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Settings
NOTE: unless specified otherwise, these variables need to be declared before Oh My Zsh is sourced in your
.zshrc
file.
For other settings:
- For a plugin, look up the plugin README.
- For a theme, look up the
<theme_name>.zsh-theme
file.
Main settings
These are the main variables which control Oh My Zsh. Some are required and some are optional; that is specified for each setting.
ZSH
(Required) This variable points to the path of the Oh My Zsh folder. By default, Oh My Zsh is installed in $HOME/.oh-my-zsh
, but if you ran the installer with a different path this will be set accordingly in your .zshrc
file.
export ZSH="$HOME/.oh-my-zsh"
It's important that this variable is set, but if it isn't, Oh My Zsh will try to determine its value when loading Oh My Zsh to the directory where the init script (oh-my-zsh.sh
) is located.
ZSH_THEME
(Optional) This variable holds the name of the Oh My Zsh you want to use. See Themes for valid theme names, or External themes for themes that aren't included in Oh My Zsh. For example:
ZSH_THEME=agnoster
If this is not set, Oh My Zsh will not load any themes and you'll get the default zsh prompt.
NOTE: if there's a built-in theme and a custom theme of the same name, the custom theme has preference, meaning it will be loaded instead of the built-in one.
plugins
(Optional) (array) This variable is an array containing the plugins that should be loaded when loading Oh My Zsh. See Plugins for valid plugins and the link to their README. Note that, in zsh, array elements are separated by spaces (do not use commas). For example:
plugins=(git dircycle autojump)
The order of the plugins in the array controls the order in which they'll be loaded. In the example above, the git
plugin will be loaded first, then the dircycle
plugin and then the autojump
plugin.
NOTE: as it happens with themes, if there's a custom plugin of the same name as a built-in one, the custom plugin will be loaded instead.
ZSH_CUSTOM
(Optional) Path to the custom folder. By default, this variable points to $ZSH/custom
. This variable is useful to, for instance, put the custom folder on another location so as to manage it with a version control system. For example:
ZSH_CUSTOM=~/code/ohmyzsh-custom
ZSH_CACHE_DIR
(Optional) Path to the cache folder. This folder is used to store and cache all sorts of data used by plugins and completion scripts. By default, this variable points to $ZSH/cache
, but you can put it wherever else you see fit. For example:
ZSH_CACHE_DIR="${XDG_CACHE_HOME:-$HOME/.cache}/ohmyzsh"
Update settings
':omz:update' mode
This setting controls which automatic update mode to use. These are the available modes:
-
disabled
: disables all automatic updates.zstyle ':omz:update' mode disabled
-
auto
: automatically updates Oh My Zsh when a new version is available, without asking for confirmation.zstyle ':omz:update' mode auto
-
reminder
: only checks if there are updates available and shows a reminder to update Oh My Zsh.zstyle ':omz:update' mode reminder
-
prompt
: it asks for confirmation before updating Oh My Zsh. This is the default mode, so you don't need to set it (just delete the zstyle setting if you've changed it before).
':omz:update' frequency
This setting tells Oh My Zsh how often should automatic updates happen (in days). This setting only takes effect when automatic updates are enabled. The default are 13 days.
# Check for updates every 7 days
zstyle ':omz:update' frequency 7
':omz:update' verbosity
This setting controls the amount of information displayed after an update finishes. These are the available verbosity levels:
-
default
: shows everything: git update process, changelog and success message.zstyle ':omz:update' verbosity default
-
minimal
: shows only the git update process and a minimal success message.zstyle ':omz:update' verbosity minimal
-
silent
: only shows the git update process.zstyle ':omz:update' verbosity silent
Deprecated settings
These settings are still supported but will be removed in a future version of Oh My Zsh.
Migrate to the zstyle
settings while you still can.
