Hello, # source test_script > a # source ./a ./a:156: unmatched " ./a:157: invalid function definition It's about following line: [[ $#exp -eq 1 && "${exp[1]//\}" = "${word//\}"(|\(N\)) ]] The first and second backslash aren't quoted and cause the two '{' to be unbound. Other quoting styles (q, qqq, qqqq) also fail in general (with e.g. parse errors, also with an 'unmatched "'). I think that quoting means: content can be anything, special characters will be taken care of – so this is a problem. The test script is: # To be sourced for k in _expand; do echo "if [[ \"\${functions[$k]}\" != ${(qq)functions[$k]} ]]; then functions[$k]=${(qq)functions[$k]} fi" done I also attach short version of the result: if [[ "${functions[_expand]}" != ' setopt localoptions nonomatch' ]]; then functions[_expand]='[[ $#exp -eq 1 && "${exp[1]//\}" = "${word//\}"(|\(N\)) ]]' fi - sourcing this will fail because of the unquoted backslash. Best regards, Sebastian Gniazdowski