need to copy and paste the variable in there. The program will put it in there for you

<ins>Will you support other shells?</ins>

The plan is to potentially support other shells in the future. A big refactor would be needed to be able to support other ones. Right now Zsh and Bash are the main shells that are supported, but if you put in an issue or even submit a PR, I can work with you to add support for another shell.

<ins>Why does the program use a Bash shebang instead of Zsh, sh, or another shell?</ins>

A Bash shebang is used because it covers both Bash and Zsh users. Almost everyone that has Zsh, has Bash installed. However, not everyone that has Bash, has Zsh installed. Therefore, the Bash shebang covers all use cases. We can't use the "sh" shebang because that could invoke a shell that's not Bash or Zsh.

<ins>How do I get a multiline $RPROMPT like with Powerlevel10k or <i>{insert OhMyZsh theme here}</i>?</ins>

What themes like Powerlevel10k are doing to get the multiline RPROMPT effect, is using a print statement that runs every time, just before the PROMPT and RPROMPT are drawn. The extra line is not actually a part of the $RPROMPT variable, it just appears to be with some clever programming. romkatv, who created Powerlevel10k, has a code snippet here that explains how its done.

<ins>Does this project have anything to do with AppleScript and its .scpt files?</ins>

Nope! I realized too late after naming this project that .scpt files existed.