How to Add Version Control Info to zsh Prompt

Mon, 31 Aug 2026 11:33:01 +0200

MacOS default shell, zsh, comes with a neat version control system integration. It works not only with git, but also with svn, mercurial, and many others! The capabilities are quite extensive — you can see yourself in zsh manual.

One thing that I found always missing from default terminal views into folders was if the folder is part of some git repo and which branch is currently checked out. Turns out, about 10 lines of .zshrc is enough to provide not only that, but also whether the current branch contains changes, staged and unstaged! I am sharing a script for zsh and its alternative for bash, which does not have a VCS integration and thus relies on native git commands. The result is branch name with + and * markers appended to the end of folder path, whenever the folder belongs to some git repository.

Zsh

Shell

# Always display version control info in the prompt
autoload -Uz vcs_info
autoload -Uz add-zsh-hook
add-zsh-hook precmd vcs_info

zstyle ':vcs_info:*' check-for-changes true
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*' unstagedstr '%F{red}*%f'
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*' stagedstr '%F{green}+%f'
zstyle ':vcs_info:git:*' formats ' %F{cyan}[%b%u%c%F{cyan}]%f'

setopt PROMPT_SUBST
PROMPT='%~${vcs_info_msg_0_} %# '

Bash

Shell

COLOR_CYAN='\e[36m'
COLOR_RED='\e[31m'
COLOR_GREEN='\e[32m'
COLOR_RESET='\e[0m'

__git_prompt() {
    local branch

    # If not a Git repository
    branch=$(git symbolic-ref --short HEAD 2>/dev/null) ||
        branch=$(git rev-parse --short HEAD 2>/dev/null) ||
        return

    GIT_PROMPT="${COLOR_CYAN}[${branch}"

    # Staged changes
    if ! git diff --cached --quiet 2>/dev/null; then
        GIT_PROMPT+="${COLOR_GREEN}+${COLOR_CYAN}"
    fi

    # Unstaged changes
    if ! git diff --quiet 2>/dev/null; then
        GIT_PROMPT+="${COLOR_RED}*${COLOR_CYAN}"
    fi

    GIT_PROMPT+="]${COLOR_RESET}"
}

__update_prompt() {
    GIT_PROMPT=""
    __git_prompt
    PS1='\w '"${GIT_PROMPT}"' \$ '
}

PROMPT_COMMAND="__update_prompt${PROMPT_COMMAND:+;$PROMPT_COMMAND}"

How to View Past Terminal Commands — from Simple to Robust

Sun, 03 Aug 2025 14:18:24 +0200

Suppose you want to re-run a shell command you used ten days ago. It was complex one; you do not remember exact flags and arguments, so it is going take a long time to reconstruct an exact text. What can you do?

1. The upwards arrow

Majority of devs know it. Press “up” to see the previous command, press “down” for the next command, press “Ctrl+C” to drop whatever is in the prompt and start fresh.

This approach works, but gets tedious when you need to find a line you used last month. Once more than ten or twenty commands have passed, scrolling becomes no better than writing a command from scratch.

2. Terminal history file

All the commands you enter into a terminal get stored in .bash_history file (or .zsh_history if you are on Mac) up to a certain limit. Thus, you can run:

Shell

cat ~/.bash_history # output all into the terminal
less ~/.bash_history # or use any text viewer
tail -n 20 ~/.bash_history # or observe only the most recent n lines
cat ~/.bash_history | grep whatever # to search for specific patterns

This method gives you full access to your history file and lets you see context around commands of interest, plus now you can search for them.

3. history command

Almost the same as using the history file directly: you get a list commands, but now it is numbered.

Shell

history -20 # show the last 20 commands
history -500 | grep ssh # search for a specific patter in a command
!780 # execute command with order number 780

But there is one important difference from direct usage of .bash_history:

history command uses the last HISTSIZE history entries (default 1000)
.bash_history file uses the last HISTFILESIZE entries (default 2000)
It means that if your command was run a really long time ago, history may not find it. The line though, is still persisted, so direct inspection of .bash_history will help.

4. fc -l

This command behaves very similar to history, with an additional ability to display ranges of command numbers::

Shell

fc -l -20 # show the last 20 commands
fc -l 100 150 # show commands 100 to 150

5. Reverse-i-search

This is the most powerful approach. Press “Ctrl+R” to enter reverse incremental search mode. Initially you get no output; start writing any part of a command you remember, e. g. ssh or input.json or -n 10 — and you will see the first full command entry with that match!

From there, you can:

Press “Enter” to execute the command immediately
Use left/right arrow keys to move within a command to edit it, then press “Enter” to execute
Press “Ctrl+R” again to go to the next, older match
Press “Ctrl+S” to go to the previous, newer match (note a comment below)
Press up-down arrows to view to nearby entries in history around the match
Press “Ctrl+C” or “Ctrl+G” to exit the search

On many systems “Ctrl+S” shortcut will not work, as it is prioritized to pause terminal output (if that happens to you, press “Ctrl+Q” to resume). To make it work for reverse-i-search, add stty -ixon to your shell config. This incantation disables terminal flow control with “Ctrl+S” / “Ctrl+Q” shortcuts:

Shell

echo "stty -ixon" >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

Happy command line manipulation!

💡 This post has a second part: Shell Configs for Better Command History Search

Blog — George Mishurovsky: posts tagged mac

How to Add Version Control Info to zsh Prompt

Zsh

Bash

How to View Past Terminal Commands — from Simple to Robust

1. The upwards arrow

2. Terminal history file

3. history command

4. fc -l

5. Reverse-i-search