fisher/man/man7/fisher-faq.md

fisher-faq(7) -- Frequently Asked Questions

SYNOPSIS

This document attempts to answer some of Fisherman most frequently asked questions. Feel free to create a new issue in the Fisherman issue tracker if your question is not answered here.

What is Fisherman?

Fisherman is a plugin manager for fish that lets you share and reuse code, prompts and configurations easily.

What do I need to know to use Fisherman?

Nothing. You can continue using your shell as usual. When you are ready to learn more just type man fisher or man 7 fisher.

How do I access other Fisherman documentation?

Fisherman documentation is based in UNIX man(1) pages. See man fisher and man 7 fisher to get started. You can also access any documentation using the fisher help command.

What are Fisherman plugins?

Plugins are written in fish and extend the shell core functionality, run initialization code, add completions or documentations to other commands, etc. See fisher help plugins.

Plugins may list any number of dependencies to other plugins using a fishfile.

What is a Fishfile?

A plain text file that lists what plugins you have installed or a plugin's dependencies to other plugins.

Fishfiles let you share plugin configurations across multiple installations, allow plugins to declare dependencies, and prevent information loss in case of system failure. See also fisher help fishfile.

What kind of Fisherman plugins are there?

There is no technical distinction between plugins, themes, commands, etc., but there is a conceptual difference.

• Standalone Utilities: Plugins that define one or more functions, meant to be used at the command line.

• Prompts / Themes: Plugins that modify the appearance of the fish prompt by defining a fish_prompt and / or fish_right_prompt functions.

• Extension Commands: Plugins that extend Fisherman default commands. An extension plugin must define one or more functions like fisher_<my_command>. For specific information about commands, see fisher help commands and then return to this guide.

• Configuration Plugins: Plugins that include one or more my_plugin.config.fish files. Files that follow this convention are evaluated at the start of the session.

See fisher help plugins and fisher help commands.

Does Fisherman support oh-my-fish plugins and themes?

Yes. To install either a plugin or theme use their URL:

fisher install omf/plugin-{rbenv,tab} omf/theme-scorphish

You can use the same mechanism to install any valid plugin from any given URL. See also Compatibility in fisher(7).

What does Fisherman do exactly every time I create a new shell session?

Essentially, add Fisherman functions and completions to the $fish_{function,complete}_path and evaluate files that follow the convention *.config.fish.

set fish_function_path {$fisher_config,$fisher_home}/functions $fish_function_path
set fish_complete_path {$fisher_config,$fisher_home}/completions $fish_complete_path

for file in $fisher_config/conf.d/*.config.fish
    source $file
end

See $fisher_home/config.fish for the full code.

How is Fisherman faster than oh-my-fish/Wahoo, etc?

Fisherman ameliorates the slow shell start problem using a flat dependency tree instead of loading a directory hierarchy per plugin. This also means that Fisherman performance does not decline depending on the number of plugins installed. See also Flat Tree in fisher(7).

Why don't you contribute your improvements back to oh-my-fish instead of creating a new project?

I have contributed back to oh-my-fish extensively. See also oh-my-fish history for August 27, 2015 when another project, Wahoo, was entirely merged with oh-my-fish.

In addition, Fisherman was built from the ground up using a completely different design, implementation and set of principles.

Some features include: UNIX familiarity, minimalistic design, flat tree structure, unified plugin architecture, external self-managed database, cache system, dependency manifest file and compatibility with oh-my-fish, etc. See fisher(7).

How can I upgrade from an existing oh-my-fish or Wahoo installation?

Install Fisherman.

git clone https://github.com/fisherman/fisherman
cd fisherman
make

You can now safely remove oh-my-fish $OMF_PATH and $OMF_CONFIG.

Backup dotfiles and other sensitive data first.

rm -rf {$OMF_PATH,$OMF_CONFIG}

I changed my prompt with fish_config and now I can't use any Fisherman theme, what do I do?

fish_config persists the prompt to XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fish/functions/fish_prompt.fish. That file takes precedence over Fisherman prompts that installs to $fisher_config/functions. To use Fisherman prompts remove the fish_promt.fish inside XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fish/functions.

Assuming XDG_CONFIG_HOME is ~/.config in your system:

rm ~/.config/fish/functions/fish_prompt.fish

How do I use fish as my default shell?

Add Fish to /etc/shells:

echo "/usr/local/bin/fish" | sudo tee -a /etc/shells

Make Fish your default shell:

chsh -s /usr/local/bin/fish

To switch back to another shell.

chsh -s /bin/another/shell

Why is this FAQ similar to the oh-my-fish FAQ?

Because it was written by the same author of Fisherman and Wahoo and some of the questions and answers simply overlap.