The Z Shell

The Z shell (zsh) is a UNIX command interpreter that you can use as an interactive login shell and as a shell script command processor. The Z shell most closely resembles the Korn shell with enhancements. The Z shell provides command-line editing, built-in spelling correction, programmable command completions, shell functions (with autoloading), a history mechanism, and a host of other features.

Reviewing Z Shell Initialization Files

The Z shell first reads files from the /etc/zshenv file. If the RCS option is not set in /etc/zshenv, all other initialization files are skipped. Otherwise, commands are read from $ZDOTDIR/.zshenv. If ZDOTDIR is not set, HOME is used instead. If the first character of argument zero passed to the shell is - or if you use the -l option, then the shell is assumed to be a login shell, and commands are read from /etc/zprofile and then $ZDOTDIR/.zprofile. Then, if the shell is interactive, commands are read from /etc/zshrc and then $ZDOTDIR/.zshrc. Finally, if the shell is a login shell, /etc/zlogin and $ZDOTDIR/.zlogin are read.

Refer to the zsh(1) manual page for complete information.