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Unix Shell Programming

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Unix Shell Programming

Programming unix system

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Nelson Junior

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You are on page 1/ 326

Copyright................................................................................................................................ 1
About the Authors.................................................................................................................. 3
We Want to Hear from You!................................................................................................... 4
Chapter 1. Introduction.......................................................................................................... 5
Chapter 2. A Quick Review of the Basics................................................................................. 8
Some Basic Commands................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 8
Working with Files.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 9
Working with Directories.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 12
Filename Substitution................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 23
Standard Input/Output and I/O Redirection............................................................................................................................................................................... 26
Pipes............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 29
Standard Error............................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 32
More on Commands...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 32
Command Summary...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 34
Exercises........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 34

Chapter 3. What Is the Shell?................................................................................................ 36

The Kernel and the Utilities.......................................................................................................................................................................................................... 36
The Login Shell.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 37
Typing Commands to the Shell..................................................................................................................................................................................................... 40
The Shell's Responsibilities........................................................................................................................................................................................................... 42

Chapter 4. Tools of the Trade................................................................................................ 47

Regular Expressions...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 47
cut................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 57
paste............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 60
sed.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 62
tr..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 64
grep................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 68
sort................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 73
uniq................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 76
Exercises........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 78

Chapter 5. And Away We Go................................................................................................. 80

Command Files............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 80
Variables........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 83
Built-in Integer Arithmetic........................................................................................................................................................................................................... 89
Exercises........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 90

Chapter 6. Can I Quote You on That?.................................................................................... 92

The Single Quote........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 92
The Double Quote.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 95
The Backslash................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 97
Command Substitution................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 99
Exercises...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 105

Chapter 7. Passing Arguments............................................................................................. 106

The $# Variable........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 107
The $* Variable............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 108
A Program to Look Up Someone in the Phone Book.................................................................................................................................................................. 108
A Program to Add Someone to the Phone Book......................................................................................................................................................................... 109
A Program to Remove Someone from the Phone Book............................................................................................................................................................... 111
${n}............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 112
The shift Command...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 112
Exercises....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 113

Chapter 8. Decisions, Decisions........................................................................................... 115

Exit Status..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 115
The test Command....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 118
The else Construct........................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 126
The exit Command....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 128
The elif Construct......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 129
The case Command...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 132
The Null Command :.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 138
The && and || Constructs............................................................................................................................................................................................................ 138
Exercises...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 140

Chapter 9. 'Round and 'Round She Goes............................................................................. 142

The for Command........................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 142
The until Command..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 147
More on Loops.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 151
The getopts Command................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 155

Unix Shell Programming, Third Edition. Unix Shell Programming, Third Edition, ISBN: 0-672-32490-3
Prepared for [email protected], Terry Wyatt
Copyright 2003 by Sams Publishing. This download file is made available for personal use only and is subject to the Terms of Service. Any other use requires prior written consent from
the copyright owner. Unauthorized use, reproduction and/or distribution are strictly prohibited and violate applicable laws. All rights reserved.

Exercises....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 158

Chapter 10. Reading and Printing Data............................................................................... 160

The read Command..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 160
The printf Command.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 173
Exercises....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 176

Chapter 11. Your Environment............................................................................................ 178

Local Variables............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 178
Exported Variables....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 181
PS1 and PS2.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 185
HOME, James.............................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 185
Your PATH................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 186
Your Current Directory................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 191
More on Subshells........................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 193
Your .profile File......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 200
The TERM Variable..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 201
The TZ Variable........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 201
Exercises...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 202

Chapter 12. More on Parameters........................................................................................ 203

Parameter Substitution............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 203
The $0 Variable........................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 208
The set Command....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 208
The IFS Variable.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 212
The readonly Command.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 215
The unset Command.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 215
Exercises....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 215

Chapter 13. Loose Ends....................................................................................................... 218

The eval Command...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 218
The wait Command..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 220
The trap Command..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 220
More on I/O................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 223
Functions..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 228
The type Command...................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 231
Exercises....................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 231

Chapter 14. Rolo Revisited.................................................................................................. 232

Design Considerations................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 232
rolo............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 233
add............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 235
lu.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 236
display.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 236
rem............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 237
change.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 238
listall............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 239
Sample Output............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 240
Exercises...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 242

Chapter 15. Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features.................................................... 244

Getting the Right Shell................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 245
The ENV File................................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 245
Command-Line Editing............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 246
Command History....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 246
The vi Line Edit Mode................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 247
The Line Edit Mode..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 250
Other Ways to Access Your History............................................................................................................................................................................................ 253
Functions..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 255
Integer Arithmetic....................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 255
The alias Command..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 258
Arrays.......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 260
Job Control.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 264
The Restricted Shell rsh.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 266
Miscellaneous Features............................................................................................................................................................................................................... 268
Compatibility Summary.............................................................................................................................................................................................................. 269
Exercises...................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 270

Appendix A. Shell Summary................................................................................................ 272

Startup......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 272
Commands................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 272
Comments.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 273
Parameters and Variables............................................................................................................................................................................................................ 273
Command Re-entry..................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 275
Quoting......................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 277
Filename Substitution................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 279
I/O Redirection............................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 279
Exported Variables and Subshell Execution.............................................................................................................................................................................. 280

Functions..................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 280
Job Control.................................................................................................................................................................................................................................. 281
Command Summary.................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 281

Appendix B. For More Information.................................................................................... 302

Online Documentation................................................................................................................................................................................................................ 302
Documentation on the Web........................................................................................................................................................................................................ 302
Books........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................... 303

bvdindexIndex.................................................................................................................... 305

Copyright 2003 by Sams Publishing

All rights reserved. No part of this book shall be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written
permission from the publisher. No patent liability is assumed with respect to the use of the information contained herein. Although every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book,
the publisher and author assume no responsibility for errors or omissions. Nor is any liability assumed for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 2002115932
Printed in the United States of America
First Printing: March 2003
06 05 04 03 4 3 2 1

Trademarks
All terms mentioned in this book that are known to be trademarks or service marks have been
appropriately capitalized. Sams Publishing cannot attest to the accuracy of this information. Use of
a term in this book should not be regarded as affecting the validity of any trademark or service mark.

Warning and Disclaimer

Every effort has been made to make this book as complete and as accurate as possible, but no
warranty or fitness is implied. The information provided is on an as is basis. The authors and the
publisher shall have neither liability nor responsibility to any person or entity with respect to any loss
or damages arising from the information contained in this book.

Credits
Acquisitions Editor

Katie Purdum
Development Editor
Scott Meyers
Managing Editor
Charlotte Clapp
Copy Editor
Geneil Breeze
Indexer
Erika Millen
Proofreader

Jessica McCarty
Technical Editor
Michael Watson
Interior Designer
Gary Adair
Cover Designer
Gary Adair
Page Layout
Susan Geiselman

Dedication
To my father, Harry Wood
Patrick Wood

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

To Gregory, Linda, and Julia for giving meaning to my life

Stephen G. Kochan

About the Authors

Stephen G. Kochan is the owner of TechFitness, a technology-based fitness company. Prior to that,
he was president and CEO of Pipeline Associates, a company specializing in color printing software.
Mr. Kochan is the author of several best-selling books on Unix and C programming, including the
best-selling Programming in C. He also acted as Series Editor for the Hayden Unix System Library.
Patrick Wood is the CTO of the New Jersey location of Electronics for Imaging. He was a member
of the technical staff at Bell Laboratories when he met Mr. Kochan in 1985. Together they founded
Pipeline Associates, Inc., a Unix consulting firm, where he was the Vice President. They coauthored
Exploring the Unix System, Unix System Security, Topics in C Programming, and Unix Shell Programming.

xii

We Want to Hear from You!

As the reader of this book, you are our most important critic and commentator. We value your opinion
and want to know what we're doing right, what we could do better, what areas you'd like to see us
publish in, and any other words of wisdom you're willing to pass our way.
You can email or write me directly to let me know what you did or didn't like about this bookas
well as what we can do to make our books stronger.

Please note that I cannot help you with technical problems related to the topic of this book, and that
due to the high volume of mail I receive, I might not be able to reply to every message.
When you write, please be sure to include this book's title and author as well as your name and
phone or email address. I will carefully review your comments and share them with the author and
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Chapter 1. Introduction

It's no secret that the Unix operating system has emerged as a standard operating system. For
programmers who have been using Unix for many years now, this came as no surprise: The Unix
system provides an elegant and efficient environment for program development. After all, this is
what Dennis Ritchie and Ken Thompson strived for when they developed Unix at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s.
One of the strongest features of the Unix system is its wide collection of programs. More than 200
basic commands are distributed with the standard operating system. These commands (also known
as tools) do everything from counting the number of lines in a file, to sending electronic mail, to
displaying a calendar for any desired year.
But the real strength of the Unix system comes not entirely from this large collection of commands
but also from the elegance and ease with which these commands can be combined to perform far
more sophisticated functions.
To further this end, and also to provide a consistent buffer between the user and the guts of the
Unix system (the kernel), the shell was developed. The shell is simply a program that reads in the
commands you type and converts them into a form more readily understood by the Unix system. It
also includes some fundamental programming constructs that let you make decisions, loop, and
store values in variables.
The standard shell distributed with Unix and Linux systems derives from AT&T's distribution, which
evolved from a version originally written by Stephen Bourne at Bell Labs. Since then, the IEEE
created standards based on the Bourne shell and the other more recent shells. The current version
of this standard as of this revision is the Shell and Utilities volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, also
known as the POSIX standard. This shell is what we propose to teach you about in this book.
The examples in this book were tested on both SunOS 5.7 running on a Sparcstation Ultra-30 and
on Silicon Graphics IRIX 6.5 running on an Octane; some examples were also run on Red Hat Linux
7.1 and Cygwin. All examples, except some Bash examples in Chapter 15, were run using the Korn
shell, although many were also run with Bash.
Many Unix systems are still around that have Bourne shell derivatives and utilities not compliant
with the POSIX standard. We'll try to note this throughout the text wherever possible; however, there
are so many different versions of Unix from so many different vendors that it's simply not possible
to mention every difference. If you do have an older Unix system that doesn't supply a POSIXcompliant shell, there's still hope. We'll list resources at the end of this book where you can obtain
free copies of three different POSIX-compliant shells.
Because the shell offers an interpreted programming language, programs can be written, modified,
and debugged quickly and easily. We turn to the shell as our first choice of programming language.
After you become adept at programming in the shell, you too may turn to it first.

