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Just realized I can just use "..." to go back two directories! Is this a zsh feature? (lemmy.ca)

submitted 1 year ago by catastrophicblues@lemmy.ca to c/programming@beehaw.org

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I accidentally discovered that both "cd ..." and "..." work, and moreover, I can add more dots to go back further! I'm using zsh on iTerm2 on macOS. I'm pretty sure this isn't a cd feature. Is this specific to zsh or iTerm2? Are there other cool features I just never knew existed??

I'm so excited about an extra dot right now.

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[–] rnd@beehaw.org 18 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not really. . and .. are the only standard directory entries that are added by the system.

Some shells may extrapolate from that by adding ... to go two directories up, but ... can just as well be the name of an actual file or directory.

[–] catastrophicblues@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’ve always thought it was funny how *nix lets you name things in a way that makes it miserable for others lol. I think I had a directory named - because of a mkdir syntax error.

[–] rnd@beehaw.org 2 points 1 year ago

I guess this is an interesting contrast to Windows, where not only certain characters (like ? or * or |) are banned, but also entire filenames that used to refer to device files in DOS (con, prn, lpt1, etc.)