Startup and shutdown


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Startup and shutdown
A login shell begins by executing commands from the system files
/etc/csh.cshrc and /etc/csh.login.
It then executes commands from files in the user's home directory:
first ~/.tcshrc (+)
or, if ~/.tcshrc is not found, ~/.cshrc,
then ~/.history (or the value of the histfile shell variable),
then ~/.login,
and finally ~/.cshdirs (or the value of the dirsfile shell variable) (+).
The shell may read /etc/csh.login before instead of after
/etc/csh.cshrc, and ~/.login before instead of after
~/.tcshrc or ~/.cshrc and ~/.history, if so compiled;
see the version shell variable. (+)

Non-login shells read only /etc/csh.cshrc and ~/.tcshrc
or ~/.cshrc on startup.

Commands like stty(1) and tset(1),
which need be run only once per login, usually go in one's ~/.login file.
Users who need to use the same set of files with both csh(1) and
tcsh can have only a ~/.cshrc which checks for the existence of the
tcsh shell variable (q.v.) before using tcsh-specific commands,
or can have both a ~/.cshrc and a ~/.tcshrc which sources
(see the builtin command) ~/.cshrc.
The rest of this manual uses `~/.tcshrc' to mean `~/.tcshrc or,
if ~/.tcshrc is not found, ~/.cshrc'.

In the normal case, the shell begins reading commands from the terminal,
prompting with `> '. (Processing of arguments and the use of the shell to
process files containing command scripts are described later.)
The shell repeatedly reads a line of command input, breaks it into words,
places it on the command history list, parses it and executes each command
in the line.

One can log out by typing `^D' on an empty line, `logout' or `login' or
via the shell's autologout mechanism (see the autologout shell variable).
When a login shell terminates it sets the logout shell variable to
`normal' or `automatic' as appropriate, then
executes commands from the files
/etc/csh.logout and ~/.logout. The shell may drop DTR on logout
if so compiled; see the version shell variable.

The names of the system login and logout files vary from system to system for
compatibility with different csh(1) variants; see FILES.

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