Zsh and Oh My Zsh

2015-07-06 2 min read

    I spend a fair amount of time in the command line and one of my biggest wins in productivity has come from adopting Z shell along with the wonderful oh-my-zsh framework. I initially installed it when looking for better git integration but have been discovering tons of new tricks and features since. In addition to the standard autocompletion for both paths as well as commands there are various plugins to support a variety of other scripts. Just a few days ago I enabled a plugin to allow for autocompletion for Python’s fabric commands. The advantage for a single command is tiny if you’re quick on the keyboard but when you’re running hundreds of commands each day it’s nice to get your typing speed to be as quick as your thought process. Zsh comes close.

    If your bash environment is optimized for your flow after years of tweaking zsh is not for you. Otherwise you should give it a shot - it’s a superset of what you get in bash and you can easily migrate your bash configuration to zsh and can easily switch back. I have dozens of apps installed right now that I’m sure I’ll forget to reinstall when I get a new computer - until I realize I need them. Zsh on the other hand will be one of the first things I install - it’s that critical to my productivity.