bash: parse_git_branch: command not found

Question

This should be very simple. I recently noticed that when I type 'bash' into Terminal on Mac it shows this:

Jays-MacBook-Pro: ~ $ bash
bash: parse_git_branch: command not found

When before it didn't. Can someone explain why and how to resolve.

Answer 1

It is likely that you configured BASH to run parse_git_branch and print the result as part of PS1 (or alike). You can check this by: "echo $PS1" and "echo $PROMPT_COMMAND".

However, parse_git_branch is not a builtin function of bash. Below is how I configured my PS1. You may want to copy my git_branch_4_ps1 as your parse_git_branch

    PS1='\n'                           # begin with a newline
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[38;5;101m\]\! \t '   # time and command history number
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[38;5;106m\]\u@\h '   # user@host
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[7;35m\]${MY_WARN}\[\e[0m\] ' # warning message if there is any
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[38;5;10m\]${MY_EXTRA} '      # extra info if there is any
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[0;36m\]$(git_branch_4_ps1) ' # git_branch_4_ps1 defined below
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[38;5;33m\]\w'        # working directory
    PS1=$PS1'\n\[\e[32m\]\$ '          # "$"/"#" sign on a new line
    PS1=$PS1'\[\e[0m\]'                # restore to default color

    function git_branch_4_ps1 {     # get git branch of pwd
        local branch="$(git branch 2>/dev/null | grep "\*" | colrm 1 2)"
        if [ -n "$branch" ]; then
            echo "(git: $branch)"
        fi
    }

Answer 2

If your parse_git_branch is defined in ~/.bash_profile, it will not be loaded when you open a non-login shell (e.g. by running bash).

The differences between login and non-login shells are described here: Difference between Login Shell and Non-Login Shell? For our purposes, the main difference is that login shells (e.g. that when you first open Terminal) automatically source ~/.bash_profile upon startup, whereas non-login shells (e.g. that when you run bash from within Terminal) do not.

To fix this error, simply source your ~/.bash_profile after running bash:

user@host:~ $ bash
bash: parse_git_branch: command not found
user@host:~ $ source .bash_profile

Alternatively, place the function in ~/.bashrc instead, which will be automatically sourced by non-login shells (as covered in the earlier link).

Answer 3

Instead of having

parse_git_branch

call in PS1 definition alone you may use

parse_git_branch 2>/dev/null

to send stderr to /dev/null. This will silence the error you don't want to see.

Answer 4

have you export your $PS1 ? You can check by run command:

printenv

else you should export it by run:

export -n PS1

after you will can run sudo or sudo su without problem

Answer 5

In .bashrc add

parse_git_branch() {
     git branch 2> /dev/null | sed -e '/^[^*]/d' -e 's/* \(.*\)/(\1)/'
}

Answer 6

The key to this is to NOT export PS1. If it's exported, then any non-login shell also takes PS1. Since .bash_profile is automatically source'd by the login shell, the PS1 variable only affects the login shell.