gcloud beta interactive

NAME

gcloud beta interactive - start the gcloud interactive shell

SYNOPSIS

gcloud beta interactive [--context=CONTEXT] [GCLOUD_WIDE_FLAG …]

DESCRIPTION

(BETA) gcloud beta interactive provides an enhanced bash(1) command line with features that include:

• auto-completion and active help for all commands
• state preservation across commands: cd, local/environment variables

Display

The gcloud beta interactive display window is divided into sections, described here from top to bottom.

Previous Output

Command output scrolls above the command input section as commands are executed.

Command Input

Commands are typed, completed, and edited in this section. The default prompt is "$ ". If a context has been set, then its tokens are prepopulated before the cursor.

Active Help

As you type, this section displays in-line help summaries for commands, flags, and arguments. You can toggle active help on and off via the F2 key. Hit F8 to display the help text in your browser.

Status Display

Current gcloud project and account information, and function key descriptions and settings are displayed in this section. Function keys toggle mode/state settings or run specific actions.

F2:help:STATE

Toggles the active help section, ON when enabled, OFF when disabled.

F7:context

Sets the context for command input, so you won't have to re-type common command prefixes at every prompt. The context is the command line from just after the prompt up to the cursor.

For example, if you are about to work with gcloud compute for a while, type gcloud compute and hit F7. This will display gcloud compute at subsequent prompts until the context is changed.

Hit ctrl-c and F7 to clear the context, or edit a command line and/or move the cursor and hit F7 to set a different context.

F8:web-help

Opens a web browser tab/window to display the complete man page help for the current command. If there is no active web browser (running in ssh(1) for example), then command specific help or man(1) help is attempted.

F9:quit

Exit.

Auto and Tab Completion

Command completions are displayed in a scrolling pop-up menu. Use tab and up/down keys to navigate the completions, and space or / to select the highlighted completion.

Completions for known commands, flags, and static flag values are displayed automatically. Positional and dynamic flag value completions for known commands are displayed after tab is entered. Known commands include gcloud, bq, gsutil, kubectl, and any command with a man page that has been executed at least once in any interactive session.

tab completion for unknown commands defers to bash(1), while still using the interactive user interface. Absent specific command information, a file/path completer is used when tab is entered for unknown positionals (arguments that do not start with '-'). The default completer handles '~' path notation and embedded $var references, but does not expand their values in completions.

Configure bash completions as you normally would. gcloud beta interactive starts up bash in a mode that sources ~/.bashrc with the environment variable COSHELL_VERSION set to a non-empty version value.

Command completion resets with each simple command in the command line. Simple commands are separated by '|', ';', '&' and may appear after '$(', '(', '{', '!', if, then, elif, while, and name=value per command exports. Use tab on an empty line to enable command executable search on PATH for the first token in each simple command.

Currently simple and compound commands must be entered in a single line.

Refer to Using gcloud interactive for more information and animated GIFs.

Control Characters

Control characters affect the currently running command or the current command line being entered at the prompt.

ctrl-c

If a command is currently running, then that command is interrupted. This terminates the command. Otherwise, if no command is running, ctrl-c clears the current command line.

ctrl-d

Exits when entered as the first character at the command prompt. You can also run the exit command at the prompt.

ctrl-w

If a command is not currently running, then the last word on the command line is deleted. This is handy for "walking back" partial completions.

Command history

gcloud beta interactive maintains persistent command history across sessions.

emacs mode

^N">^N

Move ahead one line in the history.

^P">^P

Move back one line in the history.

^R">^R

Search backwards in the history.

vi mode

/

Search backwards in the history.

j

Move ahead one line in the history.

k

Move back one line in the history.

n

Search backwards for the next match.

N

Search forwards for the next match.

history search mode

ENTER/RETURN

Retrieve the matched command line from the history.

^R-1">^R

Search backwards for the next match.

^S">^S

Search forwards for the next match.

Layout Configuration

Parts of the layout are configurable via $ gcloud config set interactive/property. These properties are only checked at startup. You must exit and restart to see the effects of new settings.

bottom_bindings_line

If True, display the bottom key bindings line. The default value is true.

bottom_status_line

If True, display the bottom status line. The default value is false.

completion_menu_lines

Number of lines in the completion menu. The default value is 4.

context

Command context string. The default value is "".

debug

If True, enable the debugging display. The default value is false.

fixed_prompt_position

If True, display the prompt at the same position. The default value is false.

help_lines

Maximum number of help snippet lines. The default value is 10.

hidden

If True, expose hidden commands/flags. The default value is false.

justify_bottom_lines

If True, left- and right-justify bottom toolbar lines. The default value is false.

manpage_generator

If True, use the manpage CLI tree generator for unsupported commands. The default value is true.

multi_column_completion_menu

If True, display the completions as a multi-column menu. The default value is false.

obfuscate

If True, obfuscate status PII. The default value is false.

prompt

Command prompt string. The default value is "$ ".

show_help

If True, show help as command args are being entered. The default value is true.

suggest

If True, add command line suggestions based on history. The default value is false.

CLI Trees

gcloud beta interactive uses CLI tree data files for typeahead, command line completion, and help snippet generation. A few CLI trees are installed with their respective Google Cloud CLI components: gcloud (core component), bq, gsutil, and kubectl. Trees for commands that have man(1) pages are generated on the fly. See $ gcloud topic cli-trees for details.

EXAMPLES

To set the command context of gcloud beta interactive to "gcloud ", run:

gcloud beta interactive --context="gcloud "

FLAGS

--context=CONTEXT

Default command context. This is a string containing a command name, flags, and arguments. The context is prepopulated in each command line. You can inline edit any part of the context, or ctrl-c to eliminate it.

GCLOUD WIDE FLAGS

These flags are available to all commands: --access-token-file, --account, --billing-project, --configuration, --flags-file, --flatten, --format, --help, --impersonate-service-account, --log-http, --project, --quiet, --trace-token, --user-output-enabled, --verbosity.

Run $ gcloud help for details.

NOTES

On Windows, install git(1) for a bash(1) experience. gcloud beta interactive will then use the git (MinGW) bash instead of cmd.exe.

Please run $ gcloud feedback to report bugs or request new features.

This command is currently in beta and might change without notice. This variant is also available:

gcloud alpha interactive