Shell Customizations

A ready-to-use PowerShell setup for Windows: a beautiful prompt, smart history search, file-type icons, and the bundled font that makes it all look right. Everything lives in this repo — clone it, run one script, and your terminals (Windows Terminal, VS Code, plain pwsh) all look and behave the same.

Don't know PowerShell yet? That's fine. Follow the steps in Quick Start line by line. You can copy-paste each command.

What you get

🎨 A colorful prompt showing your current folder, Git status, last command's success/failure, and Azure context (powered by Oh My Posh).
⚡ Smart history search — start typing a command, press Up Arrow, and PowerShell finds the last matching command you ran.
🤖 Inline command suggestions as you type, based on your history.
📁 Icons next to files and folders in directory listings (powered by Terminal-Icons).
🔤 The Nerd Font the prompt needs to render its icons.
🚀 An optimized profile that loads ~3× faster than the standard one.
🔄 A switcher script to flip between the original and optimized profiles whenever you want.

Quick Start

You'll need about 10 minutes. Open PowerShell 7 (look for the icon labeled PowerShell that opens a window with the title pwsh — not the old "Windows PowerShell").

1. Install the prerequisites (one-time)

Copy and paste this whole block into PowerShell. It installs PowerShell 7 (if missing), Oh My Posh, and the icon module.

# Install PowerShell 7 if you don't have it (skip if you're already in pwsh)
winget install --id Microsoft.PowerShell -e --accept-source-agreements --accept-package-agreements

# Install Oh My Posh (the prompt engine)
winget install --id JanDeDobbeleer.OhMyPosh -e --accept-source-agreements --accept-package-agreements

# Install the icon module
Install-Module -Name Terminal-Icons -Scope CurrentUser -Force

Close and reopen your terminal so it picks up the new commands.

2. Install the font

The fancy prompt uses special icon characters that only render correctly with a Nerd Font. The simplest option:

oh-my-posh font install CascadiaCode

When it asks which variant, choose CascadiaCode.

Alternatively, double-click any .ttf file in this repo's fonts/ folder and click Install.

3. Tell your terminal to use the font

Windows Terminal

Press Ctrl+, to open Settings.
Click your PowerShell profile (or Defaults to apply to all profiles).
Go to Appearance → Font face → select CaskaydiaCove Nerd Font Mono.
Click Save.

VS Code

Press Ctrl+, to open Settings.
Search for terminal.integrated.fontFamily.
Set it to CaskaydiaCove Nerd Font Mono.

4. Clone this repo

Pick any folder you like — just remember where you put it. Don't delete or move it after step 5.

# Example: clone into C:\Tools
mkdir C:\Tools -Force | Out-Null
cd C:\Tools
git clone https://github.com/davde-ms/shell_customizations.git
cd shell_customizations

5. Run the switcher

.\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized

You should see green or yellow output saying it linked or copied two files. Close and reopen your terminal — your new prompt is live.

That's it. Open Windows Terminal or a VS Code terminal — both should show the new prompt.

What's in this repo

File / folder	What it is
`Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1`	The original profile for regular PowerShell windows (Windows Terminal, standalone pwsh.exe).
`Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1`	The original profile for VS Code's integrated terminal.
`op_Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1`	The optimized profile for regular PowerShell windows. Faster startup.
`op_Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1`	The optimized profile for VS Code's integrated terminal.
`Switch-Profile.ps1`	The switcher script — flips your active profile between Original and Optimized.
`oh-my-posh/`	The prompt theme files (`.json`).
`oh-my-posh-docs/`	Reference docs for the Oh My Posh theme syntax (for editing themes).
`fonts/`	The Caskaydia Cove Nerd Font files.

How it works

PowerShell automatically runs a script called your profile every time it starts. Your profile is just a .ps1 file at a specific location:

C:\Users\<you>\Documents\PowerShell\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1     ← regular PowerShell
C:\Users\<you>\Documents\PowerShell\Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1         ← VS Code's terminal

(If you use OneDrive, your Documents folder may live under OneDrive\Documents\ or OneDrive - <Org>\Documents\. PowerShell knows where it is — type $PROFILE to see your exact path.)

