Adding an alias to zsh-abbr via fzf

[LangLangBart]

I have a question when adding a selected alias via fzf

# select any existing aliases from a list with ‘fzf’ and add them to 'zsh-abbr'
alias | fzf --multi | while IFS= read -r line; do abbr add --force "$line"; done

Once the alias is added, the extended alias starts and ends with single quotes. See GIF below for more clarity.

if you add set -x the problem becomes obvious

Short notation	Long notation	Result
set -v	set -o verbose	Prints shell input lines as they are read.
set -x	set -o xtrace	Print command traces before executing command.

alias | fzf --multi | while IFS= read -r line; do set -x; abbr add --force "$line";set +x; done
# +zsh:18> abbr add --force 'agif='\''agg --font-dir $HOME/Library/Fonts --font-family "MesloLGS NF" --font-size 18 --fps-cap 20 --theme asciinema --speed 1.5 --renderer resvg $HOME/Desktop/asciinema.cast $HOME/Desktop/them.gif'\'
# +abbr:1> emulate -LR zsh
# Redefined the regular user abbreviation `agif`
# +zsh:18> set +x

Question: Is this an issue with fzf or zsh-abbr ?

The following works as a workaround, by removing the single quotes.

alias | fzf --multi | while IFS= read -r line; do abbr add --force "$(sed <<<"$line" 's/=./=/;s/.$//')"; done

---

PS: The tool you developed is very useful and has been incorporated into my workflow.

[LangLangBart]

• eval was needed
  • ref: Shell-Builtin-Commands.html#index-eval
  • ref: A User's Guide to the Z-Shell by Peter Stephenson - 5.1: Quoting

alias | fzf --multi | while IFS= read -r line; do abbr add --force "$(eval print -r -- "$line")"; done

[olets]

Is the result different from the result of zsh-abbr's import-aliases? https://zsh-abbr.olets.dev/commands.html#import-aliases

[LangLangBart]

Is the result different from the result of zsh-abbr's import-aliases? https://zsh-abbr.olets.dev/commands.html#import-aliases

My fzf function seems to work mostly fine, noticed some trouble with quotes in the form of $’...’ (aka ANSI-C Quoting, C-style quotes or POSIX quotes). It seems that fzf automatically inserts them at the beginning of the line if it decides they are necessary. For individually selected items in the fzf list it does work, but part of a multi selection it doesn't. Such aliases are skipped in my function.

# example of an alias with $'...'
alias color='for i in {0..255}; do print -Pn "%K{$i}  %k%F{$i}${(l:3::0:)i}%f " ${${(M)$((i%6)):#3}:+'$'\n}; done'

# debug message for aliases with $'...' prefixes (olet is the name of my function)
+olet:11> eval print -r 'color=$'\''for i in {0..255}; do print -Pn "%K{$i}  %k%F{$i}${(l:3::0:)i}%f " ${${(M)$((i%6)):#3}:+\n}; done'\'
+(eval):1> print -r $'color=for i in {0..255}; do print -Pn "%K{$i}  %k%F{$i}${(l:3::0:)i}%f " ${${(M)$((i%6)):#3}:+\n}; done'
+olet:11> abbr add --force $'color=for i in {0..255}; do print -Pn "%K{$i}  %k%F{$i}${(l:3::0:)i}%f " ${${(M)$((i%6)):#3}:+\n}; done'
+abbr:1> emulate -LR zsh
Redefined the regular user abbreviation `color`

# 'color' is only partially expanded
"for i in {0..255}; do print -Pn \"%K{\$i}  %k%F{\$i}\${(l:3::0:)i}%f \" \${\${(M)\$((i%6)):#3}:+ 

---

Your setup with abbr import-aliases seems to work more reliably for such edge cases, as seen above.

---

PS: I knew the abbr import-aliases utility because of the good documentation. I just didn't want to add all aliases, because I got used to some never being expanded and other aliases being very long, and it looks bad on the command line when you see their long expansion. I read about the ⌃ Control + Space hotkey, but pressing an additional hotkey for certain aliases is more cumbersome and this particular hotkey is already assigned to toggle the egoist/devdocs-desktop app.