-
DISABLE_AUTO_UPDATE=true
: if set, it has the same effect as settingdisabled
mode in the new zstyle format. Instead, use:zstyle ':omz:update' mode disabled
-
DISABLE_UPDATE_PROMPT=true
: if set, it has the same effect as settingauto
mode in the new zstyle format. Instead, use:zstyle ':omz:update' mode auto
-
UPDATE_ZSH_DAYS=<days>
: if set, it has the same effect as settingfrequency <days>
in the new zstyle format. Instead, use:zstyle ':omz:update' frequency <days>
Completion settings
ZSH_COMPDUMP
(Optional) Path to the completion cache file. By default, the name of the cache file is computed using the $SHORT_HOST
(hostname) and $ZSH_VERSION
variables, and put in either $ZDOTDIR
or $HOME
. You can change it to avoid cluttering your home directory. For example:
# If $ZSH_CACHE_DIR is already defined
ZSH_COMPDUMP="$ZSH_CACHE_DIR/.zcompdump"
As explained in the FAQ, you can reset the completion cache file by rm
-ing it and restarting the zsh session:
rm "$ZSH_COMPDUMP"
exec zsh
ZSH_DISABLE_COMPFIX
(Optional) Zsh automatically detects directories in $fpath
that might have insecure permissions. These are directories that are checked when loading completion functions or other functions, so if a directory has insecure permissions, it could mean that you end up running code that a malicious actor put there.
You only need to use this setting when the directories detected by Zsh have secure permissions but you still get the warning message. By setting this variable to true
, you won't get the warning anymore. For example:
If you get this or a similar warning in macOS:
[oh-my-zsh] Insecure completion-dependent directories detected:
drwxr-xr-x 3 john admin 96 Jul 25 23:13 /usr/local/share/zsh
drwxr-xr-x 4 john admin 128 Jul 26 03:38 /usr/local/share/zsh/site-functions
you can safely ignore it as long as you control the john
user, which has write permissions in both those directories. To do that, set the ZSH_DISABLE_COMPFIX
variable, before Oh My Zsh is sourced in your .zshrc
file:
ZSH_DISABLE_COMPFIX=true
COMPLETION_WAITING_DOTS
If you enable this setting, Oh My Zsh will print a red ellipsis to indicate that Zsh is still processing a completion request, and will disappear when the completion finishes. This is useful for example when completing a command that requires a lot of processing before offering completion entries.
COMPLETION_WAITING_DOTS=true
You can also set it to a string other than false
so that it is shown instead of
the default red ellipsis. For example:
COMPLETION_WAITING_DOTS="%F{yellow}waiting...%f"
NOTE: this setting has been found to cause issues with multiline prompt themes (zsh 5.7.1 and newer seem to work).
CASE_SENSITIVE
Set to true
to force case-sensitive completion. Otherwise, case-insensitive matching will be
applied on filenames. For example, if there are two files beginning with file
, one lowercase
(file-one
), one uppercase (FILE-TWO
), the completion system will offer both as entries when
trying to complete file
, unless CASE_SENSITIVE=true
is applied.
By default, both file-one
and FILE-TWO
will match:
$ cat file<TAB>
file-one FILE-TWO
With CASE_SENSITIVE=true
, only file-one
will match:
$ cat file<TAB>
$ cat file-one
HYPHEN_INSENSITIVE
Case-sensitive completion must be off. Underscores (_
) and
hyphens (-
) will be interchangeable, if HYPHEN_INSENSITIVE=true
.
$ cat file-<TAB>
file-one file_two
Automatic title
DISABLE_AUTO_TITLE
Oh My Zsh automatically sets the title of your terminal and tabs when running a command or printing the prompt. Use this setting if you want to disable that.
DISABLE_AUTO_TITLE=true
ZSH_THEME_TERM_TITLE_IDLE
This variable needs to be set after Oh My Zsh has been sourced.
Default title for the terminal when the shell is not running a command. This is used just before printing the prompt.
This variable is a string with Prompt Expansion sequences, so you can use any of the prompt sequences defined in that documentation page.
Default: shows username, hostname and current directory: %n@%m:%~
(in Terminal.app
the directory is omitted).