Introduction

This book assumes that you are familiar with the fundamentals of the Unix system; that is, that you
know how to log in; how to create files, edit them, and remove them; and how to work with directories.
But in case you haven't used the Unix system for a while, we'll examine the basics in Chapter 2, A
Quick Review of the Basics. Besides the basic file commands, filename substitution, I/O redirection,
and pipes are also reviewed in Chapter 2.
Chapter 3, What Is the Shell?, reveals what the shell really is. You'll learn about what happens
every time you log in to the system, how the shell program gets started, how it parses the command
line, and how it executes other programs for you. A key point made in Chapter 3 is that the shell is
just a program; nothing more, nothing less.
Chapter 4, Tools of the Trade, provides tutorials on tools useful in writing shell programs. Covered
in this chapter are cut, paste, sed, grep, sort, tr, and uniq. Admittedly, the selection is subjective, but it does set the stage for programs that we'll develop throughout the remainder of the
book. Also in Chapter 4 is a detailed discussion of regular expressions, which are used by many
Unix commands such as sed, grep, and ed.
Chapters 5 through 10 teach you how to put the shell to work for writing programs. You'll learn how
to write your own commands; use variables; write programs that accept arguments; make decisions;
use the shell's for, while, and until looping commands; and use the read command to read
data from the terminal or from a file. Chapter 6, Can I Quote You on That?, is devoted entirely to
a discussion on one of the most intriguing (and often confusing) aspects of the shell: the way it
interprets quotes.
By this point in the book, all the basic programming constructs in the shell will have been covered,
and you will be able to write shell programs to solve your particular problems.
Chapter 11, Your Environment, covers a topic of great importance for a real understanding of the
way the shell operates: the environment. You'll learn about local and exported variables; subshells;
special shell variables such as HOME, PATH, and CDPATH; and how to set up your .profile file.
Chapter 12, More on Parameters, and Chapter 13, Loose Ends, tie up some loose ends, and
Chapter 14, Rolo Revisited, presents a final version of a phone directory program called rolo that
is developed throughout the book.
Chapter 15, Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features, discusses features of the shell that either
are not formally part of the IEEE POSIX standard shell (but are available in most Unix and Linux
shells) or are mainly used interactively instead of in programs.
Appendix A, Shell Summary, summarizes the features of the IEEE POSIX standard shell.
Appendix B, For More Information, lists references and resources, including the Web sites where
different shells can be downloaded.
The philosophy this book uses is to teach by example. Properly chosen examples do a far superior
job at illustrating how a particular feature is used than ten times as many words. The old A picture
is worth adage seems to apply just as well to examples. You are encouraged to type in each
example and test it on your system, for only by doing can you become adept at shell programming.
You also should not be afraid to experiment. Try changing commands in the program examples to
see the effect, or add different options or features to make the programs more useful or robust.
At the end of most chapters you will find exercises. These can be used as assignments in a classroom environment or by yourself to test your progress.
This book teaches the IEEE POSIX standard shell. Incompatibilities with earlier Bourne shell versions are noted in the text, and these tend to be minor.

Introduction

Acknowledgments from the first edition of this book: We'd like to thank Tony Iannino and Dick Fritz
for editing the manuscript. We'd also like to thank Juliann Colvin for performing her usual wonders
copy editing this book. Finally, we'd like to thank Teri Zak, our acquisitions editor, and posthumously
Maureen Connelly, our production editor. These two were not only the best at what they did, but
they also made working with them a real pleasure.
For the first revised edition of this book, we'd like to acknowledge the contributions made by Steven
Levy and Ann Baker, and we'd like to also thank the following people from Sams: Phil Kennedy,
Wendy Ford, and Scott Arant.
For the second revised edition of this book, we'd like to thank Kathryn Purdum, our acquisitions
editor, Charlotte Clapp, our project editor, and Geneil Breeze, our copy editor.

Chapter 2. A Quick Review of the Basics

IN THIS CHAPTER
Some Basic Commands
Working with Files
Working with Directories

Filename Substitution
Standard Input/Output and I/O Redirection
Pipes
Standard Error
More on Commands
Command Summary
Exercises

This chapter provides a review of the Unix system, including the file system, basic commands,
filename substitution, I/O redirection, and pipes.

Some Basic Commands

Displaying the Date and Time: The date Command
The date command tells the system to print the date and time:
$ date
Sat Jul 20 14:42:56 EDT 2002
$

date prints the day of the week, month, day, time (24-hour clock, the system's time zone), and year.
Throughout this book, whenever we use boldface type like this, it's to indicate what you,
the user, types in. Normal face type like this is used to indicate what the Unix system
prints. Italic type is used for comments in interactive sequences.
Every Unix command is ended with the pressing of the Enter key. Enter says that you are finished
typing things in and are ready for the Unix system to do its thing.

Finding Out Who's Logged In: The who Command

The who command can be used to get information about all users currently logged in to the system:
$ who
pat
ruth
steve
$

tty29
tty37
tty25

Jul 19 14:40
Jul 19 10:54
Jul 19 15:52

A Quick Review of the Basics

Here, three users are logged in: pat, ruth, and steve. Along with each user id, the tty number of
that user and the day and time that user logged in is listed. The tty number is a unique identification
number the Unix system gives to each terminal or network device that a user has logged into.
The who command also can be used to get information about yourself:
$ who am i
pat
tty29
$

Jul 19 14:40

who and who am i are actually the same command: who. In the latter case, the am and i are
arguments to the who command.

Echoing Characters: The echo Command

The echo command prints (or echoes) at the terminal whatever else you happen to type on the line
(there are some exceptions to this that you'll learn about later):
$ echo this is a test
this is a test
$ echo why not print out a longer line with echo?
why not print out a longer line with echo?
$ echo
A blank line is displayed
$ echo one
two
one two three four five
$

three

four

five

You will notice from the preceding example that echo squeezes out extra blanks between words.
That's because on a Unix system, the words are important; the blanks are merely there to separate
the words. Generally, the Unix system ignores extra blanks (you'll learn more about this in the next
chapter).

Working with Files

The Unix system recognizes only three basic types of files: ordinary files, directory files, and special files. An ordinary file is just that: any file on the system that contains data, text, program instructions, or just about anything else. Directories are described later in this chapter. As its name
implies, a special file has a special meaning to the Unix system and is typically associated with some
form of I/O.
A filename can be composed of just about any character directly available from the keyboard (and
even some that aren't) provided that the total number of characters contained in the name is not
greater than 255. If more than 255 characters are specified, the Unix system simply ignores the
extra characters.1
The Unix system provides many tools that make working with files easy. Here we'll review many
basic file manipulation commands.

Listing Files: The ls Command

To see what files you have stored in your directory, you can type the ls command:

1Modern

Unix and Microsoft Windows systems support long filenames; however, some older Unix and Windows systems only allow much
shorter filenames.

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ ls
READ_ME
names
tmp
$

This output indicates that three files called READ_ME, names, and tmp are contained in the current
directory. (Note that the output of ls may vary from system to system. For example, on many Unix
systems ls produces multicolumn output when sending its output to a terminal; on others, different
colors may be used for different types of files. You can always force single-column output with the
l option.)

Displaying the Contents of a File: The cat Command

You can examine the contents of a file by using the cat command. The argument to cat is the
name of the file whose contents you want to examine.

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

$ cat names
Susan
Jeff
Henry
Allan
Ken
$

Counting the Number of Words in a File: The wc Command

With the wc command, you can get a count of the total number of lines, words, and characters of
information contained in a file. Once again, the name of the file is needed as the argument to this
command:
$ wc names
5
$

27 names

The wc command lists three numbers followed by the filename. The first number represents the
number of lines contained in the file (5), the second the number of words contained in the file (in
this case also 5), and the third the number of characters contained in the file (27).

Command Options
Most Unix commands allow the specification of options at the time a command is executed. These
options generally follow the same format:
-letter

That is, a command option is a minus sign followed immediately by a single letter. For example, to
count just the number of lines contained in a file, the option -l (that's the letter l) is given to the
wc command:
$ wc -l names
5 names
$

To count just the number of characters in a file, the -c option is specified:

$ wc -c names
27 names
$

A Quick Review of the Basics

Finally, the -w option can be used to count the number of words contained in the file:
$ wc -w names
5 names
$

Some commands require that the options be listed before the filename arguments. For example,
sort names -r is acceptable, whereas wc names -l is not. Let's generalize by saying that
command options should precede filenames on the command line.

Making a Copy of a File: The cp Command

To make a copy of a file, the cp command is used. The first argument to the command is the name
of the file to be copied (known as the source file), and the second argument is the name of the file
to place the copy into (known as the destination file). You can make a copy of the file names and
call it saved_names as follows:
$ cp names saved_names
$

Execution of this command causes the file named names to be copied into a file named
saved_names. As with many Unix commands, the fact that a command prompt was displayed after
the cp command was typed indicates that the command executed successfully.

Renaming a File: The mv Command

A file can be renamed with the mv command. The arguments to the mv command follow the same
format as the cp command. The first argument is the name of the file to be renamed, and the second
argument is the new name. So, to change the name of the file saved_names to hold_it, for
example, the following command would do the trick:
$ mv saved_names hold_it
$

When executing an mv or cp command, the Unix system does not care whether the file specified
as the second argument already exists. If it does, the contents of the file will be lost.2 For example,
if a file called old_names exists, executing the command
cp names old_names

would copy the file names to old_names, destroying the previous contents of old_names in the
process. Similarly, the command
mv names old_names

would rename names to old_names, even if the file old_names existed prior to execution of the
command.

Removing a File: The rm Command

To remove a file from the system, you use the rm command. The argument to rm is simply the name
of the file to be removed:

2Assuming

that you have the proper permission to write to the file.

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ rm hold_it
$

You can remove more than one file at a time with the rm command by simply specifying all such
files on the command line. For example, the following would remove the three files wb, collect,
and mon:
$ rm wb collect mon
$

Working with Directories

Suppose that you had a set of files consisting of various memos, proposals, and letters. Further
suppose that you had a set of files that were computer programs. It would seem logical to group
this first set of files into a directory called documents, for example, and the latter set of files into a
directory called programs. Figure 2.1 illustrates such a directory organization.

Figure 2.1. Example directory structure.

The file directory documents contains the files plan, dact, sys.A, new.hire, no.JSK, and
AMG.reply. The directory programs contains the files wb, collect, and mon. At some point, you
may decide to further categorize the files in a directory. This can be done by creating subdirectories
and then placing each file into the appropriate subdirectory. For example, you might want to create
subdirectories called memos, proposals, and letters inside your documents directory, as
shown in Figure 2.2.

Figure 2.2. Directories containing subdirectories.

documents contains the subdirectories memos, proposals, and letters. Each of these directories in turn contains two files: memos contains plan and dact; proposals contains sys.A and
new.hire; and letters contains no.JSK and AMG.reply.
Although each file in a given directory must have a unique name, files contained in different directories do not. So, for example, you could have a file in your programs directory called dact, even
though a file by that name also exists in the memos subdirectory.

