Update prompt regularly

[killermoehre]

Hi,

the terminal emulator of my choice (xfce4-terminal, libvte based) doesn't support a status line. But I would really like to see the current time in the lower right corner (and on a tty and such).

I can use

bleopt prompt_status_line='\r\r\t'
bleopt prompt_status_align=$'justify=\r'

to show the time stamp, but it's not refreshing every second.

Any way to implement such feature? Or would I need to use some additional tooling like tmux (which would be hard overkill for this, IMHO)?

[akinomyoga]

This is an example (You need Bash 4.0+):

# blerc

ble/util/idle.push 'ble/util/idle.sleep 1000'
function ble/prompt/backslash:killermoehre/time {
  ble/prompt/unit/add-hash '$SECONDS'
  ble/prompt/process-prompt-string '\t'
}
bleopt prompt_status_line='\r\q{killermoehre/time}'
bleopt prompt_status_align=$'justify=\r'

ble/prompt/unit/add-hash '$SECONDS' instructs that the prompt content should be invalidated when the Bash built-in shell variable SECONDS is changed. ble/util/idle.push 'ble/util/idle.sleep 1000' is an empty timer loop to induce an update if any of the UI elements is invalidated.

[killermoehre]

@akinomyoga I used your solution now. Still great. But could be greater 😅

Do you know how I could configure tmux in such a way that it only renders the status bar, but does noting else? Doesn't take over the alternative screen, works with scroll wheel input as expected, etc.

[killermoehre]

I just found shox, which might do what I want.

[killermoehre]

Nope, shox is not what I want.

[akinomyoga]

Do you know how I could configure tmux in such a way that it only renders the status bar, but does noting else?

I'm not sure, but it depends on what you expect for the detailed behaviors.

Doesn't take over the alternative screen,

I'm not sure if I correctly understand what you mean, but maybe you can check the following Stack Overflow answer:

• macos - Why does tmux erase terminal contents on editor exit? - Stack Overflow

In your case, you might need to turn off the alternate screen as

# .tmux.conf

set-window-option -g alternate-screen off

works with scroll wheel input as expected, etc.

Maybe you could check the following page. You may use set -g mouse on or set -g mouse off depending on whether mouse scroll is processed inside/outside tmux.

• Scroll shell output with mouse in tmux - Super User

[akinomyoga]

Today, there was a related post for a status line in the help-bash mailing list, though it doesn't seem to be so robust as far as I tested it

https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/help-bash/2023-08/msg00002.html