Super quick guide to Espanso

Espanso is a text expanding utility, and it's really good at what it does. If you find yourself typing the same text (your name, address, greetings, etc.) over and over again, Espanso is what you need. Deploying the tool is a matter of grabbing the right package, installing it, and running it as a service:

wget https://github.com/federico-terzi/espanso/releases/download/v2.2.1/espanso-debian-x11-amd64.deb
sudo apt install ./espanso-debian-x11-amd64.deb
espanso service register
espanso start

The example above uses Espanso 2.2.1 for Debian with X11. So if you use a different setup, adjust the first two commands accordingly.

To add text expansion rules, switch to $HOME/.config/espanso/match and open the base.yml file for editing.

An expansion rule consists of a trigger (that is, an abbreviation) and a text that replaces it:

- trigger: ":hello"
  replace: "Oh, hello there!"

Add the rules you need, and you're done. When you save the changes, Espanso automatically reloads, and you can use triggers everywhere — including command-line applications.