The switcher (Switch-Profile.ps1) replaces those files with pointers to the version you want from this repo. It also remembers where this repo lives by saving its path in an environment variable called SHELL_CUSTOMIZATIONS_ROOT, so the profiles can find their theme files no matter where you cloned the repo.

Symlink vs. Copy

The switcher prefers to use a symbolic link (symlink): a tiny pointer file. With a symlink, when you edit a file in this repo, the change is live the next time you open a terminal — no re-running needed.

But Windows requires either administrator rights or Developer Mode to create symlinks. If neither is available, the switcher falls back to a regular file copy. That works fine, but with one trade-off: after editing a profile in this repo, you have to re-run .\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized for the change to take effect.

Recommended one-time setup: enable Developer Mode

This lets symlinks work without admin rights.

Open Windows Settings.
Go to Privacy & security → For developers.
Turn Developer Mode to On.
Re-run .\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized.

Switching between Original and Optimized

The optimized profile loads in about a third of the time. It does this by:

Caching the prompt initialization output (no need to spawn oh-my-posh.exe on every shell start).
Loading icons lazily — Terminal-Icons starts in the background after your first prompt is on screen.
Trimming unused PSReadLine sample handlers.

Run any of these from inside the cloned repo folder:

.\Switch-Profile.ps1                # show which version is currently active
.\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized      # use the fast version (recommended)
.\Switch-Profile.ps1 Original       # go back to the verbose original

After switching, close and reopen your terminal for the change to take effect.

Measure the difference yourself

1..5 | ForEach-Object {
    (Measure-Command { pwsh -NoLogo -Command exit }).TotalMilliseconds
} | Measure-Object -Average

Run that line, switch profiles, then run it again.

Updating, moving, or uninstalling

To pull the latest changes

cd <wherever-you-cloned-the-repo>
git pull

If you used symlink mode, you're done — your terminals will pick up the new version next time they start.

If you used copy mode (no Developer Mode / no admin), re-run the switcher to refresh the copies:

.\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized

To move the repo to a different folder

Move (or re-clone) the repo to the new location.
From the new location, run .\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized again. This updates the saved repo path and refreshes the links/copies.

To uninstall completely

The switcher backed up any pre-existing profiles for you with names like Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1.backup-<timestamp>. To restore them:

$dir = Split-Path $PROFILE
Remove-Item "$dir\Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1", "$dir\Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1" -Force -ErrorAction SilentlyContinue
# Then rename the most recent .backup-<timestamp> file back to the original name, if you want it.

To remove the saved repo path:

[Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable('SHELL_CUSTOMIZATIONS_ROOT', $null, 'User')

Troubleshooting

My prompt looks like a row of boxes or question marks

You haven't installed the Nerd Font, or your terminal isn't using it. Repeat steps 2 and 3 of the Quick Start.

My prompt looks plain (no colors, no icons)

Most likely the profile didn't run, or it can't find its theme file. Check:

# Is the profile file in place?
Test-Path $PROFILE

# Does PowerShell know where this repo is?
[Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable('SHELL_CUSTOMIZATIONS_ROOT','User')

# Is oh-my-posh on PATH?
Get-Command oh-my-posh

If the env var is empty or oh-my-posh is missing, re-run the Quick Start steps that set them up.

"Symlink creation failed (Administrator privilege required)"

This is a warning, not an error — the switcher fell back to copying the files, which still works. To stop seeing this warning, either run PowerShell as administrator once when running the switcher, or (recommended) enable Developer Mode.

`Switch-Profile.ps1` says my profile is "Unknown"

This happens in copy mode — the switcher can't tell which version is currently in place because the file isn't a symlink. The profile is still working; the status display just can't introspect it. Enable Developer Mode and re-run the switcher to get accurate status.

