Yes, shell functions are cool. I use them to augment standard commands too, e.g. make head(1) or tail(1) output more lines than usual, depending on the terminal

Yes, shell functions are cool. I use them to augment standard commands too, e.g. make head(1) or tail(1) output more lines than usual, depending on the terminal's number of lines: head () { if [[ $# -eq 0 ]] then /usr/bin/head -$[(LINES-1)/2] elif [[ -f "$1" ]] then case $# in (1) /usr/bin/head -$[(LINES-1)/2] $* ;; (2) /usr/bin/head -$[LINES*5/12] $* ;; (3) /usr/bin/head -$[(LINES-1)/3] $* ;; (*) /usr/bin/head $* ;; esac else /usr/bin/head $* fi }