Remove a certain line from Bash history file

Question

How can I remove a certain line from history's database?

Answer 1

Just edit the file ~/.bash_history.

Answer 2

history | sed -i 59d

59 is the line number. Cannot be anything sweeter than this :)

Answer 3

If you need to remove several lines at the same time I normally use this:

history | grep <string> | cut -d ' ' -f 3 | awk '{print "history -d " $1}'

If you need to remove the last command you can use:

history -d $((HISTCMD-2))

Answer 4

If you need to remove a range of lines from history, the following bash function could save you some time:

function histdel() {
    [ $# -eq 1 ] && history -d "$1" && history -w
    if [ $# -eq 2 -a "$1" -le "$2" ]; then
        for n in `seq "$2" "$1"`; do
            history -d "$n"
        done
        history -w
    fi
}

Function should be typically added to $HOME/.bashrc. To use the function imediatelly, you will need to have the file read again by your running shell (. $HOME/.bashrc). Then to delete e.g. commands 200-210 from history:

$ histdel 200 210

(Note: This question is among the top search results if you search for deleting a range of commands from bash history. So, while the above is more than what the question asks, it could be useful for some readers.)

Answer 5

To prevent a command from being added to the history in the first place, make sure that the environment variable HISTCONTROL contains among its colon-separated values the value ignorespace, for example (add e.g. to .bashrc):

$ export HISTCONTROL=ignorespace

This will prevent any command with a leading space from being added to the history. You can then clear the history completely by running

$  history -c -w
  ^-- additional space character

Answer 6

Typing "history -d xxx" will delete a specified line. You then have to type "history -w" to make them permanent. It also removes them from the .bash_history file. The surest fire way is cYrus's answer.