How to change the default shell in Cygwin?

I am trying to change my default shell from bash to zsh in cygwin.

The normal unix command chsh isn't available on cygwin
The etc/passwd file it seems isn't used anymore in existing versions of cygwin.

So how else can the default shell be changed ?

gyaani_guy

Posted 2015-07-14T16:10:39.277

Reputation: 321

Answers

The answer depends on how you start Cygwin.

If you start Cygwin with Cygwin.bat, modify the last line of /Cygwin.bat (usually C:\cygwin\ or C:\cygwin64\).

If you start Cygwin with mintty, then add the shell as a parameter. mintty /usr/bin/zsh -

Steven

Posted 2015-07-14T16:10:39.277

Reputation: 24 804

2Thank you, I am using Conemu. Had to change the sh.exe to zsh.exe in Conemu Settings > startup > tasks > bash Cygwin Bash > set CHERE_INVOKING=1 & %ConEmuDrive%\CygWin\bin\sh.exe --login -i – gyaani_guy – 2015-07-14T17:31:33.673

@gyaani_guy I am just using ConEmu to execute CygWin\bin\zsh.exe. sh.exe --login will launch Bash, how do you change that? Or does it not matter anyway? I imagine sh.exe --login is unnecessarily executing sh before zsh... – deed02392 – 2016-10-19T10:10:16.333

@deed02392 I am not sure I understand.. but the exact command I am using is set CHERE_INVOKING=1 & %ConEmuDrive%\CygWin\bin\zsh.exe --login -i hth – gyaani_guy – 2016-10-19T18:18:11.637

@gyaani_guy thanks, I was confused because in your first comment you seemed to imply that you start zsh with sh.exe. Now I realise I just didn't read your message correctly :-) – deed02392 – 2016-10-20T09:45:22.247

3The mintty example didn't quite work for me. It had issues until I made it a login shell by adding -l:

mintty.exe -i /Cygwin-Terminal.ico /usr/bin/zsh -l - – Morgan May – 2016-11-02T03:32:54.373

See this answer for a better solution.

– exhuma – 2019-03-14T09:22:22.773

This is the only answer that directly allows you to directly pass the -l flag to zsh, so this is the only answer that allows you to have a proper login zsh instance started. – mtraceur – 2019-07-03T20:41:29.403

If you run mintty.exe directly or run Cygwin Terminal from the start menu or desktop (which is a shortcut to mintty.exe), you can set the SHELL environment variable in Windows to /usr/bin/zsh.

On Windows 7:

Press Windows key.
Start typing "environment".
When it appears, select "Edit environment variables for your account".

The rest should be self-explanatory.

dc46and2

Posted 2015-07-14T16:10:39.277

Reputation: 193

5This seriously needs more up-votes. I've never seen this documented anywhere, and it's obviously the intended method. – Kevin Mills – 2017-02-09T01:04:24.163

1For those who don't want to rely on search to find the appropriate panel, right-click the Start menu and select "System" to launch the System control panel. Then click "Advanced system settings" from the left-side column. On the "System Properties" window that pops up, click "Environment Variables..." to launch the environment variable editor. – David C. – 2017-04-13T19:40:17.543

Worked perfectly! – bkunzi01 – 2017-07-16T21:56:56.783

Copied from my answer on Stack Overflow:

Instead of creating a passwd file, which Cygwin recommends against¹, you could edit /etc/nsswitch.conf. Add or edit the following line:

db_shell: /usr/bin/fish

The down/up side of this method is that, if you have multiple users, this change affects all of them. The up/up side is that it's dead simple. The only catch is that you have to restart Cygwin.

If you do use mkpasswd after this change, it will use your new default shell for all users that are allowed to log on.

¹ The mkpasswd documentation says this:

Don't use this command to generate a local /etc/passwd file, unless you really need one. See the Cygwin User's Guide for more information.

I can't really find any solid reasoning in the user's guide, other than a mention that you'll have to regenerate the /etc/passwd and /etc/group files if your users and groups change, which I suppose is a decent enough reason. I can say that the process is somewhat error prone for newbies.

P Daddy

Posted 2015-07-14T16:10:39.277

Reputation: 391

This is a hack: put this as the first line of your ~/.bash_profile:

exec zsh

glenn jackman

Posted 2015-07-14T16:10:39.277

Reputation: 18 546