How to Recall the Argument of the Previous Bash Command

How can I recall the argument of the previous bash command?

You can use $_ or !$ to recall the last argument of the previous command.

Also Alt + . can be used to recall the last argument of any of the previous commands.

How to use arguments from previous command?

Just as M-. (meta-dot or esc-dot or alt-dot) is the readline function yank-last-arg, M-C-y (meta-control-y or esc-ctrl-y or ctrl-alt-y) is the readline function yank-nth-arg. Without specifying n, it yanks the first argument of the previous command.

To specify an argument, press Escape and a number or hold Alt and press a number. You can do Alt--to begin specifying a negative number then release Alt and press the digit (this will count from the end of the list of arguments.

Example:

Enter the following command

$ echo a b c d e f g
a b c d e f g

Now at the next prompt, type echo (with a following space), then

Press Alt-Ctrl-y and you'll now see:

$ echo a

without pressing Enter yet, do the following

Press Alt-3 Alt-Ctrl-y

Press Alt-- 2 Alt-Ctrl-y

Now you will see:

$ echo ace

By the way, you could have put the echo on the line by selecting argument 0:

Press Alt-0 Alt-Ctrl-y

Edit:

To answer the question you added to your original:

You can press Alt-0 then repeatedly press Alt-. to step through the previous commands (arg 0). Similarly Alt-- then repeating Alt-. would allow you to step through the previous next-to-last arguments.

If there is no appropriate argument on a particular line in history, the bell will be rung.

If there is a particular combination you use frequently, you can define a macro so one keystroke will perform it. This example will recall the second argument from previous commands by pressing Alt-Shift-Y. You could choose any available keystroke you prefer instead of this one. You can press it repeatedly to step through previous ones.

To try it out, enter the macro at a Bash prompt:

bind '"\eY": "\e2\e."'

To make it persistent, add this line to your ~/.inputrc file:

"\eY": "\e2\e."

Unfortunately, this doesn't seem to work for arg 0 or negative argument numbers.

how can I recall previous commands' arguments? (in csh, and in bash?)

Using history expansion you can pick a specific command from the
history, execute it as it is, or modify it and execute it based on your
needs. The ! starts the history expansion.

!! Repeats the previous command

!10 Repeat the 10th command from the history

!-2 Repeat the 2nd command (from the last) from the history

!string Repeat the command that starts with “string” from the history

!?string Repeat the command that contains the word “string” from the history

^str1^str2^ Substitute str1 in the previous command with str2 and execute it

!!:$ Gets the last argument from the previous command.

!string:n Gets the nth argument from the command that starts with “string” from the history.

!^ first argument of the previous command

!$ last argument of the previous command

!* all arguments of the previous command

!:2 second argument of the previous command

!:2-3 second to third arguments of the previous command

!:2-$ second to last arguments of the previous command

!:2* second to last arguments of the previous command

!:2- second to next to last arguments of the previous command

!:0 the command itself

Last but not least, I would also recommend you to press on Alt + . to access to the last argument of any of the previous commands you have entered

Recall all arguments from a previously executed command in bash shell

Try leaving out the second !:

$ ls foo bar baz
foo bar baz
$ echo !ls:*
echo foo bar baz
foo bar baz

Bash refer to previous arguments in same line

mkdir tmp && cd "$_"

is what you're looking for, I believe (you can drop the double quotes if you're sure that quoting is not needed).

$_ expands differently in different contexts, but the one that matters here (from man bash , v3.2.51):

expands to the last argument to the previous command, after expansion.

Background:

Note: the following discusses bash, but it seems to apply to zsh in principle as well.

$_ is a so-called special parameter, which you'll find listed among others (without the $ prefix) in the Special Parameters section of man bash:

Works both in interactive shells and in scripts.
Works at the individual command level, not at the line level.

By contrast, !-prefixed tokens (such as !$ to recall the most recent line's last token) relate to the shell's [command] history expansion (section HISTORY EXPANSION of man bash):

By default they work only in interactive shells, but that can be changed with set -o history and set -o histexpand (thanks, @chepner)).
Work at the line level (more accurately: everything that was submitted with one Enter keystroke, no matter how many individual commands or lines it comprised).