A Quick Review of the Basics

The Home Directory and Pathnames

The Unix system always associates each user of the system with a particular directory. When you
log in to the system, you are placed automatically into a directory called your home directory.
Although the location of users' home directories can vary from one Unix version to the next, and
even one user to the next, let's assume that your home directory is called steve and that this
directory is actually a subdirectory of a directory called users. Therefore, if you had the directories
documents and programs, the overall directory structure would actually look something like Figure
2.3. A special directory known as / (pronounced slash) is shown at the top of the directory tree.
This directory is known as the root.

Figure 2.3. Hierarchical directory structure.

Whenever you are inside a particular directory (called your current working directory), the files
contained within that directory are immediately accessible. If you want to access a file from another
directory, you can either first issue a command to change to the appropriate directory and then
access the particular file, or you can specify the particular file by its pathname.
A pathname enables you to uniquely identify a particular file to the Unix system. In the specification
of a pathname, successive directories along the path are separated by the slash character /. A
pathname that begins with a slash character is known as a full pathname because it specifies a
complete path from the root. So, for example, the pathname /users/steve identifies the directory
steve contained under the directory users. Similarly, the pathname /users/steve/documents references the directory documents as contained in the directory steve under users. As
a final example, the pathname /users/steve/documents/letters/AMG.reply identifies the
file AMG.reply contained along the appropriate directory path.
To help reduce some of the typing that would otherwise be required, Unix provides certain notational
conveniences. Pathnames that do not begin with a slash character are known as relative pathnames. The path is relative to your current working directory. For example, if you just logged in to
the system and were placed into your home directory /users/steve, you could directly reference
the directory documents simply by typing documents. Similarly, the relative pathname programs/mon could be typed to access the file mon contained inside your programs directory.

A Quick Review of the Basics

By convention, the directory name .. always references the directory that is one level higher. For
example, after logging in and being placed into your home directory /users/steve, the pathname .. would reference the directory users. And if you had issued the appropriate command to
change your working directory to documents/letters, the pathname .. would reference the
documents directory, ../.. would reference the directory steve, and ../proposals/
new.hire would reference the file new.hire contained in the proposals directory. Note that in
this case, as in most cases, there is usually more than one way to specify a path to a particular file.
Another notational convention is the single period ., which always refers to the current directory.
Now it's time to examine commands designed for working with directories.

Displaying Your Working Directory: The pwd Command

The pwd command is used to help you get your bearings by telling you the name of your current
working directory.
Recall the directory structure from Figure 2.3. The directory that you are placed in after you log in
to the system is called your home directory. You can assume from Figure 2.3 that the home directory
for the user steve is /users/steve. Therefore, whenever steve logs in to the system, he will
automatically be placed inside this directory. To verify that this is the case, the pwd (print working
directory) command can be issued:
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

The output from the command verifies that steve's current working directory is /users/steve.

Changing Directories: The cd Command

You can change your current working directory by using the cd command. This command takes as
its argument the name of the directory you want to change to.
Let's assume that you just logged in to the system and were placed inside your home directory, /
users/steve. This is depicted by the arrow in Figure 2.4.

Figure 2.4. Current working directory is steve.

A Quick Review of the Basics

You know that two directories are directly below steve's home directory: documents and programs. In fact, this can be verified at the terminal by issuing the ls command:
$ ls
documents
programs
$

The ls command lists the two directories documents and programs the same way it listed other
ordinary files in previous examples.
To change your current working directory, issue the cd command, followed by the name of the
directory to change to:
$ cd documents
$

After executing this command, you will be placed inside the documents directory, as depicted in
Figure 2.5.

Figure 2.5. cd documents.

You can verify at the terminal that the working directory has been changed by issuing the pwd
command:
$ pwd
/users/steve/documents
$

The easiest way to get one level up in a directory is to issue the command
cd ..

because by convention .. always refers to the directory one level up (known as the parent directory;
see Figure 2.6).
$ cd ..
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.6. cd ..

If you wanted to change to the letters directory, you could get there with a single cd command
by specifying the relative path documents/letters (see Figure 2.7):
$ cd documents/letters
$ pwd
/users/steve/documents/letters
$

Figure 2.7. cd documents/letters.

You can get back up to the home directory by using a single cd command to go up two directories
as shown:
$ cd ../..
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

Or you can get back to the home directory using a full pathname rather than a relative one:

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ cd /users/steve
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

Finally, there is a third way to get back to the home directory that is also the easiest. Typing the
command cd without an argument always places you back into your home directory, no matter
where you are in your directory path:
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

More on the ls Command

When you type the ls command, the files contained in the current working directory are listed. But
you can also use ls to obtain a list of files in other directories by supplying an argument to the
command. First let's get back to your home directory:
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

Now let's take a look at the files in the current working directory:
$ ls
documents
programs
$

If you supply the name of one of these directories to the ls command, you can get a list of the
contents of that directory. So, you can find out what's contained in the documents directory simply
by typing the command ls documents:
$ ls documents
letters
memos
proposals
$

To take a look at the subdirectory memos, you follow a similar procedure:

$ ls documents/memos
dact
plan
$

If you specify a nondirectory file argument to the ls command, you simply get that filename echoed
back at the terminal:
$ ls documents/memos/plan
documents/memos/plan
$

An option to the ls command enables you to determine whether a particular file is a directory, among
other things. The -l option (the letter l) provides a more detailed description of the files in a directory.
If you were currently in steve's home directory as indicated in Figure 2.6, the following would
illustrate the effect of supplying the -l option to the ls command:

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ ls l
total 2
drwxr-xr-x
drwxr-xr-x
$

5 steve
2 steve

DP3725
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80 Jun 25 13:27 documents

96 Jun 25 13:31 programs

The first line of the display is a count of the total number of blocks (1,024 bytes) of storage that the
listed files use. Each successive line displayed by the ls -l command contains detailed information
about a file in the directory. The first character on each line tells whether the file is a directory. If the
character is d, it is a directory; if it is -, it is an ordinary file; finally, if it is b, c, l, or p, it is a special
file.
The next nine characters on the line tell how every user on the system can access the particular
file. These access modes apply to the file's owner (the first three characters), other users in the
same group as the file's owner (the next three characters), and finally to all other users on the system
(the last three characters). They tell whether the user can read from the file, write to the file, or
execute the contents of the file.
The ls -l command lists the link count (see Linking Files: The ln Command, later in this chapter),
the owner of the file, the group owner of the file, how large the file is (that is, how many characters
are contained in it), and when the file was last modified. The information displayed last on the line
is the filename itself.
$ ls -l programs
total 4
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
$

DP3725
DP3725
DP3725

358 Jun 25 13:31 collect

1219 Jun 25 13:31 mon
89 Jun 25 13:30 wb

The dash in the first column of each line indicates that the three files collect, mon, and wb are
ordinary files and not directories.

Creating a Directory: The mkdir Command

To create a directory, the mkdir command must be used. The argument to this command is simply
the name of the directory you want to make. For example, assume that you are still working with
the directory structure depicted in Figure 2.7 and that you want to create a new directory called misc
on the same level as the directories documents and programs. If you were currently in your home
directory, typing the command mkdir misc would achieve the desired effect:
$ mkdir misc
$

Now if you execute an ls command, you should get the new directory listed:
$ ls
documents
misc
programs
$

The directory structure now appears as shown in Figure 2.8.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.8. Directory structure with newly created misc directory.

Copying a File from One Directory to Another

The cp command can be used to copy a file from one directory into another. For example, you can
copy the file wb from the programs directory into a file called wbx in the misc directory as follows:
$ cp programs/wb misc/wbx
$

Because the two files are contained in different directories, it is not even necessary that they be
given different names:
$ cp programs/wb misc/wb
$

When the destination file has the same name as the source file (in a different directory, of course),
it is necessary to specify only the destination directory as the second argument:
$ cp programs/wb misc
$

When this command gets executed, the Unix system recognizes that the second argument is the
name of a directory and copies the source file into that directory. The new file is given the same
name as the source file. You can copy more than one file into a directory by listing the files to be
copied before the name of the destination directory. If you were currently in the programs directory,
the command
$ cp wb collect mon ../misc
$

would copy the three files wb, collect, and mon into the misc directory, under the same names.
To copy a file from another directory into your current one and give it the same name, use the fact
that the current directory can always be referenced as '.':
$ pwd
/users/steve/misc
$ cp ../programs/collect .
$

The preceding command copies the file collect from the directory ../programs into the current
directory (/users/steve/misc).

A Quick Review of the Basics

Moving Files Between Directories

You recall that the mv command can be used to rename a file. However, when the two arguments
to this command reference different directories, the file is actually moved from the first directory into
the second directory. For example, first change from the home directory to the documents directory:
$ cd documents
$

Suppose that now you decide that the file plan contained in the memos directory is really a proposal
and not a memo. So you want to move it from the memos directory into the proposals directory.
The following would do the trick:
$ mv memos/plan proposals/plan
$

As with the cp command, if the source file and destination file have the same name, only the name
of the destination directory need be supplied.
$ mv memos/plan proposals
$

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Also like the cp command, a group of files can be simultaneously moved into a directory by simply
listing all files to be moved before the name of the destination directory:
$ pwd
/users/steve/programs
$ mv wb collect mon ../misc
$

This would move the three files wb, collect, and mon into the directory misc. You can also use
the mv command to change the name of a directory. For example, the following renames the directory programs to bin.
$ mv programs bin
$

Linking Files: The ln Command

In simplest terms, the ln command provides an easy way for you to give more than one name to a
file. The general form of the command is
ln from to

This links the file from to the file to.

