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JeanSibelius
Asked: 2012-04-29 07:13:26 +0800 CST

Where is .bashrc?

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I feel stupid asking, but I can't seem to find the answer to this anywhere. I'm trying to follow these instructions to edit my bash prompt, but there is no .bashrc in either my user directory (~/.bashrc), or in my home directory, or in the main file system directory.

There is no .bashrc in /etc/ (there is a bash.bashrc, however).

Do I create a .bashrc file in my user or home directory? Is there a better, more recent set of instructions for modifying the bash prompt?

configuration command-line hidden-files bashrc

10 Answers

  1. Best Answer

    Don't forget it is a hidden file inside your home directory (you would not be the first to do a ls -l and thinking it is not there).

    Do a:

    ls -la ~/ | more

    There should be a .bashrc on the first page. If not just create it with: 

    vi ~/.bashrc

    and add in the lines you need to add into it.

    Permissions of my .bashrc are:

    -rw-r--r--  1 discworld discworld  3330 Mar 10 16:03 .bashrc

    (chmod 644 .bashrc to make it rw r r).

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  2. User specific, hidden by default.

    ~/.bashrc

    If not there simply create one.

    System wide:

    /etc/bash.bashrc
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  3. There is a .bashrc in every user's home folder (99.99% of the time) as well as one system-wide (which I don't know the location of in Ubuntu).

    The quickest way to access it is nano ~/.bashrc from a terminal (replace nano with whatever you like to use).

    If this is not present in a user's home folder the system-wide .bashrc is used as a fallback as it is loaded before the user's file. You could simply copy and paste it (with root permissions of course), but a .bashrc is not entirely essential (it may be required to make things work. I haven't found out) at a user level as it mostly overrides the system-wide one with user-specific tweaks. You could write your own though.

    The main components for that users may tweak are PS1 (the Bash prompt defaults to display user@localhost:pwd $) and aliases as well as setting a color prompt and maybe PS2 (busy state message).

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  4. Use gedit ~/.bashrc, it will allow you to modify ~/.bashrc using gedit.

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  5. It is hidden because of the '.' it starts with.

    list it with

    ls -al

    or enable "show hidden files" under the view menu in nautilus (Ctrl-H will also do the trick).

    You can edit it with your favorite text editor from your home directory e.g.

    cd

    to go to your home directory then:

    emacs .bashrc

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  6. If .bashrc is not in your home folder, even after you list the hidden files, you can copy it from: 

    /etc/skel/.bashrc
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  7. Use nano ~/.bashrc to open and edit the .bashrc file. (This will create the file if it does not yet exist)

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  8. if not in home directory, you can just copy from /etc/bash.bashrc, and make it source for your terminal, by typing in your terminal source .bashrc from your home directory after copying.

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  9. If you use encryption and work from the command line you might not see it as one need to mount the real home-dir first (in contrast to in the graphical UI where this is done automaticallu) by the command:

    ecryptfs-mount-private

    (I had the same question and stumbled upon this question; but found my answer in the readme instead)

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  10. Bashrc file is a hidden file inside the home directory. It is actually, give the path directions.

    And those are wanted to edit .bashrc file, try this command gedit ~/.bashrc instead of this ~/.bashrc .

    This command gedit ~/.bashrc directly take you to the text editor, where you can edit it easily, as you know.

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