dircycle

Plugin for cycling through the directory stack

This plugin enables directory navigation similar to using back and forward on browsers or common file explorers like Finder or Nautilus. It uses a small zle trick that lets you cycle through your directory stack left or right using <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd> / <kbd>Right</kbd> . This is useful when moving back and forth between directories in development environments, and can be thought of as kind of a nondestructive pushd/popd.

Enabling the plugin

Open your .zshrc file and add dircycle in the plugins section:

zsh

plugins=(
    # all your enabled plugins
    dircycle
)

Restart the shell or restart your Terminal session:
console
```
$ exec zsh
$
```

Usage Examples

Say you opened these directories on the terminal:

console

~$ cd Projects
~/Projects$ cd Hacktoberfest
~/Projects/Hacktoberfest$ cd oh-my-zsh
~/Projects/Hacktoberfest/oh-my-zsh$ dirs -v
0       ~/Projects/Hacktoberfest/oh-my-zsh
1       ~/Projects/Hacktoberfest
2       ~/Projects
3       ~

By pressing <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd>, the current working directory or $PWD will be from oh-my-zsh to Hacktoberfest. Press it again and it will be at Projects.

And by pressing <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>, the $PWD will be from Projects to Hacktoberfest. Press it again and it will be at oh-my-zsh.

Here's a example history table with the same accessed directories like above:

Current `$PWD`	Key press	New `$PWD`
`oh-my-zsh`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd>	`Hacktoberfest`
`Hacktoberfest`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd>	`Projects`
`Projects`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd>	`~`
`~`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>	`Projects`
`Projects`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>	`Hacktoberfest`
`Hacktoberfest`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>	`oh-my-zsh`
`oh-my-zsh`	<kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>	`~`

Note the last traversal, when pressing <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd> on a last known $PWD, it will change back to the first known $PWD, which in the example is ~.

Here's an asciinema cast demonstrating the example above:

Functions

Function	Description
`insert-cycledleft`	Change `$PWD` to the previous known stack, bound to <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Left</kbd>
`insert-cycledright`	Change `$PWD` to the next known stack, bound to <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Right</kbd>
`insert-cycledup`	Change `$PWD` to the parent folder, bound to <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Up</kbd>
`insert-cycleddown`	Change `$PWD` to the first alphabetical child folder, bound to <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>Down</kbd>

Rebinding keys

You can bind these functions to other key sequences, as long as you know the bindkey sequence. For example, these commands bind to <kbd>Alt</kbd> + <kbd>Shift</kbd> + <kbd>key</kbd> in xterm-256color:

zsh

bindkey '^[[1;4D' insert-cycledleft
bindkey '^[[1;4C' insert-cycledright
bindkey "\e[1;4A" insert-cycledup
bindkey "\e[1;4B" insert-cycleddown

You can get the bindkey sequence by pressing <kbd>Ctrl</kbd> + <kbd>V</kbd>, then pressing the keyboard shortcut you want to use.