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Aprime
Asked: 2020-06-04 09:45:04 +0800 CST

zsh: read:-p: no coprocess error while using read command with -p flag

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community. I recently started to use zsh instead of bash and now i'm getting some problems that cannot be found on bash. One of theme: when i use read -p command, obviously with flag -p, i get an error that says:

read: -p: no coprocess

On the other hand when I switch to bash again, this command works perfectly.

My full command:

read -p "what's your name" name

Thank you for help <3

scripts command-line bash zsh

1 Answers

  1. The usage is not compatible between shells.

    As explained in man zshbuiltins, the way to emit a prompt string for a zsh read command is to append it to the identifier name after a ?:

              If the first argument contains a `?', the remainder of this word
          is used as a prompt on standard error when the shell is interac‐
          tive.

    So for example

     % read name\?"what's your name? "
what's your name?

    (the ? needs to be escaped here to prevent the shell treating it as a globbing character) or

     % read "name?what's your name? " 
what's your name?

    See also:

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