Arch Linux

majik67

Member

Registered: 2007-05-21

Posts: 22

tcsh failing to work

I dont normally use the csh shell, but I do need it to run serveral CAD apps.

I keep getting an error:

Unknown colorls variable `mh'.

I have searched google and have only found this problem in Mandriva, and the solution does not seem relevant to arch unfortunately, I have tried those "solutions" without success. I dont even know what is going wrong because my configuration files dont even point to what is suposedly causing those errors. My config is completely devoid of colorized output, which would cause this problem.

Anybody know what is going on and how to fix it?

mike_r

Member

Registered: 2009-01-22

Posts: 114

Re: tcsh failing to work

I use csh (tcsh) all the time, so fundamentally everything is okay. Do you have an LS_COLORS environment variable set? If so, are you sure the syntax is correct? Mine looks like

setenv LS_COLORS "fi=1;37:di=32:ln=36:ex=35:pi=44;31:so=44;33:bd=44;37:cd=44;37:
*.GIF=42;30:*.gif=42;30:*.jpg=46;30:*.JPG=46;30:*.JPEG=46;30:*.ppm=41;30:*.pgm=4
1;30:*.pbm=41;30:*.tga=47;30:*.tif=45;30:*.tiff=45;30:*.TIFF=45;30:*.gz=33:*.bz2
=41;32"

Overkill, I know, but you can create quite complex configs. If you don't have it set, you might try a simple one to see if that changes anything.

Without more info, I can't be of more help. Would you be willing to post your .cshrc?

Mike

---

Linux User #353 - SLS -> Slackware -> Red Hat -> Mandrake -> Fedora -> Arch

donpicoro

Member

Registered: 2009-04-10

Posts: 42

Re: tcsh failing to work

That tcsh problem happens to me too.
I use bash on a daily basis, but some data analysis software uses a script written in tcsh and off course since the first line of the script is:

#!/bin/csh -f

which points to

$ ls -l `which csh`
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 4 2009-07-27 02:49 /bin/csh -> tcsh*

I get the same problem. Any ideas?

Google only shows reports regarding mandriva and its configuration files /etc/DIR_COLORS or ~/.tcshrc which I do not have.
Thanks in advance for any help

mike_r

Member

Registered: 2009-01-22

Posts: 114

Re: tcsh failing to work

What version of tcsh do you have? I notice that all the Mandriva bug reports point to the 6.15 generation. "pacman -Q tcsh" on my machine points to 6.17.00-1. Maybe this is just an issue of an old version of tcsh?

Mike

---

Linux User #353 - SLS -> Slackware -> Red Hat -> Mandrake -> Fedora -> Arch

donpicoro

Member

Registered: 2009-04-10

Posts: 42

Re: tcsh failing to work

Same version here man.

pacman -Qs tcsh
local/tcsh 6.17.00-1
    Enhanced version of the Berkeley C shell

And I do not have any tcsh specific startup files besides

cat /etc/profile.d/glib2.csh 
setenv G_BROKEN_FILENAMES 1

and

cat /etc/profile.d/mozilla-common.csh 
setenv MOZ_PLUGIN_PATH "/usr/lib/mozilla/plugins"

Which seem very unrelated to this problem.

donpicoro

Member

Registered: 2009-04-10

Posts: 42

Re: tcsh failing to work

I solve it!

It turns out that it was already a bug previously http://bugs.archlinux.org/task/12658 with an older tcsh version that is striking back again. It seems to be a constant problem between coreutils and tcsh.

While this is still a bug. I manage to deal with this by disabling the line

eval `dircolors -b`

from my ~/.bash_profile and off course from my ~/.bashrc files.

Actually my ~/.bashrc used to source the other one. So, since I was already logged in  the problem did not solve by manually editing ~/.bash_profile. Hence the solutions is to stop being lazy and have two separate configuration files.

In case anyone is wondering the difference between those files, here is a simple explanation:
~/.bash_profile is read when you log in
~/.bashrc is read everytime you open a terminal.

What I did was to create a new ~/.bash_profile with the real important things I need when I log in and the rest of the lines moved to the new ~/.bashrc, including the problematic "eval `dircolors -b`" line.

So, since I rarely use tcsh, I just  commented out the problematic line and open a new terminal. Within that new terminal tcsh will work just fine!. After opening the new terminal I uncomment the line again so I have my usual colors in the other bash new terminals.

If you use tcsh on a daily basis, you may want to avoid the mentioned line at all! and maybe keep just one configuration (~/.bash_profile) file and source it from the other one (~/.bashrc) as usual.

Hope this helps you

majik67

Member

Registered: 2007-05-21

Posts: 22

Re: tcsh failing to work

hey your quick fix worked! Thanks

The version of tcsh doesnt really stop the problem, I tried previous versions up to tcsh v.14. It gives similar errors, all to do with the `colorls variable`. Too bad coreutils doesnt agree with tcsh.

mauro

Member

Registered: 2010-01-26

Posts: 5

Re: tcsh failing to work

donpicoro's trick didn't work for me, the LS_COLORS variable was somehow still set, and this is was tcsh chockes on. So just unset it:

unset LS_COLORS

no need to edit the .bashrc file and such.

marcs

Member

From: Italy

Registered: 2007-09-07

Posts: 63

Re: tcsh failing to work

donpicoro's trick didn't work for me, the LS_COLORS variable was somehow still set, and this is was tcsh chockes on. So just unset it:

unset LS_COLORS

no need to edit the .bashrc file and such.

I'm using iraf that uses tcsh. This solution works for me too! Thanks!