Strange directory completion behaviour

[amomchilov]

Hey there!

I'm not sure if there's a bug here, or if I'm just misunderstanding the zstyle config options.

My .zshrc contains only these 2 style settings:

zstyle ':autocomplete:tab:*' insert-unambiguous yes
zstyle ':autocomplete:*' widget-style complete-word

My goal is to be able to write a prefix, like cd Dr and have it expand out to the longest common prefix of all the suggestions (this is what I think insert-unambiguous yes does).

Given a line cd Dr:

$ cd Dr
directory
Desktop/    Dev/        Documents/  Downloads/  Drive/      root/

It autocompletes to cd Desktop! (This is the behaviour I would expect from insert-unambiguous no:

zsh-autocomplete/.zshrc

Lines 37 to 38 in ccf7d59

	zstyle ':autocomplete:*' insert-unambiguous no
	# no: Tab inserts the top completion.

Even weirder (to me) is that the list (I think this is called the "widget" in the code, is that so?) contains Desktop, Dev, Documents and Downloads (none of which contain an r), and root (which doesn't have a D).

I tried to debug this a bit myself. I added these print lines to inspect the variables in _autocomplete.unambiguous:

echo "\ncompstate = ["
for key val in "${(@kv)compstate}"; do
  echo "    $key: \"$val\""
done
echo "\]\n"
echo "\$IPREFIX -> \"$IPREFIX\""
echo "\$PREFIX -> \"$PREFIX\""
echo "\$SUFFIX -> \"$SUFFIX\""
echo "\$ISUFFIX  -> \"$ISUFFIX\""
echo "\$curcontext -> \"$curcontext\""
echo "\$IPREFIX\$PREFIX\$SUFFIX\$ISUFFIX -> \"$IPREFIX$PREFIX$SUFFIX$ISUFFIX\""
echo "\${compstate[unambiguous]:#?} -> \"${compstate[unambiguous]:#?}\""

and got these values at runtime:

compstate = [
    list_lines: "2"
    all_quotes: "\"
    nmatches: "6"
    pattern_match: ""
    restore: "auto"
    context: "command"
    vared: ""
    unambiguous: ""
    list_max: "100"
    unambiguous_cursor: "1"
    list: "list force packed rows"
    insert_positions: "3"
    unambiguous_positions: "0"
    exact: ""
    to_end: "match"
    last_prompt: "yes"
    pattern_insert: "menu"
    ignored: "0"
    insert: "menu"
\]

$IPREFIX -> ""
$PREFIX -> "Dr"
$SUFFIX -> ""
$ISUFFIX  -> ""
$curcontext -> "list-choices:::"
$IPREFIX$PREFIX$SUFFIX$ISUFFIX -> "Dr"
${compstate[unambiguous]:#?} -> ""

I couldn't actually find the source of this compstate associative array, which would be responsible for doing the matching and comping up with this strange nmatches: "6" value.

[marlonrichert]

According to $compstate, which is set by Zsh’s completion system, there is no unambiguous substring:

unambiguous: ""

A bit weird, though, that Dr completes to other directories than just Drive. That’s non-standard behavior.

Have you defined zstyle ':completion:*:*' matcher-list somewhere or are you using a framework that does?

Can you run zstyle -L and paste the output here?

[amomchilov]

zstyle ':completion::' matcher-list

Not intentionally!

