copy-from-bash

copy-from-bash

Since bash on windows does not support xclip I made this tool as a work around.

So, what does it do?

Basically it allows you copy text from the bash to the windows clipboard.

How does it work?

It opens a TCP connection on windows that waits until someone sents data to it. When data is sent to it it will overwrite the clipboard for a given time or for forever (except you change it).

How to start

Run the following code in windows to install the package:

npm i -g copy-from-bash

Next step is to open the TCP connection:

copyfb listen

The server should now run in the background.

To check if everything works so far you can run the following command:

copyfb sent --text "hello world" --timer 10

This will overwrite your clipboard with "hello world" for 10 seconds. The --timer options is not necessary!

Hopefully everything works so far. Let's get to bash.

btw. Node needs to be installed on ubuntu for windows.

Windows stores all global node_modules at

%appdata%\\npm\\

In order for this to work you need to add this path to your $PATH in ubuntu. The easiest way to do this is to to write it into the .bashrc file.

echo 'export PATH=$PATH:/mnt/c/Users/YOUR_USER_NAME/AppData/Roaming/npm' >> ~/.bashrc 

Now close and open your bash. If you type the following you can see if the path was added:

echo $PATH

If everything is set up you can try the following in bash:

echo "hello from bash" | clip

Now, if everything works as it is supposed to, you should have "hello from bash" in your clipboard. For 45 seconds.

You can type | clip 0 for forever or any other number for the amount of seconds.

If you are happy you can write this on windows:

copyfb autostart

This will start the TCP connection with windows, so you can go right into bash.

For less information use clip help or copyfb help.