Recall the structure of steve's programs directory from Figure 2.8. In that directory, he has stored
a program called wb. Suppose that he decides that he'd also like to call the program writeback.
The most obvious thing to do would be to simply create a copy of wb called writeback:
$ cp wb writeback
$

The drawback with this approach is that now twice as much disk space is being consumed by the
program. Furthermore, if steve ever changes wb, he may forget to make a new copy of writeback, resulting in two different copies of what he thinks is the same program.
By linking the file wb to the new name, these problems are avoided:

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ ln wb writeback
$

Now instead of two copies of the file existing, only one exists with two different names: wb and
writeback. The two files have been logically linked by the Unix system. As far as you're concerned,
it appears as though you have two different files. Executing an ls command shows the two files
separately:
$ ls
collect
mon
wb
writeback
$

Look what happens when you execute an ls -l:

$ ls -l
total 5
-rwxr-xr-x
-rwxr-xr-x
-rwxr-xr-x
-rwxr-xr-x
$

1
1
2
2

steve
steve
steve
steve

DP3725
DP3725
DP3725
DP3725

358
1219
89
89

Jun
Jun
Jun
Jun

25
25
25
25

13:31
13:31
13:30
13:30

collect
mon
wb
writeback

The number right before steve is 1 for collect and mon and 2 for wb and writeback. This
number is the number of links to a file, normally 1 for nonlinked, nondirectory files. Because wb and
writeback are linked, this number is 2 for these files. This implies that you can link to a file more
than once.
You can remove either of the two linked files at any time, and the other will not be removed:
$ rm writeback
$ ls -l
total 4
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
-rwxr-xr-x
1 steve
$

DP3725
DP3725
DP3725

358 Jun 25 13:31 collect

1219 Jun 25 13:31 mon
89 Jun 25 13:30 wb

Note that the number of links on wb went from 2 to 1 because one of its links was removed.
Most often, ln is used to link files between directories. For example, suppose that pat wanted to
have access to steve's wb program. Instead of making a copy for himself (subject to the same
problems described previously) or including steve's programs directory in his PATH (described in
detail in Chapter 11, Your Environment), he can simply link to the file from his own program directory; for example:
$ pwd
/users/pat/bin
$ ls -l
total 4
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
$ ln /users/steve/wb .
$ ls -l
total 5
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
-rwxr-xr-x
2 steve
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
$

pat's program directory

DP3822
1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat
DP3822
504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr
link wb to pat's bin
DP3822
DP3725
DP3822

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

89 Jun 25 13:30 wb
504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr

A Quick Review of the Basics

Note that steve is still listed as the owner of wb, even though the listing came from pat's directory.
This makes sense, because really only one copy of the file existsand it's owned by steve.
The only stipulation on linking files is that for ordinary links, the files to be linked together must reside
on the same file system. If they don't, you'll get an error from ln when you try to link them. (To
determine the different file systems on your system, execute the df command. The first field on
each line of output is the name of a file system.)
To create links to files on different file systems (or perhaps on different networked systems), you
can use the -s option to the ln command. This creates a symbolic link. Symbolic links behave a
lot like regular links, except that the symbolic link points to the original file; if the original file is
removed, the symbolic link no longer works. Let's see how symbolic links work with the previous
example:
$ rm wb
$ ls -l
total 4
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
$ ln -s /users/steve/wb ./symwb
$ ls -l
total 5
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
lrwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
$

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr
Symbolic link to wb
1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat
15 Jul 20 15:22 symwb -> /users/steve/wb
504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr

Note that pat is listed as the owner of symwb, and the file type is l, which indicates a symbolic link.
The size of the symbolic link is 15 (the file actually contains the string /users/steve/wb), but if
we attempt to access the contents of the file, we are presented with the contents of its symbolic
link, /users/steve/wb:
$ wc symwb
5
$

89 symwb

The -L option to the ls command can be used with the -l option to get a detailed list of information
on the file the symbolic link points to:
$ ls -Ll
total 5
-rwxr-xr-x
-rwxr-xr-x
-rwxr-xr-x
$

1 pat
2 steve
1 pat

DP3822
DP3725
DP3822

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

89 Jun 25 13:30 wb
504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr

Removing the file that a symbolic link points to invalidates the symbolic link (because symbolic links
are maintained as filenames), although the symbolic link continues to stick around:
$ rm /users/steve/wb
Assume pat can remove this file
$ ls -l
total 5
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat
lrwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
15 Jul 20 15:22 wb -> /users/steve/wb
-rwxr-xr-x
1 pat
DP3822
504 Apr 21 18:30 xtr
$ wc wb
Cannot open wb: No such file or directory
$

This type of file is called a dangling symbolic link and should be removed unless you have a specific
reason to keep it around (for example, if you intend to replace the removed file).

A Quick Review of the Basics

One last note before leaving this discussion: The ln command follows the same general format as
cp and mv, meaning that you can link a bunch of files at once into a directory using the format
ln files directory

Removing a Directory: The rmdir Command

You can remove a directory with the rmdir command. The stipulation involved in removing a directory is that no files be contained in the directory. If there are files in the directory when rmdir is
executed, you will not be allowed to remove the directory. To remove the directory misc that you
created earlier, the following could be used:
$ rmdir /users/steve/misc
$

Once again, the preceding command works only if no files are contained in the misc directory;
otherwise, the following happens:
$ rmdir /users/steve/misc
rmdir: /users/steve/misc not empty
$

If this happens and you still want to remove the misc directory, you would first have to remove all
the files contained in that directory before reissuing the rmdir command.
As an alternate method for removing a directory and the files contained in it, you can use the -r
option to the rm command. The format is simple:
rm -r dir

where dir is the name of the directory that you want to remove. rm removes the indicated directory
and all files (including directories) in it.

Filename Substitution
The Asterisk
One powerful feature of the Unix system that is actually handled by the shell is filename substitution. Let's say that your current directory has these files in it:
$ ls
chapt1
chapt2
chapt3
chapt4
$

Suppose that you want to print their contents at the terminal. Well, you could take advantage of the
fact that the cat command allows you to specify more than one filename at a time. When this is
done, the contents of the files are displayed one after the other:
$ cat chapt1 chapt2 chapt3 chapt4
...
$

But you can also type in

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ cat *
...
$

and get the same results. The shell automatically substitutes the names of all the files in the current
directory for the *. The same substitution occurs if you use * with the echo command:
$ echo *
chapt1 chapt2 chapt3 chapt4
$

Here the * is again replaced with the names of all the files contained in the current directory, and
the echo command simply displays them at the terminal.

Any place that * appears on the command line, the shell performs its substitution:
$ echo * : *
chapt1 chapt2 chapt3 chapt4 : chapt1 chapt2 chapt3 chapt4
$

The * can also be used in combination with other characters to limit the filenames that are substituted. For example, let's say that in your current directory you have not only chapt1 through
chapt4 but also files a, b, and c:
$ ls
a
b
c
chapt1
chapt2
chapt3
chapt4
$

To display the contents of just the files beginning with chapt, you can type in
$ cat chapt*
.
.
.
$

The chapt* matches any filename that begins with chapt. All such filenames matched are substituted on the command line.
The * is not limited to the end of a filename; it can be used at the beginning or in the middle as well:
$ echo
chapt1
$ echo
chapt1
$ echo
*x
$

*t1
*t*
chapt2 chapt3 chapt4
*x

In the first echo, the *t1 specifies all filenames that end in the characters t1. In the second
echo, the first * matches everything up to a t and the second everything after; thus, all filenames
containing a t are printed. Because there are no files ending with x, no substitution occurs in the
last case. Therefore, the echo command simply displays *x.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Matching Single Characters

The asterisk (*) matches zero or more characters, meaning that x* matches the file x as well as
x1, x2, xabc, and so on. The question mark (?) matches exactly one character. So cat ? prints
all files with one-character names, just as cat x? prints all files with two-character names beginning
with x.
$ ls
a
aa
aax
alice
b
bb
c
cc
report1
report2
report3
$ echo ?
a b c
$ echo a?
aa
$ echo ??
aa bb cc
$ echo ??*
aa aax alice bb cc report1 report2 report3
$

In the preceding example, the ?? matches two characters, and the * matches zero or more up to
the end. The net effect is to match all filenames of two or more characters.
Another way to match a single character is to give a list of the characters to use in the match inside
square brackets [ ]. For example, [abc] matches one letter a, b, or c. It's similar to the ?, but it
allows you to choose the characters that will be matched. The specification [0-9] matches the
characters 0 through 9. The only restriction in specifying a range of characters is that the first character must be alphabetically less than the last character, so that [z-f] is not a valid range specification.
By mixing and matching ranges and characters in the list, you can perform some complicated substitutions. For example, [a-np-z]* matches all files that start with the letters a through n or p
through z (or more simply stated, any lowercase letter but o).
If the first character following the [ is a !, the sense of the match is inverted. That is, any character
is matched except those enclosed in the brackets. So
[!a-z]

matches any character except a lowercase letter, and

*[!o]

matches any file that doesn't end with the lowercase letter o.
Table 2.1 gives a few more examples of filename substitution.
Table 2.1. Filename Substitution Examples
Command

Description

echo a*

Print the names of the files beginning with a

cat *.c

Print all files ending in .c

rm *.*

Remove all files containing a period

A Quick Review of the Basics

Command

Description

ls x*

List the names of all files beginning with x

rm *

Remove all files in the current directory (Note: Be careful when you use this.)

echo a*b

Print the names of all files beginning with a and ending with b

cp ../programs/* .

Copy all files from ../programs into the current directory

ls [a-z]*[!0-9]

List files that begin with a lowercase letter and don't end with a digit

Standard Input/Output and I/O Redirection

Standard Input and Standard Output
Most Unix system commands take input from your terminal and send the resulting output back to
your terminal. A command normally reads its input from a place called standard input, which happens to be your terminal by default. Similarly, a command normally writes its output to standard
output, which is also your terminal by default. This concept is depicted in Figure 2.9.

Figure 2.9. Typical Unix command.

Recall that executing the who command results in the display of the currently logged-in users. More
formally, the who command writes a list of the logged-in users to standard output. This is depicted
in Figure 2.10.

Figure 2.10. who command.

If a sort command is executed without a filename argument, the command takes its input from
standard input. As with standard output, this is your terminal by default.

A Quick Review of the Basics

When entering data to a command from the terminal, the Ctrl and d keys (denoted Ctrl+d in this
text) must be simultaneously pressed after the last data item has been entered. This tells the command that you have finished entering data. As an example, let's use the sort command to sort the
following four names: Tony, Barbara, Harry, Dick. Instead of first entering the names into a file, we'll
enter them directly from the terminal:
$ sort
Tony
Barbara
Harry
Dick
Ctrl+d
Barbara
Dick
Harry
Tony
$

Because no filename was specified to the sort command, the input was taken from standard input,
the terminal. After the fourth name was typed in, the Ctrl and d keys were pressed to signal the end
of the data. At that point, the sort command sorted the four names and displayed the results on
the standard output device, which is also the terminal. This is depicted in Figure 2.11.

Figure 2.11. sort command.

The wc command is another example of a command that takes its input from standard input if no
filename is specified on the command line. So the following shows an example of this command
used to count the number of lines of text entered from the terminal:
$ wc -l
This is text that
is typed on the
standard input device.
Ctrl+d
3
$

Note that the Ctrl+d that is used to terminate the input is not counted as a separate line by the wc
command. Furthermore, because no filename was specified to the wc command, only the count of
the number of lines (3) is listed as the output of the command. (Recall that this command normally
prints the name of the file directly after the count.)

