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up vote 3 down vote favorite

I am a happy user of the cd - command to go to the previous directory. At the same time I like pushd . and popd.

However, when I want to remember the current working directory by means of pushd ., I lose the possibility to go to the previous directory by cd -. (As pushd . also performs cd .).

How can I use pushd to still be able to use cd -

By the way: GNU bash, version 4.1.7(1)

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Why not use pwd to figure out where you are? – Patrick Feb 21 '12 at 12:39
I don't understand your question? The point is that pushd breaks the behavior of cd - that I want (or expect). I know perfectly well in which directory I am, but I want to increase the speed with which I change directories :) – Bernhard Feb 21 '12 at 12:46
You waid "when I want to remember the current working directory by means of pushd .". If you want to remember the current working directory, thats what pwd is for. – Patrick Feb 21 '12 at 13:49
1  
Do you know zsh? It has really nice features like AUTO_PUSHD. – jofel Feb 21 '12 at 14:39
1  
+1 Thank you for teaching me about cd -! For most of a decade, I've been doing $ cd $OLDPWD instead. – Theodore R. Smith Feb 21 '12 at 16:26
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2 Answers

up vote 3 down vote accepted

You can use something like this:

function push () 
{ 
    if [ "$1" == "." ]; then
        old=$OLDPWD;
        current=$PWD;
        builtin pushd .;
        cd $old;
        cd $current;
    else
        builtin pushd "$1";
    fi
}

If you name it pushd, then it will have precedence over the built-in as functions are evaluated before built-ins.

You need variables old and current as overwriting OLDPWD will make it lose its special meaning.

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This works perfectly for me. Is there no such feature in the built-in pushd? As I would always prefer a standard solution. Thanks for this function however, maybe I will leave out the argument and it's checking at some point. – Bernhard Feb 21 '12 at 12:41
There is no such feature in the builtin. Your own function is the best solution because pushd and popd both call cd modifying $OLDPWD, hence the source of your problem. I would name the function saved and use it in the context you like too, that of saving cwd. – bdowning Feb 21 '12 at 12:53
up vote 1 down vote

A slightly more concise version of Wojtek's answer:

pushd () {
        if [ "$1" == . ]; then
                cd -
                builtin pushd -
        else    
                builtin pushd $1
        fi      
}

By naming the function pushd, you can use pushd as normal, you don't need to remember to use the function name.

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