How to solve this problem with a 'tuned' prompt in ZSH?

Question

I have an adjusted prompt in my ZSH-configuration. Main feature is, that this prompt is colored red, so that I can easily it distinguish from the outputs of programs. My prompt is defined as follows:

PROMPT=$'\e[0;31m%n@%m:%~> \e[0m'

This works mostly fine, but sometimes my cursor switches to another position on tab-completion and some characters are left behind on the screen and mangle up the commandline. That is a little annoyance, but if someone knows a solution for this, I would appreciate it.

Answer 1

You need to wrap the non-printing sequences in %{ ... %}:

PROMPT=$'%{\e[0;31m%}%n@%m:%~> %{\e[0m%}'

You should be able to do:

PROMPT=$'%F{red}%n@%m:%~> %f'

which is simpler, easier to read and will work with terminal types that use different escape sequences.