How do I configure ConEmu to run Cygwin Bash?

Question

I created a new task

{Bash}

passed my home directory

/dir "C:\Users\TMB\"

and added bash as an application

C:\cygwin\bin\bash.exe

When I open Bash, it is unable to use the basic UNIX/Cygwin utilities. How do I configure ConEmu to run Cygwin Bash?

Solution 1

This might helps others.

It looks like version 140310 of ConEmu automatically detects CygWin Bash.

If you've installed Cygwin after you installed ConEmu, you'll need to Reload... your list of Tasks.

1. Go to Settings... (Win + Alt + P)
2. Navigate to your list of Tasks (Startup > Tasks)
3. Click on the Reload... button.

You should now see {CygWin bash} as one of your options in the list of predefined tasks:

PS -- If this method doesn't work, try resetting your ConEmu settings (click the Reset... button at the bottom of your Settings window).

Solution 2

or instead of

C:\cygwin\bin\bash.exe

use

C:\cygwin\Cygwin.bat

Solution 3

Ensure that Bash is receiving a sensible value for $PATH; usually it inherits that from whatever calls it, but ConEmu is a Windows application, so all it's going to provide is whatever you have set for %Path%. Generally that doesn't include the Cygwin path directories, so Bash doesn't know where to look for ls, &c.

The way I'd solve this would be to, via whatever means ConEmu offers for doing so, pass --login -i as command line arguments to Bash; this will tell it you're running it as an interactive login shell, so it will read /etc/profile, ~/.profile, and ~/.bashrc on start. In my experience, that's been enough to give it a sensible $PATH; if that doesn't work for you, you could specify it explicitly with a line like PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/bin:[...]:$PATH in your ~/.bashrc.

Solution 4

This is my way

Create a new task in ConEmu with following command

set HOME=C:\Home & "C:\Home\Applications\cygwin64\bin\mintty.exe" -i /Cygwin-Terminal.ico -

View more solutions

Comments

[Maximus]

What ConEmu version you are trying? Also, not all bash versions supports working directory. Git bash - can, as I remember.

[TMB]

I couldn't figure out how to set me working directory in my bash profile, but I think I found a more general solution below the marked answer.

[Maximus]

With "working directory" I mean one you specify with /dir switch. BTW, have you read this answer? superuser.com/a/482340/139371

[TMB]

This got me the utilities I was looking for next I wanted to point to my normal windows home directory not /cygdrive/c/cygwin/home so I deleted home and made a junction with mklink -J home C:\Users in cmd.exe

[Aaron Miller]

Glad it did the job for you. I never thought about using a junction to point ~ at c:\users\me, but I once did it with a symlink, and from that experience I give you the following warning: if you ever need to run ComboFix to clean up a malware infestation on your machine, it will blow away any files in c:\users\you. I lost everything in my home directory that way once, and my newest backup was a week old. Don't make the same mistake I did!

[laurent]

I think that's indeed the simplest way.

[TMB]

And if Reloading and Resetting don't work, I guess we could enter the path, command, and options as shown in your screen shot.

[TMB]

%SystemDrive%\cygwin64\bin\sh.exe --login -i for me on 140304 on the Preview Channel.

[Hanan N.]

For me clicking the Add default tasks... button (right above the Reload button) did the trick...

[John Prior]

Note that sh.exe won't source your .bashrc; only bash.exe will do that. So I'm using the command %SystemDrive%\cygwin64\bin\bash.exe --login -i

[flungo]

@JohnPrior's comment is actually very helpful. The PATH variable was all wrong when using sh.exe, but with bash.exe it can now actually find my applications.

[Dr. Koutheir Attouchi]

Your solution works, and I like having the mintty.exe interface, but can you explain why this works? Especially, what is the "&" doing here?

[carl.anderson]

I found that if I wanted to have the default tab start bash, I had to select the {Bash} task on the Startup settings (one level above Tasks).