I found the order of precedence described here but if and only if bash is instructed to source a script after the alias is given in .bashrc does the alias-function get used by the sourced script.

E.g.:

function save_cd(){
  cd "$@" 
  echo "$(pwd)" > dummy file 
  echo "$(pwd)"
};
alias cd="save cd";
source 'script-that-calls-cd-in-it'

When I tried sourcing the script that calls cd before declaring cd to be an alias the alias was not"expanded" in the shell environment if I'm using expanded properly here. Instead subsequent calls to sourced_script_defined_function used the cd built-in rather than my alias/function or in my case.. nothing was echoed.

I found the order of precedence described here but if and only if bash is instructed to source a script after the alias is given in .bashrc does the alias-function get used by the sourced script.

E.g.:

function save_cd(){
  cd "$@" 
  echo "$(pwd)" > dummy file 
  echo "$(pwd)"
};
alias cd="save cd";
source 'script-that-calls-cd-in-it'

When I tried sourcing the script that calls cd before declaring cd to be an alias the alias was not"expanded" in the shell environment if I'm using expanded properly here. Instead subsequent calls to sourced_script_defined_function used the cd built-in rather than my alias/function or in my case.. nothing was echoed.

• bash
• shell
• posix
• alias

• 2 Scripts don't expand aliases by default. You need shopt -s expand_aliases to expand them in non-interactive shells. – choroba Commented Mar 21 at 19:06
• 2 And I think you meant alias cd="save_cd" ? – shellter Commented Mar 21 at 21:45
• Beyond that, to have a testable minimal reproducible example we'd need to see a specific example of script-that-calls-cd-in-it that doesn't behave as expected in conjunction with your code. If the script is running, say, bash -c 'cd ...', that would explain it not honoring the alias (and also break the function approach, but in a way you can fix with export -f cd to copy the function into the environment for use by subprocesses). – Charles Duffy Commented Mar 21 at 23:58
• No, keeping the alias defined after the function works as expected. And I really learned something from your point about using the command command or builtin keywords. I am still familiarizing with stackoverflow and how I can best honor their "what to do when someone answers your question" faq guidelines and still benefit as a meet hobbyist. But I'll go ahead and mark yours as the answer. Any way you could address my comment on the answer about adding a resource that describes parse time expansion? Thanks Charles for your time and thought on this..