Feature request: Option to run fd in different directory than pwd

[hajdamak]

Git like -C option would be handy to run fd as if it was started in specified path rather than the current working directory.

[sharkdp]

Thank you for the feedback.

What is the use case for this?

Have you considered alternative options?

• fd … some/other/directory. This is not quite the same, as the paths will be prefixed with some/other/directory, but it's close. If you are interested in absolute paths (-a/--absolute-path), the result would be the same as with a -C option.
• Use a subshell (cd some/other/directory; fd …)

[sharkdp]

We're most probably not going to implement this in fd.

[hajdamak]

I am using fd output to feed skim on large directories. I need this to be as instant as possible. Having base directory in all entries makes fuzzy search a lot less efficient.

I am using this in Fish script which does not support subshell and using cd or pushd/popd messes up Fish history which makes back/forward keyboard shortcuts less efficient.

I have tried to pipe fd output to sed/sd before feeding skim in order to remove base directory from the list but this gets quite slow.

[sharkdp]

Ok, but a simple wrapper script would work, right?

Something like

run-fd-in.sh

#!/bin/bash

set -e

base_directory="$1"
shift

cd "$base_directory"
fd "$@"

which can be used like

./run-fd-in.sh <base-directory> [fd-options…]

[hajdamak]

Yeah, that should work. I hoped to avoid spawning another shell though.
Just wondering, are there any other arguments against this functionality besides KISS, which I totally understand.

[sharkdp]

Just wondering, are there any other arguments against this functionality besides KISS, which I totally understand.

No, I'm just trying to keep fd simple (see beginning of README).

There is one compromise which I would be willing to make because this should actually be really simple to implement: we add a new "long" command-line option (not -C, but maybe --base-directory) as a hidden option that would not show up in the -h help text (and maybe not even in the --help text). If those are just a few lines of code along the lines of if (base-directory option is present) { set_current_working_directory(…); }, I'd be willing to include this in fd.

[hajdamak]

Pull request #509 created.

[sharkdp]

closed via #509

[sharkdp]

Released in fd 7.5.0