A Quick Review of the Basics

Output Redirection
The output from a command normally intended for standard output can be easily diverted to a file
instead. This capability is known as output redirection.
If the notation > file is appended to any command that normally writes its output to standard output,
the output of that command will be written to file instead of your terminal:
$ who > users
$

This command line causes the who command to be executed and its output to be written into the
file users. Notice that no output appears at the terminal. This is because the output has been
redirected from the default standard output device (the terminal) into the specified file:
$ cat
oko
ai
ruth
pat
steve
$

users
tty01
tty15
tty21
tty24
tty25

Sep
Sep
Sep
Sep
Sep

12
12
12
12
12

07:30
13:32
10:10
13:07
13:03

If a command has its output redirected to a file and the file already contains some data, that data
will be lost. Consider this example:
$ echo line 1 > users
$ cat users
line 1
$ echo line 2 >> users
$ cat users
line 1
line 2
$

The second echo command uses a different type of output redirection indicated by the characters
>>. This character pair causes the standard output from the command to be appended to the specified file. Therefore, the previous contents of the file are not lost, and the new output simply gets
added onto the end.
By using the redirection append characters >>, you can use cat to append the contents of one file
onto the end of another:
$ cat file1
This is in file1.
$ cat file2
This is in file2.
$ cat file1 >> file2
$ cat file2
This is in file2.
This is in file1.
$

Append file1 to file2

Recall that specifying more than one filename to cat results in the display of the first file followed
immediately by the second file, and so on:
$ cat file1
This is in file1.
$ cat file2
This is in file2.
$ cat file1 file2
This is in file1.
This is in file2.
$ cat file1 file2 > file3

Redirect it instead

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ cat file3
This is in file1.
This is in file2.
$

Now you can see where the cat command gets its name: When used with more than one file, its
effect is to catenate the files together.
Incidentally, the shell recognizes a special format of output redirection. If you type
> file

not preceded by a command, the shell creates an empty (that is, zero character length) file for you.
If file previously exists, its contents will be lost.

Input Redirection
Just as the output of a command can be redirected to a file, so can the input of a command be
redirected from a file. And as the greater-than character > is used for output redirection, the lessthan character < is used to redirect the input of a command. Of course, only commands that normally
take their input from standard input can have their input redirected from a file in this manner.
To redirect the input of a command, you type the < character followed by the name of the file that
the input is to be read from. So, for example, to count the number of lines in the file users, you
know that you can execute the command wc -l users:
$ wc -l users
2 users
$

Or, you can count the number of lines in the file by redirecting the standard input of the wc command
from the file users:
$ wc -l < users
2
$

Note that there is a difference in the output produced by the two forms of the wc command. In the
first case, the name of the file users is listed with the line count; in the second case, it is not. This
points out the subtle distinction between the execution of the two commands. In the first case, wc
knows that it is reading its input from the file users. In the second case, it only knows that it is
reading its input from standard input. The shell redirects the input so that it comes from the file
users and not the terminal (more about this in the next chapter). As far as wc is concerned, it doesn't
know whether its input is coming from the terminal or from a file!

Pipes
As you will recall, the file users that was created previously contains a list of all the users currently
logged in to the system. Because you know that there will be one line in the file for each user logged
in to the system, you can easily determine the number of users logged in by simply counting the
number of lines in the users file:
$ who > users
$ wc -l < users
5
$

A Quick Review of the Basics

This output would indicate that currently five users were logged in. Now you have a command
sequence you can use whenever you want to know how many users are logged in.
Another approach to determine the number of logged-in users bypasses the use of a file. The Unix
system allows you to effectively connect two commands together. This connection is known as a
pipe, and it enables you to take the output from one command and feed it directly into the input of
another command. A pipe is effected by the character |, which is placed between the two commands. So to make a pipe between the who and wc -l commands, you simply type who | wc l:
$ who | wc -l
5
$

The pipe that is effected between these two commands is depicted in Figure 2.12.

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833
Figure 2.12. Pipeline process: who | wc -l.

When a pipe is set up between two commands, the standard output from the first command is
connected directly to the standard input of the second command. You know that the who command
writes its list of logged-in users to standard output. Furthermore, you know that if no filename argument is specified to the wc command, it takes its input from standard input. Therefore, the list of
logged-in users that is output from the who command automatically becomes the input to the wc
command. Note that you never see the output of the who command at the terminal because it is
piped directly into the wc command. This is depicted in Figure 2.13.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.13. Pipeline process.

A pipe can be made between any two programs, provided that the first program writes its output to
standard output, and the second program reads its input from standard input.
As another example of a pipe, suppose that you wanted to count the number of files contained in
your directory. Knowledge of the fact that the ls command displays one line of output per file enables
you to use the same type of approach as before:
$ ls | wc -l
10
$

The output indicates that the current directory contains 10 files.

It is also possible to form a pipeline consisting of more than two programs, with the output of one
program feeding into the input of the next.

Filters
The term filter is often used in Unix terminology to refer to any program that can take input from
standard input, perform some operation on that input, and write the results to standard output. More
succinctly, a filter is any program that can be used between two other programs in a pipeline. So in
the previous pipeline, wc is considered a filter. ls is not because it does not read its input from
standard input. As other examples, cat and sort are filters, whereas who, date, cd, pwd, echo,
rm, mv, and cp are not.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Standard Error
In addition to standard input and standard output, there is another place known as standard error.
This is where most Unix commands write their error messages. And as with the other two standard
places, standard error is associated with your terminal by default. In most cases, you never know
the difference between standard output and standard error:
$ ls n*
n* not found
$

List all files beginning with n

Here the not found message is actually being written to standard error and not standard output by
the ls command. You can verify that this message is not being written to standard output by redirecting the ls command's output:
$ ls n* > foo
n* not found
$

So, you still get the message printed out at the terminal, even though you redirected standard output
to the file foo.
The preceding example shows the raison d'tre for standard error: so that error messages will still
get displayed at the terminal even if standard output is redirected to a file or piped to another command.
You can also redirect standard error to a file by using the notation
command 2> file

No space is permitted between the 2 and the >. Any error messages normally intended for standard
error will be diverted into the specified file, similar to the way standard output gets redirected.
$ ls n* 2> errors
$ cat errors
n* not found
$

More on Commands
Typing More Than One Command on a Line
You can type more than one command on a line provided that you separate each command with a
semicolon. For example, you can find out the current time and also your current working directory
by typing in the date and pwd commands on the same line:
$ date; pwd
Sat Jul 20 14:43:25 EDT 2002
/users/pat/bin
$

You can string out as many commands as you want on the line, as long as each command is
delimited by a semicolon.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Sending a Command to the Background

Normally, you type in a command and then wait for the results of the command to be displayed at
the terminal. For all the examples you have seen thus far, this waiting time is typically shortmaybe
a second or two. However, you may have to run commands that require many seconds or even
minutes to execute. In those cases, you'll have to wait for the command to finish executing before
you can proceed further unless you execute the command in the background.
If you type in a command followed by the ampersand character &, that command will be sent to the
background for execution. This means that the command will no longer tie up your terminal, and
you can then proceed with other work. The standard output from the command will still be directed
to your terminal; however, in most cases the standard input will be dissociated from your terminal.
If the command does try to read any input from standard input, it will be stopped and will wait for
you to bring it to the foreground (we'll discuss this in more detail in Chapter 15, Interactive and
Nonstandard Shell Features).3
$ sort data > out &
Send the sort to the background
[1] 1258
Process id
$ date
Your terminal is immediately available to do other work
Sat Jul 20 14:45:09 EDT 2002
$

When a command is sent to the background, the Unix system automatically displays two numbers.
The first is called the command's job number and the second the process id. In the preceding example, 1 was the job number and 1258 the process id. The job number is used by some shell
commands that you'll learn more about in Chapter 15. The process id uniquely identifies the command that you sent to the background and can be used to obtain status information about the command. This is done with the ps command.

The ps Command
The ps command gives you information about the processes running on the system. ps without any
options prints the status of just your processes. If you type in ps at your terminal, you'll get a few
lines back describing the processes you have running:
$ ps
PID
195
1353
1258
$

TTY
01
01
01

TIME
0:21
0:00
0:10

COMMAND
sh
ps
sort

The shell
This ps command
The previous sort

The ps command prints out four columns of information: PID, the process id; TTY, the terminal
number that the process was run from; TIME, the amount of computer time in minutes and seconds
that process has used; and COMMAND, the name of the process. (The sh process in the preceding
example is the shell that was started when you logged in, and it has used 21 seconds of computer
time.) Until the command is finished, it shows up in the output of the ps command as a running
process. Process number 1353 in the preceding example is the ps command that was typed in, and
1258 is the sort from the preceding example.
When used with the -f option, ps prints out more information about your processes, including the
parent process id (PPID), the time the processes started (STIME), and the command arguments:

3Note

that the capability to stop a command when it reads from standard input may be missing on non-Unix implementations of the shell or
on older shells that do not conform to the POSIX standard. On these implementations, any read from standard input will get an end-of-file
condition as if Ctrl+d were typed.

A Quick Review of the Basics

$ ps -f
UID
steve
steve
steve
$

PID
195
1360
1258

PPID C
STIME
1 0 10:58:29
195 43 14:54:48
195 0 14:45:04

30
TTY
tty01
tty01
tty01

TIME
0:21
0:01
3:17

COMMAND
-sh
ps -f
sort data

Command Summary
Table 2.2 summarizes the commands reviewed in this chapter. In this table, file refers to a file,
file(s) to one or more files, dir to a directory, and dir(s) to one or more directories.
Table 2.2. Command Summary
Command

Description

cat file(s)

Display contents of file(s) or standard input if not supplied

cd dir

Change working directory to dir

cp filel file2

Copy filel to file2

cp file(s) dir

Copy file(s) into dir

date

Display the date and time

echo args

Display args

ln file1 file2

Link file1 to file2

ln file(s) dir

Link file(s) into dir

ls file(s)

List file(s)

ls dir(s)

List files in dir(s) or in current directory if dir(s) is not specified

mkdir dir(s)

Create directory dir(s)

mv file1 file2

Move file1 to file2 (simply rename it if both reference the same directory)

mv file(s) dir

Move file(s) into directory dir

List information about active processes

pwd

Display current working directory path

rm file(s)

Remove files(s)

rmdir dir(s)

Remove empty directory dir(s)

sort file(s)

Sort lines of file(s) or standard input if not supplied

wc file(s)

Count the number of lines, words, and characters in file(s) or standard input if not supplied

who

Display who's logged in

Exercises
1: Given the following files in your current directory:
$ ls
feb96
jan12.02
jan19.02
jan26.02
jan5.02
jan95
jan96
jan97
jan98
mar98
memo1

A Quick Review of the Basics

memo10
memo2
memo2.sv
$

What would be the output from the following commands?

echo
echo
echo
echo
echo

*
m[a-df-z]*
jan*
?????
jan?? feb?? mar??

echo
echo
echo
echo
echo

*[!0-9]
[A-Z]*
*.*
*02
[fjm][ae][bnr]*

2: What is the effect of the following command sequences?

ls | wc -l
who | wc -l
ls *.c | wc -l
who | sort
cp memo1 ..

rm ???
mv progs/* /users/steve/backup
rm *.o
cd; pwd
plotdata 2>errors &

Chapter 3. What Is the Shell?

