2.18.0 (2026-07-05)
This release comes with notable changes to the directories used for looking up and sourcing completion recipes and helpers, allowing for more flexibility and customization and fewer conflicts between things shipping with bash-completion and third party/upstream/origin packages.
Files that come with bash-completion itself are located in directories reserved for that use, their names ending with -core and -fallback. Packages should continue install their files in the same completions and helpers dirs like before; these directories precede the bash-completion "core" ones in lookup order.
A new concept of startup dirs has been introduced. Files from these directories are sourced eagerly on bash-completion startup. This replaces and allows for more flexibility than using the deprecated /etc/bash_completion.d directory for this purpose.
See README.md for more information.
Features
- _comp__init: source system startup files earlier (b09700d)
- _comp_compgen_filedir: automatically add
-fon _comp_compgen-Cor-P(#1552) (6d5fca6) - _comp_compgen_filedir: support "filedir -X" (ce28419)
- _comp_compgen_sysv_services: factorize SysV service generation (c4c8c4b)
- aclocal,automake: support versioned 1.17 executables (94bbb3a)
- aclocal,automake: support versioned 1.18 executables (9287b4b)
- apt-*: update known options up to apt 3.2.0 (c421d50)
- apt-cache: update known options up to apt 3.2.0 (0ab85c5)
- apt-get: update known options up to apt 3.2.0 (6a18e0c)
- apt-mark: update known options up to apt 3.2.0 (644a026)
- codex: 3rd party fallback completion loader (0f425bd)
- copilot: 3rd party fallback completion loader (744602a)
- curlie: alias to curl (dd8f6e0)
- curl: more option argument (non-)completions (5099cef)
- dive: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (f817cca)
- doas: add new completion (f047b70)
- doas: generate completions as if we're root (a705713)
- encore: 3rd party fallback completion loader (1e54d02)
- etcdctl,etcdutl: 3rd party fallback completion loaders (39f8ddf)
- helium: alias to chromium-browser (8600af0)
- inotifywait2: generate exclude filenames prefixed by
@(c1e2f1b) - inotifywait: generate exclude filenames prefixed by @ (0a2c165)
- ip: Check /usr/share config path (45530b0)
- jq: --rawfile arg (non-)completion (4f454d8)
- jreleaser: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (e1c2815)
- mago: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (97c4c49)
- ogg123: associate opus extension (7d3ea33)
- opencode: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (dbcea18)
- pnpm: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (44804ae)
- pydoc: support versioned 3.13..15 executables (bd60b26)
- python,pyvenv: support versioned 3.14 and .15 executables (72a2e47)
- release-plz: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (c3c4066)
- rumdl: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (5ef9790)
- skupper: add 3rd-party fallback completion loader (4237c9c)
- ssh-keygen: -M arg completion (b13bf99)
- ssh-keygen: -Z argument completion (c763d52)
- ssh-keygen: update -t arg completions (4269a90)
- ssh-keygen: update -Y arg completions (a73bcaf)
- ssh: do not complete -P arg (tag) (7d26a86)
- ssh: include proxy in -O arg completions (fc1df1f)
- ssh: more option arg (non-)completions (33f789c)
- sudo-rs,sudo.ws: alias to sudo (084cc68)
- sudo: more option argument (non-)completions (216135e)
- support the "startup{,-core}" directory (d6169af)
- syncthing: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (bc5dfff)
- tmux: complete src/target session arguments (18b6da4)
- tmux: complete target-session arguments (ced59c3)
- ty: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (57a2b31)
- waydroid: add 3rd party fallback completion loader (acc800f)
- xrdb: misc improvements (#1669) (461f90c)
- zed: 3rd party fallback completion loader (83532fa)
Bug Fixes
- _comp_compgen_services: fix no completions without sysvdir (a2e2659)
- _comp_compgen_services: skip service status marks (1ac9169)
- _comp_compgen_sysv_services: do not generate names in subdirs (5557fbe)
- _comp_compgen: clear the variable when no completions are generated (c07bd66)
- _comp_complete_service: fix init-script-action parsing (#1499) (91e075a)
- _comp_complete_user_at_host: care about $cur starting with "-" (277da58)
- _comp_load: deprecate unsuffixed "completions/<cmd>" w/o ".bash" (06910da)
- _comp_load: drop support for "_<cmd>" (f245356)
- _known_hosts: fix spacing of an error message (0463570)
- _known_hosts: work around custom IFS (8171929)
- _variable_assignments: exclude invalid timezones for "TZ" (d405a1d)
- add compatibility wrapper for tail (f6fee8a)
- alternatives: work around localvar_inherit (360192a)
- apt-get,ebtables,iptables,mplayer,service: avoid | and | in sed (ed64c30)
- apt-get,gpg{,2},ipmitool,screen: avoid \t, \r, \w in POSIX sed (da40e7a)
- ccache: fix a wrong AWK condition (c300c0f)
- cd: Complete from . on empty CDPATH entry (#1527) (6f1eba6)
- cd: fix cdable_vars overwritten by another generator (24bd420)
- cd: work around bash-4.2 nounset (45d1c93)
- compatdir: shadow compat files of the same name (ff1bf72)
- completion load precedence more (0a15408)
- export: complete options not at $1 (832822d)
- export: suffix "=" only when unique and already complete (76f980c)
- export: work around custom IFS (2617d26)
- fbgs,fbi: add mandatory semicolons before "}" in POSIX sed (288e77e)
- fix non-POSIX sed expressions (e999091)
- gnokii: use double \ in [...] for POSIX.1-2024 recommendation (ab0483a)
- inotifywait: add
-tinnoargopts(0295129) - interdiff: move to fallback for the upstream completion (11987a4)
- invoke-rc.d: avoid using non-POSIX | in sed (db928dd)
- invoke-rc.d: fix a bug of generating existing words (dfb903b)
- ipstables,ebtables: fix filtering of chain names (213a1d2)
- iscsiadm: separate merged options (--logoutall--show → --logoutall --show) (#1612) (0a7ca44)
- jq: --indent arg range (d02e405)
- jq: missing hyphen in --monochrome-output (ef69198)
- lilo,mutt: remove unnecessary escaping " in sed regexp (b8f6ef2)
- lintian: fix variable leaks (e0e916a)
- lintian: use compgen -X instead of sed with non-POSIX <> (b6f34ef)
- load from more new style completion dirs (10377fc)
- miscellaneous fixes after separation of directories (c4a8fd0)
- nsupdate: fix typo "_comp_com{tp => pg}en" (3b1ade2)
- pkg-get: avoid double expansions (fb5e32c)
- pkg-get: do not check the command name as arguments (a86175d)
- pkg-get: localize variable "file" properly (c37bed1)
- pkg-get: work around localvar_inherit (7881795)
- pkg-get: work around nounset (cd5c28d)
- povray: work around bash-4.3 nounset (8f85887)
- service,{invoke,update}-rc.d: fix regressions and refactor (1ee269f)
- shellcheck: avoid non-POSIX > in sed regular expressions (c0b3620)
- tox: move completion to fallback directory (be397c2)
- tshark: rename "cmp_cmd_tshark_{ => mut_}{prefs,protocols}" (dfacd2b)
- update-rc.d: fix the usage of the X optarg (0f47959)
- xrandr: remove wrong \ from character range (cc75da2)