Shorten

Simple (Python) tool to shorten any command in your terminal.

shorten takes the place of adding aliases in your bash profile. It also makes a few things a more convenient. For example, you can

1. create an alias from any location,
2. list your aliases and
3. search aliases by leading characters.

Let me know if you experience any issues!

Things you can do

Create an alias. Call shorten (from anywhere!) on any command and give it an alias.

$ shorten echo e
Alias successfully added.

$ # Let's try it out!
$ echo 'Hello, world!'
Hello, world!

Remove an alias. Call shorten delete.

$ shorten delete e

List all your aliases.

$ shorten list all

Alias         Command
-----         -------
ipynb         jupyter notebook
jlab          jupyter lab
e             echo

List aliases that start with substring.

$ shorten list ip

Alias         Command
-----         -------
ipynb         jupyter notebook

Protip: shorten shorten ;).

$ shorten shorten s

How does it work?

Shorten creates a hidden folder in your home directory. This is where your aliases will be stored. Each alias is actually a python script that redirects the alias to the true command.

Shorten adds a line to your bash profile that points your $PATH variable to ~/.shorten. If you can't get your aliases to work (or you're using another shell like Zsh), check that the following line is in the right rc file.

export PATH="~/.shorten:$PATH"

Install

Clone this repo and pip install:

pip install -e .