IN THIS CHAPTER

The Kernel and the Utilities

The Login Shell
Typing Commands to the Shell
The Shell's Responsibilities

In this chapter you'll learn what the shell is and what it does.

The Kernel and the Utilities

The Unix system is itself logically divided into two pieces: the kernel and the utilities (see Figure 3.1).

Figure 3.1. The Unix system.

The kernel is the heart of the Unix system and resides in the computer's memory from the time the
computer is turned on and booted until the time it is shut down.
The utilities, on the other hand, reside on the computer's disk and are only brought into memory as
requested. Virtually every command you know under the Unix system is classified as a utility; therefore, the program resides on the disk and is brought into memory only when you request that the
command be executed. So, for example, when you execute the date command, the Unix system
loads the program called date from the computer's disk into memory and initiates its execution.
The shell, too, is a utility program. It is loaded into memory for execution whenever you log in to the
system.

What Is the Shell?

In fact, it's worth learning the precise sequence of events that occurs when the first shell on a terminal
or window starts up.

The Login Shell

A terminal is connected to a Unix system through a direct wire, modem, or network. In the first case,
as soon as you turn on the terminal (and press the Enter key a couple of times if necessary), you
should get a login: message on your screen. In the second case, you must first dial the computer's
number and get connected before the login: message appears. In the last case, you may connect
over the network via a program such as ssh, telnet, or rlogin, or you may use some kind of
networked windowing system (for example, X Window System) to start up a terminal emulation
program (for example, xterm).
For each physical terminal port on a system, a program called getty will be active. This is depicted
in Figure 3.2.

Figure 3.2. The getty process.

What Is the Shell?

The Unix systemmore precisely a program called initautomatically starts up a getty program on each terminal port whenever the system is allowing users to log in. getty determines the
baud rate, displays the message login: at its assigned terminal, and then just waits for someone
to type in something. As soon as someone types in some characters followed by Enter, the
getty program disappears; but before it goes away, it starts up a program called login to finish
the process of logging in (see Figure 3.3). It also gives login the characters you typed in at the
terminalcharacters that presumably represent your login name.

Figure 3.3. login started on sue's terminal.

When login begins execution, it displays the string Password: at the terminal and then waits for
you to type your password. After you have typed it, login then proceeds to verify your login name
and password against the corresponding entry in the file /etc/passwd. This file contains one line
for each user of the system. That line specifies, among other things, the login name, home directory,
and program to start up when that user logs in.1 The last bit of information (the program to start up)
is stored after the last colon of each line. If nothing follows the last colon, the standard shell /usr/
bin/sh is assumed by default. The following three lines show typical lines from /etc/passwd for
three users of the system: sue, pat, and bob:
1The

file's name (passwd) derives from a time when encrypted versions of the users' passwords were stored in this file along with other user
information. The encrypted passwords are no longer stored in /etc/passwd but for security reasons are now kept in the /etc/shadow
file, which is not readable by normal users.

What Is the Shell?

sue:*:15:47::/users/sue:
pat:*:99:7::/users/pat:/usr/bin/ksh
bob:*:13:100::/users/data:/users/data/bin/data_entry

After login checks the password you typed in against the one stored in /etc/shadow, it then
checks for the name of a program to execute. In most cases, this will be /usr/bin/sh, /usr/
bin/ksh, or /bin/bash. In other cases, it may be a special custom-designed program. The main
point here is that you can set up a login account to automatically run any program whatsoever
whenever someone logs in to it. The shell just happens to be the program most often selected.
So login initiates execution of the standard shell on sue's terminal after validating her password
(see Figure 3.4).

Figure 3.4. login executes /usr/bin/sh.

According to the other entries from /etc/passwd shown previously, pat gets the program ksh
stored in /usr/bin (this is the Korn shell), and bob gets the program data_entry (see Figure
3.5).

What Is the Shell?

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833
Figure 3.5. Three users logged in.

The init program starts up other programs similar to getty for networked connections. For example, sshd, telnetd, and rlogind are started to service logins via ssh, telnet, and rlogin, respectively. Instead of being tied directly to a specific, physical terminal or modem line, these
programs connect users' shells to pseudo ttys. These are devices that emulate terminals over network connections. You can see this whether you're logged in to your system over a network or on
an X Windows screen:
$ who
phw
$

pts/0

Jul 20 17:37

Logged in with rlogin

Typing Commands to the Shell

When the shell starts up, it displays a command prompttypically a dollar sign $at your terminal
and then waits for you to type in a command (see Figure 3.6, Steps 1 and 2). Each time you type
in a command and press the Enter key (Step 3), the shell analyzes the line you typed and then
proceeds to carry out your request (Step 4). If you ask it to execute a particular program, the shell
searches the disk until it finds the named program. When found, the shell asks the kernel to initiate
the program's execution and then the shell goes to sleep until the program has finished (Step 5).
The kernel copies the specified program into memory and begins its execution. This copied program
is called a process; in this way, the distinction is made between a program that is kept in a file on
the disk and a process that is in memory doing things.

What Is the Shell?

Figure 3.6. Command cycle.

If the program writes output to standard output, it will appear at your terminal unless redirected or
piped into another command. Similarly, if the program reads input from standard input, it will wait
for you to type in input unless redirected from a file or piped from another command (Step 6).
When the command finishes execution, control once again returns to the shell, which awaits your
next command (Steps 7 and 8).
Note that this cycle continues as long as you're logged in. When you log off the system, execution
of the shell then terminates and the Unix system starts up a new getty (or rlogind, and so on)
at the terminal and waits for someone else to log in. This cycle is illustrated in Figure 3.7.

Figure 3.7. Login cycle.

What Is the Shell?

It's important for you to recognize that the shell is just a program. It has no special privileges on the
system, meaning that anyone with the capability and devotion can create his own shell program.
This is in fact the reason why various flavors of the shell exist today, including the older Bourne
shell, developed by Stephen Bourne; the Korn shell, developed by David Korn; the Bourne again
shell, mainly used on Linux systems; and the C shell, developed by Bill Joy.

The Shell's Responsibilities

Now you know that the shell analyzes each line you type in and initiates execution of the selected
program. But the shell also has other responsibilities, as outlined in Figure 3.8.

Figure 3.8. The shell's responsibilities.

Program Execution
The shell is responsible for the execution of all programs that you request from your terminal.
Each time you type in a line to the shell, the shell analyzes the line and then determines what to do.
As far as the shell is concerned, each line follows the same basic format:

What Is the Shell?

program-name arguments
The line that is typed to the shell is known more formally as the command line. The shell scans this
command line and determines the name of the program to be executed and what arguments to pass
to the program.
The shell uses special characters to determine where the program name starts and ends, and where
each argument starts and ends. These characters are collectively called whitespace characters,
and are the space character, the horizontal tab character, and the end-of-line character, known more
formally as the newline character. Multiple occurrences of whitespace characters are simply ignored
by the shell. When you type the command
mv tmp/mazewars games

the shell scans the command line and takes everything from the start of the line to the first whitespace character as the name of the program to execute: mv. The set of characters up to the next
whitespace character is the first argument to mv: tmp/mazewars. The set of characters up to the
next whitespace character (known as a word to the shell)in this case, the newlineis the second
argument to mv: games. After analyzing the command line, the shell then proceeds to execute the
mv command, giving it the two arguments tmp/mazewars and games (see Figure 3.9).

Figure 3.9. Execution of mv with two arguments.

As mentioned, multiple occurrences of whitespace characters are ignored by the shell. This means
that when the shell processes this command line:
echo

when

eat?

it passes four arguments to the echo program: when, do, we, and eat? (see Figure 3.10).

Figure 3.10. Execution of echo with four arguments.

Because echo takes its arguments and simply displays them at the terminal, separating each by a
space character, the output from the following becomes easy to understand:
$ echo
when
when do we eat?
$

eat?

The fact is that the echo command never sees those blank spaces; they have been gobbled up
by the shell. When we discuss quotes in Chapter 6, Can I Quote You on That?, you'll see how you
can include blank spaces in arguments to programs.

What Is the Shell?

We mentioned earlier that the shell searches the disk until it finds the program you want to execute
and then asks the Unix kernel to initiate its execution. This is true most of the time. However, there
are some commands that the shell knows how to execute itself. These built-in commands include
cd, pwd, and echo. So before the shell goes searching the disk for a command, the shell first
determines whether it's a built-in command, and if it is, the shell executes the command directly.

Variable and Filename Substitution

Like any other programming language, the shell lets you assign values to variables. Whenever you
specify one of these variables on the command line, preceded by a dollar sign, the shell substitutes
the value assigned to the variable at that point. This topic is covered in complete detail in Chapter
5, And Away We Go.
The shell also performs filename substitution on the command line. In fact, the shell scans the
command line looking for filename substitution characters *, ?, or [...] before determining the
name of the program to execute and its arguments. Suppose that your current directory contains
the files as shown:
$ ls
mrs.todd
prog1
shortcut
sweeney
$

Now let's use filename substitution for the echo command:

$ echo *
List all files
mrs.todd prog1 shortcut sweeney
$

How many arguments do you think were passed to the echo program, one or four? Because we
said that the shell is the one that performs the filename substitution, the answer is four. When the
shell analyzes the line
echo *

it recognizes the special character * and substitutes on the command line the names of all files in
the current directory (it even alphabetizes them for you):
echo mrs.todd prog1 shortcut sweeney

Then the shell determines the arguments to be passed to the command. So echo never sees the
asterisk. As far as it's concerned, four arguments were typed on the command line (see Figure 3.11).

Figure 3.11. Execution of echo.

What Is the Shell?

