Zim is a Zsh configuration framework that bundles a plugin manager, useful modules and a wide variety of themes, without compromising on speed.
Check how Zim compares to other frameworks and plugin managers:
Installing Zim is easy. You can choose either the automatic or manual method below:
This will install a predefined set of modules and a theme for you.
With curl
:
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/zimfw/install/master/install.zsh | zsh
With wget
:
wget -nv -O - https://raw.githubusercontent.com/zimfw/install/master/install.zsh | zsh
Restart your terminal and you're done. Enjoy your Zsh IMproved! Take some time
to tweak your ~/.zshrc
file and to also check the available
modules and themes you can add to your ~/.zimrc
.
Set Zsh as the default shell, if you haven't done so already:
chsh -s $(which zsh)
Restart your terminal and you're done. Enjoy your Zsh IMproved!
~/.zshrc
Add the lines below to your ~/.zshrc
file, in the following order:
To use our degit
tool by default to install modules:
zstyle ':zim:zmodule' use 'degit'
This is optional and only required if you don't have git
installed (yes,
zimfw works even without git
!)
To set where the zimfw plugin manager configuration file will be located:
ZIM_CONFIG_FILE=~/.config/zsh/zimrc
This is optional. The value of ZIM_CONFIG_FILE
can be any path your user
has at least read access to. By default, the file must be at ~/.zimrc
, if
the ZDOTDIR
environment variable is not defined. Otherwise, it must be at
${ZDOTDIR}/.zimrc
.
To set the directory where the zimfw plugin manager will keep necessary files:
ZIM_HOME=~/.zim
The value of ZIM_HOME
can be any directory your user has write access to.
You can even set it to a cache directory like ${XDG_CACHE_HOME}/zim
or
~/.cache/zim
.
To automatically download the zimfw plugin manager if missing:
# Download zimfw plugin manager if missing.
if [[ ! -e ${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh ]]; then
curl -fsSL --create-dirs -o ${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh \
https://github.com/zimfw/zimfw/releases/latest/download/zimfw.zsh
fi
Or if you use wget
instead of curl
:
# Download zimfw plugin manager if missing.
if [[ ! -e ${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh ]]; then
mkdir -p ${ZIM_HOME} && wget -nv -O ${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh \
https://github.com/zimfw/zimfw/releases/latest/download/zimfw.zsh
fi
This is optional. Alternatively, you can download the zimfw.zsh
script
anywhere your user has write access to: just replace the occurrences of
${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh
by the preferred path, like /usr/local/bin/zimfw.zsh
for example. If you choose to not include this step, you should manually
download the zimfw.zsh
script once and keep it at the preferred path.
To automatically install missing modules and update the static initialization script if missing or outdated:
# Install missing modules and update ${ZIM_HOME}/init.zsh if missing or outdated.
if [[ ! ${ZIM_HOME}/init.zsh -nt ${ZIM_CONFIG_FILE:-${ZDOTDIR:-${HOME}}/.zimrc} ]]; then
source ${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh init -q
fi
This step is optional, but highly recommended. If you choose to not include
it, you must remember to manually run zimfw install
every time you update
your ~/.zimrc
file. If you have chosen to keep the
zimfw.zsh
in a different path as mentioned in the previous step, replace
${ZIM_HOME}/zimfw.zsh
by the chosen path.
To source the static script, that will initialize your modules:
# Initialize modules.
source ${ZIM_HOME}/init.zsh
~/.zimrc
This file configures the zimfw plugin manager. It's referred to as ~/.zimrc
in the documentation for the sake of simplicity, but the actual location of the
file is defined by the following rules:
You can define the full path and name of the file with a ZIM_CONFIG_FILE
environment variable. For example:
ZIM_CONFIG_FILE=~/.config/zsh/zimrc
Or, if you defined a ZDOTDIR
environment variable, then the file must be at
${ZDOTDIR}/.zimrc
Otherwise, it must be at at ~/.zimrc
, which is it's default location.
As for the contents of the file, you can start with just:
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions
If you also want one of our prompt themes:
zmodule git-info
zmodule duration-info
zmodule asciiship
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions
If you want to use our completion module too, instead of using compinit
directly:
zmodule git-info
zmodule duration-info
zmodule asciiship
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-completions --fpath src
zmodule completion
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-syntax-highlighting
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-autosuggestions
The completion module calls compinit
for you. You should remove any
compinit
calls from your ~/.zshrc
when you use this module. The modules will
be initialized in the order they are defined, and completion must be
initialized after all modules that add completion definitions, so it must come
after zsh-users/zsh-completions.
Check the zmodule
usage below for more examples on how to use it to
define the modules you want to use.
The zimfw plugin manager installs your modules at ${ZIM_HOME}/modules
and
builds a static script at ${ZIM_HOME}/init.zsh
that will initialize them. Your
modules are defined in your ~/.zimrc
file.
The ~/.zimrc
file must contain zmodule
calls to define the modules to be
initialized. The modules will be initialized in the same order they're defined.
The ~/.zimrc
file is not sourced during Zsh startup and it's only used to
configure the zimfw plugin manager.
Check examples of ~/.zimrc
files above.
Below are some usage examples:
zmodule archive
zmodule StackExchange/blackbox
zmodule https://gitlab.com/Spriithy/basher.git
zmodule /usr/local/share/zsh-autosuggestions
zmodule zsh-users/zsh-completions --fpath src
zmodule spaceship-prompt/spaceship-prompt --source spaceship.zsh --no-submodules
orzmodule spaceship-prompt/spaceship-prompt --name spaceship --no-submodules
zmodule sindresorhus/pure --source async.zsh --source pure.zsh
. Separatezmodule sindresorhus/pure --source async.zsh
zmodule sindresorhus/pure
zmodule skywind3000/z.lua --cmd 'eval "$(lua {}/z.lua --init zsh enhanced once)"'
zmodule skywind3000/z.lua --on-pull 'lua z.lua --init zsh enhanced once >! init.zsh'
zmodule romkatv/powerlevel10k --use degit
zmodule ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh --root plugins/vim-interaction
zmodule sorin-ionescu/prezto --root modules/command-not-found
zmodule sorin-ionescu/prezto --root modules/gnu-utility
or
zmodule ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh --root plugins/perl
zmodule ohmyzsh/ohmyzsh --root plugins/vim-interaction
The Zim plugin manager:
~/.zimrc
? Run zimfw install
.~/.zimrc
? Run zimfw uninstall
.zimfw update
.zimfw upgrade
.zimfw help
.Set the path of the directory used by zimfw with the ZIM_HOME
environment
variable:
ZIM_HOME=~/.zim
By default, the zimfw plugin manager configuration file must be at ~/.zimrc
,
if the ZDOTDIR
environment variable is not defined. Otherwise, it must be at
${ZDOTDIR}/.zimrc
. You can customize its full path and name with the
ZIM_CONFIG_FILE
environment variable:
ZIM_CONFIG_FILE=~/.config/zsh/zimrc
Modules are installed using git
by default. If you don't have git
installed, or if you want to take advantage of our degit tool for faster and
lighter module installations, you can set degit as the default tool with:
zstyle ':zim:zmodule' use 'degit'
By default, zimfw will check if it has a new version available every 30 days. If
the zimfw.zsh
file cannot be upgraded, either because your user does not have
write access to it, or because it was sourced from a symlink, then this will be
disabled. This can be manually disabled with:
zstyle ':zim' disable-version-check yes
The best way to remove Zim is to manually delete ~/.zim
, ~/.zimrc
, and
remove the initialization lines from your ~/.zshenv
, ~/.zshrc
and ~/.zlogin
.