cdf: a function to change to the directory that contains a file

TL;DR: cdf is a tool that you can use in any bash-like shell (zsh included) to change to the directory that contains the file whose path is being passed as an argument.

As a macOS user, I’m very used to the fact that you can use Show in Finder or Show in enclosing folder on many occassions. But sometimes, you want to do something similar in the terminal.

That is why I developed the following bash function (which started in my .bash_profile, and now lives in my .zshrc) that does exactly that:

cdf() {
	dest_dir=$(dirname "$1")
	cd "$dest_dir"
}

This simply gets the destination directory from the path being passed (using dirname, and the $() substitution).

Then, use use cd to that directory. We need to use quotes after cd to make sure that we don’t split directories that cointain blanks…

And that is it! You can now start typing cdf in your terminal, and then drag and drop from your file manager — say, the Finder on macOS — and a full path to a file, and you will change directory to the folder containing that file.