I edit a file in the repo but nothing changes

You're in copy mode. Either enable Developer Mode (so future installs use symlinks) or just re-run .\Switch-Profile.ps1 Optimized after each edit.

`oh-my-posh: command not found`

Either oh-my-posh isn't installed, or you didn't restart your terminal after installing it. Run:

winget install --id JanDeDobbeleer.OhMyPosh -e

…then fully close and reopen your terminal.

For curious users — what the profiles actually do

Skip this section if you just want things to work.

Modules loaded

PSReadLine — gives PowerShell its modern command-line editing (history search, syntax coloring, predictions). Built into PowerShell 7+.
Terminal-Icons — adds file-type icons to Get-ChildItem output.
Oh My Posh — renders the prompt itself based on a theme JSON.

Tab completion is configured for

winget (Windows package manager)
dotnet (.NET CLI)

Useful key bindings (PSReadLine)

Key	What it does
`Up Arrow` / `Down Arrow`	Search history starting with what you've typed
`Right Arrow` (at end of line)	Accept the next word of the predicted command
`Alt+f` / `Alt+b`	Move forward / backward by one shell-aware word
`Alt+Backspace`	Delete the previous shell word
`(`, `[`, `"`, `'`	Auto-insert the matching closing character
`Backspace`	Delete an empty matching pair in one keystroke

Theme files

Two themes ship in oh-my-posh/:

davde-theme-json — a fuller theme with session, path, Git, exit code, shell, battery, and Azure segments. Used by the standalone PowerShell host.
sh.json — a lighter theme with session, path, Git, exit code, and Azure. Used inside VS Code (where vertical space matters more).

Editing themes? See oh-my-posh-docs/00-overview.md for a syntax reference, or the official site at ohmyposh.dev/docs/configuration.

Performance optimizations in the `op_*` profiles

Cached prompt init. oh-my-posh init is run once and its output saved to %LOCALAPPDATA%\oh-my-posh\init.<hash>.ps1. The cache is invalidated automatically when the theme JSON or oh-my-posh.exe is updated.
Lazy icon loading. Terminal-Icons is imported on the first OnIdle event after your prompt appears, instead of blocking startup.
PSReadLine auto-loaded. No explicit Import-Module PSReadLine — pwsh loads it the first time Set-PSReadLine* is called.
Trimmed key handlers. Only frequently-used bindings are kept; the dozens of sample handlers from the original profile are removed.

Together these typically take cold start from ~700–1000 ms down to ~250–400 ms.

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 13 Commits
.github		.github
fonts		fonts
oh-my-posh-docs		oh-my-posh-docs
oh-my-posh		oh-my-posh
.gitignore		.gitignore
LICENSE		LICENSE
Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1		Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1
Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1		Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1
README.md		README.md
Switch-Profile.ps1		Switch-Profile.ps1
op_Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1		op_Microsoft.PowerShell_profile.ps1
op_Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1		op_Microsoft.VSCode_profile.ps1

Folders and files

Latest commit

History

Repository files navigation

Shell Customizations

What you get

Table of Contents

Quick Start

1. Install the prerequisites (one-time)

2. Install the font

3. Tell your terminal to use the font

4. Clone this repo

5. Run the switcher

What's in this repo

How it works

Symlink vs. Copy

Recommended one-time setup: enable Developer Mode

Switching between Original and Optimized

Measure the difference yourself

Updating, moving, or uninstalling

To pull the latest changes

To move the repo to a different folder

To uninstall completely

Troubleshooting

My prompt looks like a row of boxes or question marks

My prompt looks plain (no colors, no icons)

"Symlink creation failed (Administrator privilege required)"

Switch-Profile.ps1 says my profile is "Unknown"

I edit a file in the repo but nothing changes

oh-my-posh: command not found

For curious users — what the profiles actually do

Modules loaded

Tab completion is configured for

Useful key bindings (PSReadLine)

Theme files

Performance optimizations in the op_* profiles

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`Switch-Profile.ps1` says my profile is "Unknown"

`oh-my-posh: command not found`

Performance optimizations in the `op_*` profiles

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