Sometimes in the Erlang shell, if I mistype a command and hit Enter, the shell goes to the next line in anticipation that the command will continue (so the line number on the left stays the same).
For example, I just now mistakenly (on purpose) typed 1> $"X". instead of 1> $X.. After hitting Enter, now the command line is stuck on 1>. I have tried typing . followed by Enter and simply Enter in the hopes of terminating the command sequence, but it doesn't work. Although I have tried, it is very hard to look this up on google because the incredibly common keywords lead to other results.
Is there a way I can break that sequence without having to exit the shell entirely with Ctrl C? The trouble with restarting the shell is all the variables are lost.
you can hit Ctrl-g, which gets you to the "User switch command" this erlang's shell break mode
The prompt will change from > to --->.
In this mode
erlang shell will then state exception exit: killed and return to the state it was in immediately before you got stuck.
~ → erl
Erlang/OTP 19 [erts-8.2] [source] [64-bit] [smp:8:8] [async-threads:10] [hipe] [kernel-poll:false] [dtrace]
local recon loaded
local stdlib2 loaded
Eshell V8.2 (abort with ^G)
1> $"X".
1> l
1> .
1> .
1>
User switch command
--> i
--> c
** exception exit: killed
1> R=22.
22
2> $"X".
2>
User switch command
--> i
--> c
** exception exit: killed
2> b().
R = 22
ok
3>