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Hline allows you to select one or more commands and copy them to your system clipboard. Selection order is preserved, making it easy to build command sequences.

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Selecting commands

You can select commands individually or select all visible commands at once.

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Toggle selection

Press Space to toggle selection for the command under the cursor. 
# Before pressing Space
  git status
  git add .
> git commit -m "fix"    [cursor]
  git push

# After pressing Space
  git status
  git add .
✓ git commit -m "fix"    [cursor, now selected]
  git push

# Press Space again to deselect
  git status
  git add .
> git commit -m "fix"    [cursor, deselected]
  git push

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Select all visible

Press a to select all currently shown commands. This respects any active filters. 
# With filter: "git"
  git status
  git add .
  git commit -m "fix"
  git push

# Press 'a'
✓ git status
✓ git add .
✓ git commit -m "fix"
✓ git push

# Shows toast: "Selected 4 shown entries"
If you have 100 git commands in your history and filter for “git push”, pressing a selects only the visible “git push” commands, not all git commands.

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Clear all selections

Press c to deselect everything. 
# Before pressing 'c'
✓ git status
✓ git add .
  git commit -m "fix"
✓ git push

# After pressing 'c'
  git status
  git add .
  git commit -m "fix"
  git push

# Shows toast: "Cleared selections"

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Copying to clipboard

Press y to copy commands to your system clipboard.

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Copy behavior

  • No selection: Copies the command under the cursor
  • With selection: Copies all selected commands in the order they were selected

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Copy single command

# Cursor on a command, nothing selected
  git status
> git add .              [cursor]
  git commit

# Press 'y'
# Clipboard now contains: git add .
# Shows toast: "Copied 1 line"

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Copy multiple commands

# Multiple commands selected
✓ git add .
  git status
✓ git commit -m "fix"
✓ git push

# Press 'y'
# Clipboard now contains:
# git add .
# git commit -m "fix"
# git push
# Shows toast: "Copied 3 lines"
Each command is copied on its own line, ready to paste into a shell script or terminal.

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Selection order preservation

Commands are copied in the order you selected them, not the order they appear on screen. This lets you build custom command sequences.

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Example: building a git workflow

# Your history (in Recency order)
  git push origin main
  git commit -m "fix bug"
  git add .
  git status

# Step 1: Move cursor to "git add ." and press Space
  git push origin main
  git commit -m "fix bug"
✓ git add .              [selected first]
  git status

# Step 2: Move cursor to "git commit" and press Space
  git push origin main
✓ git commit -m "fix bug"  [selected second]
✓ git add .
  git status

# Step 3: Move cursor to "git push" and press Space
✓ git push origin main     [selected third]
✓ git commit -m "fix bug"
✓ git add .
  git status

# Step 4: Press 'y' to copy
# Clipboard contains (in selection order):
# git add .
# git commit -m "fix bug"
# git push origin main
Even though “git push” appears first on screen, it’s copied last because you selected it last.

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Selection with filters

Selections persist even when commands are filtered out of view.

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Example workflow

# 1. Filter for git commands and select some
/git
[Esc]
[Space on "git status"]
[Space on "git push"]

# 2. Clear filter to show all commands
/
[Ctrl+u]
[Esc]

# 3. Filter for docker commands and select some
/docker
[Esc]
[Space on "docker ps"]

# 4. Press 'y' to copy
# Clipboard contains:
# git status
# git push  
# docker ps
Your git selections remained active even when you filtered for docker commands.

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Selection with sorting

Changing the sort order doesn’t affect selection order for copying. 
# In Recency order
✓ git push                [selected first]
  git commit
✓ git add .               [selected second]

# Press 's' to switch to Alpha order
✓ git add .               [was selected second]
  git commit
✓ git push                [was selected first]

# Press 'y'
# Clipboard contains (original selection order):
# git push
# git add .

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Clipboard integration

Hline uses your system clipboard:
  • Linux: X11 clipboard (primary and clipboard selection) or Wayland clipboard
  • macOS: pbcopy/pbpaste
  • Windows: Windows clipboard API
After copying with y, you can paste the commands anywhere using your system’s paste shortcut (usually Ctrl+V or Cmd+V).

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Error handling

If copying fails, you’ll see an error toast: 
Clipboard error: failed to access clipboard
This can happen if:
  • The clipboard service isn’t available
  • You’re using hline over SSH without X11 forwarding
  • The clipboard API isn’t accessible

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Tips

  • Select commands in the order you want to run them, not the order they appear
  • Use a to quickly select all commands matching a filter
  • Clear selections with c before starting a new selection
  • Copy a single command with y without needing to select it first

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