bashansi-escapetext-cursorvt100

How to get the cursor position in bash?


In a bash script, I want to get the cursor column in a variable. It looks like using the ANSI escape code {ESC}[6n is the only way to get it, for example the following way:

# Query the cursor position
echo -en '\033[6n'

# Read it to a variable
read -d R CURCOL

# Extract the column from the variable
CURCOL="${CURCOL##*;}"

# We have the column in the variable
echo $CURCOL

Unfortunately, this prints characters to the standard output and I want to do it silently. Besides, this is not very portable...

Is there a pure-bash way to achieve this ?


Solution

  • You have to resort to dirty tricks:

    #!/bin/bash
    # based on a script from http://invisible-island.net/xterm/xterm.faq.html
    exec < /dev/tty
    oldstty=$(stty -g)
    stty raw -echo min 0
    # on my system, the following line can be replaced by the line below it
    echo -en "\033[6n" > /dev/tty
    # tput u7 > /dev/tty    # when TERM=xterm (and relatives)
    IFS=';' read -r -d R -a pos
    stty $oldstty
    # change from one-based to zero based so they work with: tput cup $row $col
    row=$((${pos[0]:2} - 1))    # strip off the esc-[
    col=$((${pos[1]} - 1))