Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases

More Mac Sites:
Macworld
MacUser
iPhone Central

14,000 hints and counting!

Jan 15, '10 07:30:00AM • Contributed by: Anonymous

Do you use just use 'host' aliases defined in ~/.ssh/config for all of your SSH'ing? If so, this hint lets you easily tab-complete those aliases in Bash without needing bash-completion.

It's quick. It's dirty. But it works.

Put the following in your user's .profile (or Bash-specific initialization file):

complete -o default -o nospace -W "$(/usr/bin/env ruby -ne 'puts $_.split(/[,\s]+/)[1..-1].reject{|host| host.match(/\*|\?/)} if $_.match(/^\s*Host\s+/);' < $HOME/.ssh/config)" scp sftp ssh

Now any time you're using scp, sftp, or ssh, you can just type part of the alias. For instance, on my computer, I type ssh se[TAB], and it completes to ssh server.

[robg adds: I haven't tested this one.]

•

Currently 3.19 / 5

You rated: 4 / 5 (26 votes cast)

[14,920 views]

Hint Options

Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases | 6 comments | Create New Account

Click here to return to the 'Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases' hint

The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. This site is not responsible for what they say.

For zsh
Authored by: sabi on Jan 15, '10 08:57:00AM

I've had this set up for years...


# completion of .ssh/hosts
_hosts() {
    local expl hosts

    if ! zstyle -a ":completion:${curcontext}:hosts" hosts hosts
    then
	(( $+_cache_hosts )) ||
	: ${(A)_cache_hosts:=${(s: :)${(ps:\t:)${${(f)~~"$(</etc/hosts)"}%%\#*}##[:blank:]#[^[:blank:]]#}}} 
	(( $+_cache_sshconf_hosts )) ||
	: ${(A)_cache_sshconf_hosts:=${${${(M)${(s:# :)${(zj:# :)${(Lf)"$([[ -f ~/.ssh/config ]] && <~/.ssh/config)"}%%\#*}}##host *}#host }/\*}}
	hosts=( "$_cache_hosts[@]" "$_cache_sshconf_hosts[@]")
	_wanted hosts expl host \
	    compadd -M 'm:{a-zA-Z}={A-Za-z} r:|.=* r:|=*' "$@" -a hosts
    fi
}

Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases
Authored by: Chris M Hartman on Jan 15, '10 10:00:23AM

This was covered last year here:
http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20080317085050719

See the comments there for aliases for other shells.

Better, broader solution: install bash_completion
Authored by: babbage on Jan 15, '10 10:25:00AM

Here's a better idea -- just install bash_completion:

http://www.caliban.org/bash/#completion

It does all kinds of clever things, with hostname completion just being the start of it. It's also clever about things like handling svn/cvs commands & paths, handling archives, etc.

I've had it installed via Fink for a while now, but if you don't care for Fink, you can always just download the raw source tarball from here:

http://www.caliban.org/files/bash/bash-completion-20060301.tar.gz

The README document describes how to set it up, but it's mainly just a matter of putting it somewhere sensible (/etc) and then editing your ~/.basrc file to load it at launch time.

---

--
DO NOT LEAVE IT IS NOT REAL

Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases
Authored by: boothefox on Jan 15, '10 01:07:43PM

For frequent connecting it is easier to make an app via Applescript Editor to call Terminal and execute an "ssh -l user -p port host" and save it somewhere convenient.

Use Tab-completion for SSH 'host' aliases
Authored by: pseutro on Jan 21, '10 03:40:43PM

If you don't mind maintaining a separate file with host names, this works pretty well in bash.

$ cat ~/.hosts
server1
server2
$ export HOSTFILE=~/.hosts
$ complete -A hostname   rsh rcp telnet rlogin r ftp ping disk ssh

Speed things up with Quicksilver
Authored by: Skurfer on Jan 27, '10 01:26:51PM

I've used a .hosts file for completion for years, but switching to Terminal and opening a new window? Who has time for all that nonsense? So, I wrote a Quicksilver plug-in to speed things along. Just type a couple of characters of the hostname (they don't have to be contiguous) and hit ↩.

http://github.com/skurfer/RemoteHosts

Look under Downloads for an already-built-and-ready-to-install copy.