Execute a command without keeping it in history

I want to execute some commands, but I don't want to store them in the command history. So that nobody will be able to search them in the .bash_history file.

Is there a way how to execute Bash commands this way?

Start your command with a space and it won't be included in the history.

Be aware that this does require the environment variable $HISTCONTROL to be set.

• Check that the following command returns ignorespace or ignoreboth:

   echo $HISTCONTROL
  

• To add the environment variable if missing, the following line can be added to the Bash profile. E.g., to file %HOME/.bashrc.

   export HISTCONTROL=ignorespace
  

After sourcing the profile again, space-prefixed commands will not be written to $HISTFILE.

In any given Bash session, set the history file to /dev/null by typing:

export HISTFILE=/dev/null

Note that, as pointed out in the comments, this will not write any commands in that session to the history!

Just don't mess with your system administrator's hard work, please ;)

Doodad's solution is more elegant. Simply unset the variable: unset HISTFILE (thanks!)

echo "discreet";history -d $(history 1)

An extension of John Doe's and Cédric ROYER's answer. But, this seems to work for me.

<your_secret_command>; history -d $((HISTCMD-1))

You should not see the entry of the command in your history.

Here's the explanation...

The 'history -d' deletes the mentioned entry from the history.

The HISTCMD stores the command_number of the one to be executed next. So, (HISTCMD-1) refers to the last executed command.

Remove a certain line from Bash history file

If you are using Z shell (zsh) you can run:

setopt histignorespace

After this is set, each command starting with a space will be excluded from history.

You can use aliases in .zshrc to turn this on/off:

# Toggle ignore-space. Useful when entering passwords.
alias history-ignore-space-on='\
setopt hist_ignore_space;\
echo "Commands starting with space are now EXCLUDED from history."'

alias history-ignore-space-off='\
unsetopt hist_ignore_space;\
echo "Commands starting with space are now ADDED to history."'

You might consider using a shell without history, like perhaps

/bin/sh << END
   your commands without history
END

(perhaps /bin/dash or /bin/sash could be more appropriate than /bin/sh)

Or even better, use the batch utility, e.g.,

batch << EOB
   your commands
EOB

The history would then contain sh or batch which is not very meaningful.

You can start your session with

export HISTFILE=/dev/null ;history -d $(history 1)

then proceed with your sneaky doings. Setting the histfile to /dev/null will be logged to the history file, yet this entry will be readily deleted and no traces (at least in the history file) will be shown.

Also, this is non-permanent.

As mentioned by Doodad in comments, unset HISTFILE does this nicely, but in case you also want to also delete some history, do echo $HISTFILE to get the history file location (usually ~/.bash_history), unset HISTFILE, and edit ~/.bash_history (or whatever HISTFILE was - of course it's now unset so you can't read it).

$ echo $HISTFILE       # E.g. ~/.bash_history
$ unset HISTFILE
$ vi ~/.bash_history   # Or your preferred editor

Then you've edited your history, and the fact that you edited it!

You can also use the following command:

echo toto; history -d $(history | sed -n '$s/\s*\([0-9]*\)\s*.*$/\1/p')

I think it's a very portable command.

There are several ways you can achieve this. This sets the size of the history file to 0:

export HISTFILESIZE=0

This sets the history file to /dev/null, effectively disabling it:

export HISTFILE=/dev/null

For individual commands, you can prefix the command with a space and it won't be saved in the history file. Note that this requires you have the ignorespace value included in the $HISTCONTROL environment variable (man bash and search for ignorespace for more details).

You just need to run:
$ set +o history

To see more, run:
$ man set

This is handy if you want to erase all the history, including the fact that you erased all the history!

rm .bash_history;export HISTFILE=/dev/null;exit

This command might come in handy. This will not record the command that is executed

history -d $((HISTCMD-1)) && <Your Command Here>