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macosterminalzsh

How to disable tab auto-complete "camera flash" for MacOS terminal?


Whenever I use the tab auto-complete feature in the default terminal for MacOS, there is a visual effect much like a camera flash that illuminates the terminal window for a fraction of a second. It is fairly distracting, and I would like to disable it. I've checked the preferences, but couldn't find a relevant option. Any help is appreciated.

Edit: I should specify, it only happens when nothing has been typed in but a path is expected.

For example, typing "cd " and hitting tab will produce a camera flash, whereas "cd Downlo" and hitting tab will not.


Solution

  • That sounds like the "visual bell" that's normally used when the Terminal receives a BELL character, but the sound is muted. If that's it, you can change it with Terminal menu > Preferences -> Profiles section -> Advanced tab -> uncheck the Visual Bell option.

    BTW, this also disables that flash for anything else that would normally trigger a Terminal bell sound. You can trigger this yourself with the command printf '\a' (the \a translates to the "alert" or BELL character).