Terminal.app does not support alt/meta/command-key modifiers such as meta-backspace

mac-osxputtyterminal

This was observed on Mac OS X 10.5, running Terminal.app. On a native Linux machine, from a bash command prompt, typing meta–backspace deletes up until the most recent whitespace. On a Mac, it sounds the system bell.

SSHing into a Linux machine with Terminal.app as the terminal causes the same problem.

This behavior is consistent with the third party application iTerm. However, the Windows program PuTTy handles meta–backspace (and other meta commands) as expected.

Best Answer

The real solution to this problem is to use option as meta in the Terminal.app preferences and Emacs. In Emacs 23, I do:

(setq mac-option-modifier 'meta)

to use option as meta. Hope this helps.

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You probably have escape sequences for colors in your prompt that are not properly delimited. They need to be enclosed in \[ and \].

PS1='\[\033[1;36m\]\u\[\033[0m\]@\[\033[1;34m\]\h\[\033[0m\]\$ `

The length of non-printing character sequences are not included in the length of the prompt when they are thus enclosed and the position of previous commands needs to be calculated for proper display when they wrap.

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Why not just remove the passphrase from the key? There is no value in having a passphrase on your key if you are just going to save the password somewhere in a config file or script.

Just load up your ppk file with puttygen, remove the password and save.

You can certainly make a copy of your ppk just and strip the phrase just from that copy, and then protect that copy with filesystem ACLs to minimize the risk.

Best Answer

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Bash – Why does CTRL-r act weirdly (showing only part of a command) on OS X

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