In bash, how to expand the !$ while typing the command line?

Question

Is there a way to expand the !$ in command line while interactively editing the command inside shell?

For example, while I am typing ls !$, I press some button and then I see what is the value of !$.

Answer 1

Do you want this sequence to be treated literally, without any expansion? You may quote it with apostrophes: '!$'

UPDATE If you want to expand it before executing, you may use Ctrl-Alt-E, but beware that it would perform "word expansion" as well, so !$ "single argument" would be expanded to expanded_string single argument (no quotes => two arguments).

You may also use Alt-_ (works in both emacs and vi modes), or Alt-. (works only in emacs mode) to just insert the last argument of the previous command directly, without any expansion.

Answer 2

You can simple use：

!$:p

This will print the most recently executed command's last word.

Or type Ctrl-Alt-e to expand !$

Or type ESC. to get !$

Answer 3

You type !$ and after that you press: Alt-^ and the !$ is expanded immediately.

Thanks to @Alexis for his answer on https://stackoverflow.com/q/9360013/813665 that reveals me the power of Alt-^.