I/O Redirection
It is the shell's responsibility to take care of input and output redirection on the command line. It
scans the command line for the occurrence of the special redirection characters <, >, or >> (also
<< as you'll learn in Chapter 13, Loose Ends).
When you type the command
echo Remember to tape Law and Order > reminder

the shell recognizes the special output redirection character > and takes the next word on the command line as the name of the file that the output is to be redirected to. In this case, the file is
reminder. If reminder already exists and you have write access to it, the previous contents are
lost (if you don't have write access to it, the shell gives you an error message).
Before the shell starts execution of the desired program, it redirects the standard output of the
program to the indicated file. As far as the program is concerned, it never knows that its output is
being redirected. It just goes about its merry way writing to standard output (which is normally your
terminal, you'll recall), unaware that the shell has redirected it to a file.
Let's take another look at two nearly identical commands:
$ wc -l users
5 users
$ wc -l < users
5
$

In the first case, the shell analyzes the command line and determines that the name of the program
to execute is wc and it is to be passed two arguments: -l and users (see Figure 3.12).

Figure 3.12. Execution of wc -l users.

When wc begins execution, it sees that it was passed two arguments. The first argument, -l, tells
it to count the number of lines. The second argument specifies the name of the file whose lines are
to be counted. So wc opens the file users, counts its lines, and then prints the count together with
the filename at the terminal.
Operation of wc in the second case is slightly different. The shell spots the input redirection character
< when it scans the command line. The word that follows on the command line is the name of the
file input is to be redirected from. Having gobbled up the < users from the command line, the
shell then starts execution of the wc program, redirecting its standard input from the file users and
passing it the single argument -l (see Figure 3.13).

Figure 3.13. Execution of wc -l < users.

What Is the Shell?

When wc begins execution this time, it sees that it was passed the single argument -l. Because
no filename was specified, wc takes this as an indication that the number of lines appearing on
standard input is to be counted. So wc counts the number of lines on standard input, unaware that
it's actually counting the number of lines in the file users. The final tally is displayed at the terminal
without the name of a file because wc wasn't given one.
The difference in execution of the two commands is important for you to understand. If you're still
unclear on this point, review the preceding section.

Pipeline Hookup
Just as the shell scans the command line looking for redirection characters, it also looks for the pipe
character |. For each such character that it finds, it connects the standard output from the command
preceding the | to the standard input of the one following the |. It then initiates execution of both
programs.
So when you type
who | wc -l

the shell finds the pipe symbol separating the commands who and wc. It connects the standard
output of the former command to the standard input of the latter, and then initiates execution of both
commands. When the who command executes, it makes a list of who's logged in and writes the
results to standard output, unaware that this is not going to the terminal but to another command
instead.
When the wc command executes, it recognizes that no filename was specified and counts the lines
on standard input, unaware that standard input is not coming from the terminal but from the output
of the who command.

Environment Control
The shell provides certain commands that let you customize your environment. Your environment
includes your home directory, the characters that the shell displays to prompt you to type in a command, and a list of the directories to be searched whenever you request that a program be executed.
You'll learn more about this in Chapter 11, Your Environment.

Interpreted Programming Language

The shell has its own built-in programming language. This language is interpreted, meaning that the
shell analyzes each statement in the language one line at a time and then executes it. This differs
from programming languages such as C and FORTRAN, in which the programming statements are
typically compiled into a machine-executable form before they are executed.
Programs developed in interpreted programming languages are typically easier to debug and modify
than compiled ones. However, they usually take much longer to execute than their compiled equivalents.
The shell programming language provides features you'd find in most other programming languages. It has looping constructs, decision-making statements, variables, and functions, and is
procedure-oriented. Modern shells based on the IEEE POSIX standard have many other features
including arrays, data typing, and built-in arithmetic operations.

Chapter 4. Tools of the Trade

IN THIS CHAPTER
Regular Expressions
cut
paste

sed
tr
grep
sort
uniq
Exercises

This chapter provides detailed descriptions of some commonly used shell programming tools. Covered are cut, paste, sed, tr, grep, uniq, and sort. The more proficient you become at using
these tools, the easier it will be to write shell programs to solve your problems. In fact, that goes for
all the tools provided by the Unix system.

Regular Expressions
Before getting into the tools, you need to learn about regular expressions. Regular expressions are
used by several different Unix commands, including ed, sed, awk, grep, and, to a more limited
extent, vi. They provide a convenient and consistent way of specifying patterns to be matched.
The shell recognizes a limited form of regular expressions when you use filename substitution.
Recall that the asterisk (*) specifies zero or more characters to match, the question mark (?) specifies any single character, and the construct [...] specifies any character enclosed between the
brackets. The regular expressions recognized by the aforementioned programs are far more sophisticated than those recognized by the shell. Also be advised that the asterisk and the question
mark are treated differently by these programs than by the shell.
Throughout this section, we assume familiarity with a line-based editor such as ex or ed. See
Appendix B, For More Information, for more information on these editors.

Matching Any Character: The Period (.)

A period in a regular expression matches any single character, no matter what it is. So the regular
expression
r.

specifies a pattern that matches an r followed by any single character.

The regular expression

Tools of the Trade

.x.

matches an x that is surrounded by any two characters, not necessarily the same.
The ed command
/ ... /

searches forward in the file you are editing for the first line that contains any three characters surrounded by blanks:
$ ed intro
248
1,$p
Print all the lines
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the Unix system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
/ ... / Look for three chars surrounded by blanks
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
/ Repeat last search
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
1,$s/p.o/XXX/g
Change all p.os to XXX
1,$p
Let's see what happened
The Unix operating system was XXXneered by Ken
ThomXXXn and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the Unix system was to create an
environment that XXXmoted efficient XXXgram
development.

In the first search, ed started searching from the beginning of the file and found the characters
was in the first line that matched the indicated pattern. Repeating the search (recall that the ed
command / means to repeat the last search), resulted in the display of the second line of the file
because and matched the pattern. The substitute command that followed specified that all occurrences of the character p, followed by any single character, followed by the character o were to
be replaced by the characters XXX.

Matching the Beginning of the Line: The Caret (^)

When the caret character ^ is used as the first character in a regular expression, it matches the
beginning of the line. So the regular expression
^George

matches the characters George only if they occur at the beginning of the line.
$ ed intro
248
/^the/
Find the line that starts with the
the design of the Unix system was to create an
1,$s/^/>>/
Insert >> at the beginning of each line
1,$p
>>The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
>>Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
>>in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
>>the design of the Unix system was to create an
>>environment that promoted efficient program
>>development.

Tools of the Trade

The preceding example shows how the regular expression ^ can be used to match just the beginning
of the line. Here it is used to insert the characters >> at the start of each line. A command such as
1,$s/^/

is commonly used to insert spaces at the start of each line (in this case five spaces would be inserted).

Matching the End of the Line: The Dollar Sign ($)

Just as the ^ is used to match the beginning of the line, so is the dollar sign $ used to match the
end of the line. So the regular expression
contents$

matches the characters contents only if they are the last characters on the line. What do you think
would be matched by the regular expression .$?
Would this match a period character that ends a line? No. This matches any single character at the
end of the line (including a period) recalling that the period matches any character. So how do you
match a period? In general, if you want to match any of the characters that have a special meaning
in forming regular expressions, you must precede the character by a backslash (\) to remove that
special meaning. So the regular expression
\.$

matches any line that ends in a period, and the regular expression
^\.

matches any line that starts with one (good for searching for nroff commands in your text).
$ ed intro
248
/\.$/
Search for a line that ends with a period
development.
1,$s/$/>>/
Add >> to the end of each line
1,$p
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken>>
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories>>
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in>>
the design of the Unix system was to create an>>
environment that promoted efficient program>>
development.>>
1,$s/..$//
Delete the last two characters from each line
1,$p
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the Unix system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.

It's worth noting that the regular expression

matches any line that contains no characters (such a line can be created in ed by simply pressing
Enter while in insert mode). This regular expression is to be distinguished from one such as
^ $

Tools of the Trade

which matches any line that consists of a single space character.

Matching a Choice of Characters: The [...] Construct

Suppose that you are editing a file and want to search for the first occurrence of the characters
the. In ed, this is easy: You simply type the command
/the/

This causes ed to search forward in its buffer until it finds a line containing the indicated string of
characters. The first line that matches will be displayed by ed:
$ ed intro
248
/the/
in the late 1960s.

Find line containing the

One of the primary goals in

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Notice that the first line of the file also contains the word the, except it starts a sentence and so
begins with a capital T. You can tell ed to search for the first occurrence of the or The by using a
regular expression. Just as in filename substitution, the characters [ and ] can be used in a regular
expression to specify that one of the enclosed characters is to be matched. So, the regular expression
[tT]he

would match a lower- or uppercase t followed immediately by the characters he:

$ ed intro
248
/[tT]he/
Look for the or The
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
/
Continue the search
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
/
Once again
the design of the Unix system was to create an
1,$s/[aeiouAEIOU]//g
Delete all vowels
1,$p
Th nx prtng systm ws pnrd by Kn
Thmpsn nd Dnns Rtch t Bll Lbrtrs
n th lt 1960s. n f th prmry gls n
th dsgn f th nx systm ws t crt n
nvrnmnt tht prmtd ffcnt prgrm
dvlpmnt.

A range of characters can be specified inside the brackets. This can be done by separating the
starting and ending characters of the range by a dash (-). So, to match any digit character 0 through
9, you could use the regular expression
[0123456789]

or, more succinctly, you could simply write

[0-9]

To match an uppercase letter, you write

[A-Z]

And to match an upper- or lowercase letter, you write

[A-Za-z]

Tools of the Trade

Here are some examples with ed:

$ ed intro
248
/[0-9]/
Find a line containing a digit
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
/^[A-Z]/
Find a line that starts with an uppercase letter
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
/
Again
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
1,$s/[A-Z]/*/g
Change all uppercase letters to *s
1,$p
*he *nix operating system was pioneered by *en
*hompson and *ennis *itchie at *ell *aboratories
in the late 1960s. *ne of the primary goals in
the design of the *nix system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.

As you'll learn shortly, the asterisk is a special character in regular expressions. However, you don't
need to put a backslash before the asterisk in the replacement string of the substitute command. In
general, regular expression characters such as *, ., [...], $, and ^ are only meaningful in the
search string and have no special meaning when they appear in the replacement string.
If a caret (^) appears as the first character after the left bracket, the sense of the match is inverted.1 For example, the regular expression
[^A-Z]

matches any character except an uppercase letter. Similarly,

[^A-Za-z]

matches any nonalphabetic character.

