How to Create a Permanent Alias in Mac OS X Lion Terminal?

I've googled the heck out of this. The typical methods of adding the alias to ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile just aren't working for me. Help please? Thanks!

Here's my current ~/.bash_profile

if [ -f ~/.bashrc ]; then . ~/.bashrc; fi

export PATH="$HOME/bin:${PATH}"

source ~/.bashrc

alias jm.mobi="ssh wz3chen@222.222.222.222"

# put this at the very end of your bash file
[[ -s "/usr/local/rvm/bin/rvm" ]] && . "/usr/local/rvm/bin/rvm" # This loads RVM into a    shell session.

Also, when I source ~/.bashrc or ~/.bash_profile it logs me out of root, strange ...

Waley Chen

Posted 2011-10-16T04:47:42.673

Reputation: 131

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2309103/line-doesnt-execute-in-bash-profile-and-bashrc-on-my-mac-osx-snow-leopard - The second comment in the last answer in the thread helped me figure out what's going on/what's being load and what not. – Waley Chen – 2011-10-16T06:13:55.327

Answers

Without more details of what's going wrong it's hard to tell for sure, but I see three suspicious things off the top of my head:

You source ~/.bashrc twice (once with ., then again with source). Once really should be enough.
In general, I'd recommend setting aliases in .bashrc (and then sourcing it (once) from .bash_profile). That way, the aliases are available in both login shells and subshells. Creating an alias in .bash_profile means it'll only be available in login shells.
Isn't /usr/local/rvm/scripts/rvm the appropriate file to set up rvm definitions?

Gordon Davisson

Posted 2011-10-16T04:47:42.673

Reputation: 28 538

I set aliases in .bashrc and then goign into "bash" works. Thanks! – Waley Chen – 2011-10-16T06:13:19.677