<p>With the release of macOS Catalina (10.15) Apple has switched to Zsh as default shell (instead of Bash).
Instead of setting <em>PS1</em> in Bash you can set <em>PROMPT</em> in Zsh:
<code>PROMPT="${orange}%n"</code></p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-02-17T00:52:02.530Z
It is too bad this was hastened by fear of GPL3 versions of bash.  https://scriptingosx.com/2019/06/moving-to-zsh/
chicks
CC BY-SA 4.0
2020-02-16T18:39:16.317Z
2020-02-16T18:39:16.317Z
Paidhi
<p>I can't get it to work on my Mac (catalina version 10.15.2).
<code>\u</code> works on ubuntu when I test it but not on my Mac. 
I want to customize my mac terminal. Colors work fine on my Mac and it's reading the <code>.bashrc</code> file when I test it by <code>source .bashrc</code>  .
For example with the following in <code>.bashrc</code> in the user home directory.</p>

<pre><code>orange=$(tput setaf 166);
PS1="${orange}\u"
export PS1;
</code></pre>

<p>Outputs my username in orange on ubuntu but on my Mac it just outputs <code>\u</code> in orange so for some reason <code>\u</code> isn't working on my Mac? Is there an alternative I could try?</p>

<bash><macos>
Is \u the only way to output the user from .bashrc?
doug
# Is \u the only way to output the user from .bashrc?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2020-02-16)

I can't get it to work on my Mac (catalina version 10.15.2).
\u works on ubuntu when I test it but not on my Mac. 
I want to customize my mac terminal. Colors work fine on my Mac and it's reading the .bashrc file when I test it by source .bashrc  .
For example with the following in .bashrc in the user home directory.
orange=$(tput setaf 166);
PS1="${orange}\u"
export PS1;

Outputs my username in orange on ubuntu but on my Mac it just outputs \u in orange so for some reason \u isn't working on my Mac? Is there an alternative I could try?

**Tags:** bash, macos


---

## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2020-02-16. Score: 3 | Accepted answer

With the release of macOS Catalina (10.15) Apple has switched to Zsh as default shell (instead of Bash).
Instead of setting *PS1* in Bash you can set *PROMPT* in Zsh:
`PROMPT="${orange}%n"`

> **Comments:**
> **username_2**: It is too bad this was hastened by fear of GPL3 versions of bash.  https://scriptingosx.com/2019/06/moving-to-zsh/  

---