$ zstyle -L | pbcopy
zstyle ':completion:*:expand:*' accept-exact continue
zstyle ':completion:*:expand:*' add-space subst
zstyle ':completion:*' auto-description %d
zstyle -e ':completion:*' cache-path _autocomplete.config.cache-path
zstyle ':completion:*:*:*:*:processes' command 'ps -u Alex -o pid,user,comm -w -w'
zstyle ':completion:*' command '- COLUMNS=999'
zstyle ':completion:*:expand-alias:*' complete yes
zstyle ':completion:*' complete-options yes
zstyle ':completion:list-expand:*' completer _expand _complete:-fuzzy _ignored
zstyle ':completion:history-incremental-*search-*:*' completer _autocomplete.history_lines
zstyle -e ':completion:*' completer _autocomplete.config.completer
zstyle ':completion:*:paths' expand suffix
zstyle ':completion:*:parameters' extra-verbose yes
zstyle -e ':completion:*:-command-:*' file-patterns _autocomplete.config.file-patterns.command
zstyle ':completion:*:(.|source):*' file-patterns '%p(#q-/):directories:directory %p~*.zwc(-.^*):globbed-files' '%p~*.zwc(-^/):globbed-files'
zstyle ':completion:*' file-patterns '*(-/):directories:directory %p(#q^-/):globbed-files'
zstyle ':completion:*:descriptions' format $'%{\C-[[0;2m%}%d%{\C-[[0m%}'
zstyle -e ':completion:*:warnings' format _autocomplete.config.format
zstyle ':completion:*:messages' format '%F{9}%d%f'
zstyle ':completion:*:history-lines' format ''
zstyle -e ':completion:*:expand:*' glob _autocomplete.is_glob
zstyle ':completion:*' group-name ''
zstyle ':completion:*' group-order expansions options aliases suffix-aliases functions reserved-words builtins commands local-directories directories executables
zstyle -e ':completion:*:(ssh|scp|sftp|rsh|rsync):hosts' hosts 'reply=(${=${${(f)"$(cat {/etc/ssh_,~/.ssh/known_}hosts(|2)(N) /dev/null)"}%%[# ]*}//,/ })'
zstyle ':completion:*:-command-:*' ignore-line current
zstyle ':completion:*' ignore-parents 'parent pwd directory'
zstyle ':completion:*:*:*:users' ignored-patterns adm amanda apache at avahi avahi-autoipd beaglidx bin cacti canna clamav daemon dbus distcache dnsmasq dovecot fax ftp games gdm gkrellmd gopher hacluster haldaemon halt hsqldb ident junkbust kdm ldap lp mail mailman mailnull man messagebus mldonkey mysql nagios named netdump news nfsnobody nobody nscd ntp nut nx obsrun openvpn operator pcap polkitd postfix postgres privoxy pulse pvm quagga radvd rpc rpcuser rpm rtkit scard shutdown squid sshd statd svn sync tftp usbmux uucp vcsa wwwrun xfs '_*'
zstyle ':completion:*:users' ignored-patterns '_*'
zstyle ':completion:*:widgets' ignored-patterns '.*' '*:*' '*orig-*'
zstyle ':completion:*' insert-sections yes
zstyle ':autocomplete:tab:*' insert-unambiguous yes
zstyle ':autocomplete:shift-tab:*' insert-unambiguous yes
zstyle ':completion:*:expand:*' keep-prefix no
zstyle ':completion:*:*:kill:*:processes' list-colors '=(#b) #([0-9]#) ([0-9a-z-]#)*=01;34=0=01'
zstyle ':completion:*' list-colors ''
zstyle ':completion:*:paths' list-suffixes yes
zstyle ':completion:*:options' matcher 'b:-=+'
zstyle ':completion:*-loose:*' matcher-list 'm:{[:lower:]-}={[:upper:]_} r:|[.]=** l:?|=[-_\\ ] r:?||[-_]=*'
zstyle ':completion:*-fuzzy:*' matcher-list 'm:{[:lower:]-}={[:upper:]_} r:|?=**'
zstyle ':completion:*' matcher-list 'm:{[:lower:]-}={[:upper:]_} r:|[.]=**' '+l:|=*'
zstyle ':completion:*:paths' path-completion no
zstyle ':completion:*' prefix-needed yes
zstyle ':chpwd:*' recent-dirs-file /Users/Alex/.local/share/zsh/chpwd-recent-dirs
zstyle ':chpwd:*' recent-dirs-max 0
zstyle ':completion:*:default' select-prompt '%F{black}%K{14}line %l %p%f%k'
zstyle ':completion:*' separate-sections yes
zstyle -e ':completion:*:expand:*' substitute _autocomplete.config.expand.substitute
zstyle ':completion:list-expand:*:-command-:*' tag-order '*'
zstyle ':completion:list-expand:*:git-*:(|*-)argument-*:*' tag-order '*'
zstyle ':completion:*:cd:*' tag-order local-directories directory-stack path-directories
zstyle ':completion:*:expand:*' tag-order '! all-expansions original' -
zstyle -e ':completion:*:-command-:*' tag-order _autocomplete.config.tag-order.command
zstyle ':completion:*:-tilde-:*' tag-order directory-stack named-directories
zstyle ':completion:*:git-*:(|*-)argument-*:*' tag-order '! (|cached-)files *-remote remote-* (|*-)tags' '! *-remote remote-* tags'
zstyle ':completion:*:(approximate|correct):*' tag-order '! original' -
zstyle zle-hook types isearch-exit isearch-update line-pre-redraw line-init line-finish history-line-set keymap-select
zstyle -e :url-quote-magic url-globbers $'zmodload -i zsh/parameter;\n\t reply=( noglob\n\t\t ${(k)galiases[(R)(* |)(noglob|urlglobber|globurl) *]:-}\n\t\t ${(k)aliases[(R)(* |)(noglob|urlglobber|globurl) *]:-} )'
zstyle :urlglobber url-local-schema ftp file
zstyle ':url-quote-magic:*' url-metas '*?[]^(|)~#{}='
zstyle :urlglobber url-other-schema http https ftp
zstyle -e ':url-quote-magic:*' url-seps 'reply=(";&<>${histchars[1]}")'
zstyle ':completion:*' use-cache yes
zstyle ':autocomplete:*' widget-style complete-word
zstyle zle-line-init widgets 0:user:zle-line-init 1:.autocomplete.async.read-cursor-position 2:.autocomplete.async.reset-context 3:.autocomplete.async.complete
zstyle zle-line-pre-redraw widgets 1:.autocomplete.async.complete
zstyle zle-line-finish widgets 0:user:zle-line-finish 1:.autocomplete.async.clear
zstyle zle-isearch-update widgets 1:.autocomplete.async.isearch-update
zstyle zle-isearch-exit widgets 1:.autocomplete.async.isearch-exit

[amomchilov]

For completeness, here's my plugin list:

plugins=(
    git
    last-working-dir
    macos
    zsh-autocomplete
    zsh-edit
    sudo
    alias-finder
    rust
    colored-man-pages
    command-not-found
    common-aliases
    dircycle # holy fuck this thing is incredible.
    encode64
    extract
    git
    jsontools
    swiftpm
    autoupdate
)

[marlonrichert]

I have no idea. Please open a bug report and follow the instructions in there to create a reproducible test case.

[amomchilov]

Hmmm, I can't recreate the false-matching aspect of this issue now, not sure why.

I could recreate the incorrect completion behaviour, and filed it on #457

[marlonrichert]

Oh, and you don’t need all those echo statements. To output variables in a nicely formatted way, you can just use typeset -mp <var name pattern> ...

[amomchilov]

Oh this is good to know! I tried to find something like this, but I would have never guess that typeset would do this