Control-r reverse-i-search in Bash: how do you "reset" the search in Cygwin?

Question

How do you tell Ctrl + R reverse-i-search to "reset itself" and start searching from the bottom of your history every time?

Background: When using reverse-i-search in Bash, I always get stuck once it is finished searching up through the history and it cannot find any more matches. Sometimes I hit Esc and re-invoke Ctrl + R a second time, expecting it to start a fresh new search from the bottom of my history. However, the "pointer" still seems to be at the previous place it left off in my history.

The problem is, I usually do not want this behavior. If I hit Esc, and then re-invoke Ctrl + R, I would like that to indicate it should restart from the bottom again and work its way back up.

I am using Cygwin on Windows, as none of the so-far mentioned solutions work.

_{This question was marked as a potential duplicate question. This question is not a duplicate for the following reasons:}

_{The alternate question does not deal with Cygwin.}
_{The alternate question does not deal with how to reset the search to its initial state (instead it deals with simply going backward in search as well as forward).}

Regarding Cygwin: I updated my answer. I do not use Cygwin so cannot try, but ^G may work for you in that case. — Tom Alsberg, Feb 14 '09 at 22:04
possible duplicate of [Unable to forward search Bash history similarly as with CTRL-r](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/791765/unable-to-forward-search-bash-history-similarly-as-with-ctrl-r) — Léo Léopold Hertz 준영, Jul 15 '15 at 14:04

score 36 · Answer 1 · edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:42

36

My Bash works as you are expecting. Maybe hitting Ctrl + C instead of Esc can help.

Also, you can search forward using Ctrl + S.

Ctrl + S works if it does not send a "stop" to your terminal, i.e., if "stty -a" gives you "-ixon". You can change it by "stty -ixon".

Thanks to @Phil for reminder.

edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:42

Peter Mortensen

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answered Feb 14 '09 at 21:46

hayalci

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ctrl-s usually sends a stop to your terminal so unless you have that reconfigured, (stty -a will give you that), your terminal will intercept that keystroke) – Philip Reynolds Feb 14 '09 at 21:48

score 28 · Accepted Answer · edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:36

I never tried making this the default when hitting Esc, but Bash uses readline for input, which accepts Emacs-style keybindings by default, so you can go to the bottom using M-> (usually either by combining Meta/Alt and > or by following the Esc key with >).

If M-> does not work because your terminal does not let you enter that, try ^G (Ctrl and G simultaneously). That is the "cancel" stroke in Emacs and usually works with readline too.

score 18 · Answer 3 · edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:45

I got a confirmed answer to this question.

To reset Ctrl + R, the usual Emacs key Ctrl + G can do. If you want to reverse Ctrl + R by one step, instead of working your way up from the bottom again, you can use Ctrl + S .

The trick is Ctrl + S is also used to pause the terminal. So you would need assign that to another key. For example, the following will set pause to Ctrl + W (and keep "resume" with Ctrl + Q).

$ stty STOP ^w

Alternatively, you can also totally disable XON/XOFF (resume/pause) flow control characters by

$ stty -ixon -ixoff

This will also free up Ctrl + S. To re-enable pause/resume, you can do

$ stty ixon ixoff

score 5 · Answer 4 · edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:44

5

M-> ... moves to end of history
M-< ... moves to start of history

Your left Alt key is most likely your Meta key.

Use man readline for more readline directives.

edited Dec 04 '20 at 22:44

Peter Mortensen

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answered Feb 14 '09 at 21:47

Philip Reynolds

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Control-r reverse-i-search in Bash: how do you "reset" the search in Cygwin?

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