Interpreters

The execution of scripts and hooks on Windows depends on the file extension. Windows will natively execute scripts with a .bat, .cmd, .com, and .exe extensions. Other extensions require an interpreter, which must be in your %PATH%.

The default script interpreters are:

Extension	Command	Arguments
.nu	nu	none
.pl	perl	none
.py	python3	none
.ps1	pwsh	-NoLogo -File
.rb	ruby	none

Script interpreters can be added or overridden by adding the corresponding extension (without the leading dot) as a key under the interpreters section of the configuration file.

Note

The leading . is dropped from extension, for example to specify the interpreter for .pl files you configure interpreters.pl (where . in this case just means "a child of" in the configuration file, however that is specified in your preferred format).

Example

To change the Python interpreter to C:\Python39\python3.exe and add a Tcl/Tk interpreter, include the following in your config file:

~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.toml

[interpreters.py]
    command = 'C:\Python39\python3.exe'
[interpreters.tcl]
    command = "tclsh"

Or if using YAML:

~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.yaml

interpreters:
  py:
    command: "C:\Python39\python3.exe"
  tcl:
    command: "tclsh"

Note that the TOML version can also be written like this, which resembles the YAML version more and makes it clear that the key for each file extension should not have a leading .:

~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.toml

[interpreters]
py = { command = 'C:\Python39\python3.exe' }
tcl = { command = "tclsh" }

PowerShell Core Installation

PowerShell Core (pwsh) must be installed separately on most systems. If you don't have it installed:

• Windows: Download from PowerShell releases or install via winget install Microsoft.PowerShell
• Linux/macOS: Follow instructions at Installing PowerShell

Note

chezmoi defaults to PowerShell Core (pwsh) for .ps1 scripts as it provides better UTF-8 support and cross-platform compatibility. On Windows, if pwsh is not available, chezmoi will automatically fall back to Windows PowerShell (powershell).

To explicitly use Windows PowerShell instead of the automatic selection, include the following in your config file:

~/.config/chezmoi/chezmoi.toml

[interpreters.ps1]
    command = "powershell"
    args = ["-NoLogo"]

If the script in the source state is a template (with a .tmpl extension), then chezmoi will strip the .tmpl extension and use the next remaining extension to determine the interpreter to use.