ZSH_THEME_TERM_TAB_TITLE_IDLE
This variable needs to be set after Oh My Zsh has been sourced.
This is similar to ZSH_THEME_TERM_TITLE_IDLE
but it targets the
terminal tab instead. Note that some terminals might use the terminal title and the terminal tab
title interchangeably, so if changing one setting doesn't do it you can try changing the other.
Default: current directory truncated to a maximum of 15 characters: %15<..<%~%<<
.
Library settings
These settings control the behavior of the library parts of Oh My Zsh. These libraries are located in the lib/
folder of the project. Again, these settings need to be set before Oh My Zsh is sourced.
DISABLE_MAGIC_FUNCTIONS
bracketed-paste-magic
and url-quote-magic
are two Zsh utilities that are known
buggy in some Zsh versions or user setups. If you're having problems when pasting
URLs or pasting anything at all, use this setting to disable them.
DISABLE_MAGIC_FUNCTIONS=true
DISABLE_LS_COLORS
Use this setting to disable the Oh My Zsh logic to automatically set ls
color output
based on the system you're running and which ls
commands are available.
DISABLE_LS_COLORS=true
ENABLE_CORRECTION
If you use this setting, Oh My Zsh will use setopt correct_all
, which tells Zsh to
try to correct command names and filenames passed as arguments. Only the following
commands will be prevented to have filename correction: cp
, ebuild
, gist
,
heroku
, hpodder
, man
, mkdir
, mv
, mysql
, sudo
.
ENABLE_CORRECTION=true
DISABLE_UNTRACKED_FILES_DIRTY
Use this setting if you want to disable marking untracked files under VCS as dirty. This makes repository status checks for large repositories much, much faster.
DISABLE_UNTRACKED_FILES_DIRTY=true
NOTE: this setting only takes effect if your theme calls the git_prompt_info
or parse_git_dirty
git prompt functions in lib/git.zsh
.
HIST_STAMPS
Oh My Zsh provides a wrapper for the history
command. You can use this setting
to decide whether to show a timestamp for each command in the history output.
Valid values are:
"mm/dd/yyyy"
: for<month>/<day>/<year>
(12/31/2020)."dd.mm.yyyy"
: for<day>.<month>.<year>
(31.12.2020)."yyyy-mm-dd"
: for<year>-<month>-<day>
(2020-12-31).- Custom value: you can specify another format using the strftime format
(for example,
"%d/%m/%Y"
for31/12/2020
).
Example, if HIST_STAMPS="dd.mm.yyyy"
:
$ history -5
10001 10.10.2020 13:29 gd
10002 10.10.2020 13:29 z oh
10003 10.10.2020 13:29 gd
10004 10.10.2020 13:54 vsc /home/marc/code/ohmyzsh/wiki
10005 10.10.2020 14:36 history -5
Random theme
These settings only work if the random theme is selected (ZSH_THEME=random
).
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_CANDIDATES
(Array) If this variable is set, the random theme will choose only one of the themes specified in this array. Otherwise, the random theme chooses one from all the themes found in $ZSH/themes
and $ZSH_CUSTOM
. For example:
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_CANDIDATES=(robbyrussell af-magic ys)
In this example, only 1 of these 3 themes will be selected at random. This is useful when you've used the random theme enough that you know specifically the themes that you like.
NOTE: if this variable is set, the ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_IGNORED
setting has no effect.
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_IGNORED
(Array) If this variable is set the random theme won't choose any of the themes specified in this array. This is useful if you know specifically the themes that you don't like or don't work correctly in your environment. For example:
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_IGNORED=(agnoster pygmalion rkj)
In this example, the random theme will remove these 3 themes from the pool of candidates to choose from.
NOTE: if the ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_CANDIDATES
variable is set (see above), this setting has no effect.
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_QUIET
If this variable is set to true
, the random theme will not show a startup message indicating which theme was chosen. For example:
ZSH_THEME_RANDOM_QUIET=true
If this is set and you want to know which theme was chosen, you can echo $RANDOM_THEME
to show the theme name.
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