zsh-shift-select-copy

Editor-like keyboard text selection with auto-copy for the Zsh command line.

Select text with Shift+Arrow / Option+Shift+Arrow (macOS) — the selected region is automatically pushed to your system clipboard, ready to paste with Cmd+V / Ctrl+V anywhere. No need to press Copy.

• Pure zsh, ~120 lines, single file
• No native agents, no accessibility permissions, no daemons
• macOS, Linux (X11 / Wayland), WSL out of the box

Installation

Manual

git clone https://github.com/kcisoul/zsh-shift-select-copy ~/.zsh/zsh-shift-select-copy

Then add to your ~/.zshrc:

source ~/.zsh/zsh-shift-select-copy/zsh-shift-select-copy.plugin.zsh

Oh My Zsh

git clone https://github.com/kcisoul/zsh-shift-select-copy \
  ${ZSH_CUSTOM:-~/.oh-my-zsh/custom}/plugins/zsh-shift-select-copy

Add to your plugins=(...) list in ~/.zshrc:

plugins=(... zsh-shift-select-copy)

Antidote

kcisoul/zsh-shift-select-copy

Zinit

zinit light kcisoul/zsh-shift-select-copy

Zplug

zplug "kcisoul/zsh-shift-select-copy"

After installation, restart your shell (exec zsh).

Default keybindings

Selection (Shift + motion)

Key	Action
Shift + ← / →	Select character left / right
Shift + ↑ / ↓	Select line up / down
Shift + Home / End	Select to line start / end
Option+Shift + ← / → (macOS) Ctrl+Shift + ← / → (Linux/WSL)	Select word left / right
Option+Shift + Home / End (macOS) Ctrl+Shift + Home / End (Linux/WSL)	Select to buffer start / end

Cursor motion (no selection)

Key	Action
Option + ← / → (macOS) Ctrl + ← / → (Linux/WSL)	Move cursor word left / right
Cmd + ← / → (macOS)	Move cursor to line start / end

While a selection is active

Key	Action
Any printable key	Replace the selection with the typed character
Backspace / Delete	Delete the selection
Any unmodified arrow key	Deselect (cursor moves, buffer unchanged)

Every selection-changing motion automatically copies the new region to the system clipboard. Paste anywhere with your OS's normal paste shortcut.

Configuration

The plugin exposes two environment variables. Export them before sourcing the plugin.

ZSC_AUTO_COPY (default: 1)

Set to 0 to disable auto-copy. Selection still works; the clipboard is just never written.

export ZSC_AUTO_COPY=0
source ~/.zsh/zsh-shift-select-copy/zsh-shift-select-copy.plugin.zsh

ZSC_CLIPBOARD_CMD (default: auto-detected)

The shell command used to write to the clipboard. Detection order:

1. macOS: pbcopy
2. Wayland (when $WAYLAND_DISPLAY is set): wl-copy
3. xclip -selection clipboard -in
4. xsel --clipboard --input
5. WSL: clip.exe

Override with anything that reads from stdin:

export ZSC_CLIPBOARD_CMD='wl-copy --primary'

If detection fails and the user does not override, auto-copy silently becomes a no-op (selection still works; clipboard is just untouched).

What this plugin does NOT do

This plugin handles only keyboard-based selection inside the Zsh command line buffer (ZLE region). Mouse selection auto-copy is a terminal emulator feature, not a zsh feature — it cannot be implemented in a zsh plugin because zsh has no visibility into the terminal's screen-level selection.

If you also want mouse-drag → auto-copy, enable it in your terminal:

Terminal	Setting
iTerm2	Preferences → Selection → enable "Copy to pasteboard on selection"
Wave Terminal	"term:copyonselect": true in settings.json
Kitty	copy_on_select yes in kitty.conf
WezTerm	mouse binding action CopyTo("Clipboard")
Alacritty	selection.save_to_clipboard: true in alacritty.toml
Ghostty	copy-on-select = clipboard in config
GNOME Terminal	enabled by default for PRIMARY selection (middle-click paste)

The mouse setting and this plugin are independent and complementary — you can run both, or either, or neither.

How it works (brief)

The plugin creates a dedicated zsh ZLE keymap (zsc-select) and a set of widgets. The first Shift+motion calls zle set-mark-command, switches to the new keymap, performs the motion, and pipes the resulting BUFFER[MARK..CURSOR] to $ZSC_CLIPBOARD_CMD via stdin. Subsequent Shift+motions extend the region (re-copying each time). Any non-shift key falls back through the keymap's catch-all to either kill-region + replay (printable → replace) or deactivate-region + replay (control char → deselect and execute the user's normal binding).

All state lives in standard ZLE variables (REGION_ACTIVE, MARK, CURSOR, BUFFER); there is no background process and no IPC.

License

MIT — see LICENSE.