This post will guide you how to disable bash shell commands history on Linux system. How do I disable bash shell history in CentOS/Ubuntu Linux.
Get Current Commands History
If you want to display all commands history in Linux, you just need to type any of the following command:
#history
Or
#history |less
Or
#history | more
Check the Maximum Number of Commands saved in History
If you want to check the maximum number of commands saved in history in bash shell, you can print the history environment variable HISTSIZE to get it. Just type the following command:
#echo $HISTSIZE
Outputs:
root@ubuntu-dev:~# echo $HISTSIZE 1000
So the default value of the maximum history commands are save in history file is 1000. And the commands history list is save into the .bash_history file.
Disable Bash Shell History
If you want to disable bash shell history feature, you need to remove HISTFILE variable, then the history command is not able to write into the .bash_history file.
Type the following command:
#unset HISTFILE
Or
#echo “unset HISTFILE” >> ~/.bash_profile
Disable Bash History Permanently
If you want to disable bash history permanently, you can use the set command, type the following command:
#set +o history
Clear All History Commands
To clear all bash shell history commands in Linux, just type the following command:
#history –c