$ ed intro
248
1,$s/[^a-zA-Z]//g
Delete all nonalphabetic characters
1,$p
TheUnixoperatingsystemwaspioneeredbyKen
ThompsonandDennisRitchieatBellLaboratories
InthelatesOneoftheprimarygoalsin
ThedesignoftheUnixsystemwastocreatean
Environmentthatpromotedefficientprogram
development

Matching Zero or More Characters: The Asterisk (*)

You know that the asterisk is used by the shell in filename substitution to match zero or more characters. In forming regular expressions, the asterisk is used to match zero or more occurrences of
the preceding character in the regular expression (which may itself be another regular expression).
So, for example, the regular expression
X*

matches zero, one, two, three, capital X's. The expression

XX*

1Recall

that the shell uses the ! for this purpose.

Tools of the Trade

matches one or more capital X's, because the expression specifies a single X followed by zero or
more X's. A similar type of pattern is frequently used to match the occurrence of one or more blank
spaces.
$ ed lotsaspaces
85
1,$p
This
is
an example
file
that contains
of
blank spaces
1,$s/ */ /g
1,$p
This is an example of a
file that contains a lot
of blank spaces

of a
lot
Change multiple blanks to single blanks

The ed command
1,$s/

*/ /g

told ed to substitute all occurrences of a space followed by zero or more spaces with a single space.
The regular expression
.*

is often used to specify zero or more occurrences of any characters. Bear in mind that a regular
expression matches the longest string of characters that match the pattern. Therefore, used by itself,
this regular expression always matches the entire line of text.
As another example of the combination of . and *, the regular expression
e.*e

matches all the characters from the first e on a line to the last one.
$ ed intro
248
1,$s/e.*e/+++/
1,$p
Th+++n
Thompson and D+++S
in th+++ primary goals in
th+++ an
+++nt program
d+++nt.

Here's an interesting regular expression. What do you think it matches?

[A-Za-z][A-Za-z]*

That's right, this matches any alphabetic character followed by zero or more alphabetic characters.
This is pretty close to a regular expression that matches words.
$ ed intro
248
1,$s/[A-Za-z][A-Za-z]*/X/g
1,$p
X X X X X X X X
X X X X X X X
X X X 1960X. X X X X X X
X X X X X X X X X X
X X X X X
X.

Tools of the Trade

The only thing it didn't match in this example was 1960. You can change the regular expression to
also consider a sequence of digits as a word:
$ ed intro
248
1,$s/[A-Za-z0-9][A-Za-z0-9]*/X/g
1,$p
X X X X X X X X
X X X X X X X
X X X X. X X X X X X
X X X X X X X X X X
X X X X X
X.

We could expand on this somewhat to consider hyphenated words and contracted words (for example, don't), but we'll leave that as an exercise for you. As a point of note, if you want to match a
dash character inside a bracketed choice of characters, you must put the dash immediately after
the left bracket (and after the inversion character ^ if present) or immediately before the right
bracket ]. So the expression
[-0-9]

matches a single dash or digit character.

If you want to match a right bracket character, it must appear after the opening left bracket (and
after the ^ if present). So
[]a-z]

matches a right bracket or a lowercase letter.

Matching a Precise Number of Characters: \{...\}

In the preceding examples, you saw how to use the asterisk to specify that one or more occurrences
of the preceding regular expression are to be matched. For instance, the regular expression
XX*

means match at least one consecutive X. Similarly,

XXX*

means match at least two consecutive X's. There is a more general way to specify a precise number
of characters to be matched: by using the construct
\{min,max\}

where min specifies the minimum number of occurrences of the preceding regular expression to be
matched, and max specifies the maximum. For example, the regular expression
X\{1,10\}

matches from one to ten consecutive X's. As stated before, whenever there is a choice, the largest
pattern is matched; so if the input text contains eight consecutive X's at the beginning of the line,
that is how many will be matched by the preceding regular expression. As another example, the
regular expression
[A-Za-z]\{4,7\}

matches a sequence of alphabetic letters from four to seven characters long.

Tools of the Trade

$ ed intro
248
1,$s/[A-Za-z]\{4,7\}/X/q
1,$p
The X Xng X was Xed by Ken
Xn and X X at X XX
in the X 1960s. One of the X X in
the X of the X X was to X an
XX X Xd Xnt X
XX.

A few special cases of this special construct are worth noting. If only one number is enclosed between the braces, as in
\{10\}

that number specifies that the preceding regular expression must be matched exactly that many
times. So
[a-zA-Z]\{7\}

matches exactly seven alphabetic characters; and

.\{10\}

matches exactly ten characters (no matter what they are):

$ ed intro
248
1,$s/^.\{10\}//
Delete the first 10 chars from each line
1,$p
perating system was pioneered by Ken
nd Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
e 1960s. One of the primary goals in
of the Unix system was to create an
t that promoted efficient program
t.
1,$s/.\{5\}$//
Delete the last 5 chars from each line
1,$p
perating system was pioneered b
nd Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laborat
e 1960s. One of the primary goa
of the Unix system was to crea
t that promoted efficient pr
t.

Note that the last line of the file didn't have five characters when the last substitute command was
executed; therefore, the match failed on that line and thus was left alone (recall that we specified
that exactly five characters were to be deleted).
If a single number is enclosed in the braces, followed immediately by a comma, then at least that
many occurrences of the previous regular expression must be matched. So
+\{5,\}

matches at least five consecutive plus signs. Once again, if more than five exist, the largest number
is matched.
$ ed intro
248
1,$s/[a-zA-Z]\{6,\}/X/g Change words at least 6 letters long to X
1,$p
The Unix X X was X by Ken
X and X X at Bell X

Tools of the Trade

in the late 1960s. One of the X goals in

the X of the Unix X was to X an
X that X X X
X.

Saving Matched Characters: $...$

It is possible to capture the characters matched within a regular expression by enclosing the characters inside backslashed parentheses. These captured characters are stored in registers numbered 1 through 9.
For example, the regular expression
^$.$

matches the first character on the line, whatever it is, and stores it into register 1. To retrieve the
characters stored in a particular register, the construct \n is used, where n is from 19.
So the regular expression
^$.$\1

matches the first character on the line and stores it in register 1. Then the expression matches
whatever is stored in register 1, as specified by the \1. The net effect of this regular expression is
to match the first two characters on a line if they are both the same character. Go over this example
if it doesn't seem clear.
The regular expression
^$.$.*\1$

matches all lines in which the first character on the line (^.) is the same as the last character on
the line (\1$). The .* matches all the characters in-between.
Successive occurrences of the $...$ construct get assigned to successive registers. So when
the following regular expression is used to match some text
^$...$$...$

the first three characters on the line will be stored into register 1, and the next three characters into
register 2.
When using the substitute command in ed, a register can also be referenced as part of the replacement string:
$ ed phonebook
114
1,$p
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
1,$s/$.*$
$.*$/\2 \1/ Switch the two fields
1,$p
973-555-2015 Alice Chebba
201-555-9257 Barbara Swingle
212-555-2298 Liz Stachiw
201-555-7776 Susan Goldberg
973-555-1295 Tony Iannino

The names and the phone numbers are separated from each other in the phonebook file by a single
tab character. The regular expression

Tools of the Trade

$.*$

says to match all the characters up to the first tab (that's the character between the ) and the \)
and assign them to register 1, and to match all the characters that follow the tab character and
assign them to register 2. The replacement string
\2 \1

specifies the contents of register 2, followed by a space, followed by the contents of register 1.
So when ed applies the substitute command to the first line of the file:
Alice Chebba

973-555-2015

it matches everything up to the tab (Alice Chebba) and stores it into register 1, and everything
after the tab (973-555-2015) and stores it into register 2. Then it substitutes the characters that
were matched (the entire line) with the contents of register 2 (973-555-2015) followed by a space,
followed by the contents of register 1 (Alice Chebba):
973-555-2015 Alice Chebba

As you can see, regular expressions are powerful tools that enable you to match complex patterns.
Table 4.1 summarizes the special characters recognized in regular expressions.
Table 4.1. Regular Expression Characters
Notation

Meaning

Example

Matches

any character

a..

a followed by any two characters

beginning of line

^wood

wood only if it appears at the beginning of the line

end of line

x only if it is the last character on the line

^INSERT$

a line containing just the characters INSERT

a line that contains no characters

zero or more consecutive x' s

xx*

one or more consecutive x's

zero or more characters

w.*s

w followed by zero or more characters followed by an s

[tT]

lower- or uppercase t

[a-z]

lowercase letter

[a-zA-Z]

lower- or uppercase letter

any character

[^0-9]

any nonnumeric character

not in chars

[^a-zA-Z]

any nonalphabetic character

at least min and at most max

occurrences of previous regular expressions

x\{1,5\}

at least 1 and at and at most 5 x's

[0-9]\{3,9\}

anywhere from 3 to 9 successive digits

[0-9]\{3\}

exactly 3 digits

[0-9]\{3,\}

at least 3 digits

^$.$

first character on line and stores it in register 1

^$.$\1

first and second characters on the line if they're the same

[chars]

[^chars]
\{min,max\}

$...$

zero or more occurrences of

previous regular expression

any character in chars

store characters matched between parentheses in next register (1-9)

Tools of the Trade

cut
This section teaches you about a useful command known as cut. This command comes in handy
when you need to extract (that is, cut out) various fields of data from a data file or the output of a
command. The general format of the cut command is
cut -cchars file

where chars specifies what characters you want to extract from each line of file. This can consist of
a single number, as in -c5 to extract character 5; a comma-separated list of numbers, as in c1,13,50 to extract characters 1, 13, and 50; or a dash-separated range of numbers, as in c20-50 to extract characters 20 through 50, inclusive. To extract characters to the end of the line,
you can omit the second number of the range; so
cut -c5- data

extracts characters 5 through the end of the line from each line of data and writes the results to
standard output.
If file is not specified, cut reads its input from standard input, meaning that you can use cut as a
filter in a pipeline.
Let's take another look at the output from the who command:
$ who
root
steve
george
dawn
$

console
tty02
tty08
tty10

Feb
Feb
Feb
Feb

24
24
24
24

08:54
12:55
09:15
15:55

As shown, currently four people are logged in. Suppose that you just want to know the names of
the logged-in users and don't care about what terminals they are on or when they logged in. You
can use the cut command to cut out just the usernames from the who command's output:
$ who | cut -c1-8
root
steve
george
dawn
$

Extract the first 8 characters

The -c1-8 option to cut specifies that characters 1 through 8 are to be extracted from each line of
input and written to standard output.
The following shows how you can tack a sort to the end of the preceding pipeline to get a sorted
list of the logged-in users:
$ who | cut -c1-8 | sort
dawn
george
root
steve
$

If you wanted to see what terminals were currently being used, you could cut out just the tty
numbers field from the who command's output:

Tools of the Trade

$ who | cut -c10-16

console
tty02
tty08
tty10
$

How did you know that who displays the terminal identification in character positions 10 through 16?
Simple! You executed the who command at your terminal and counted out the appropriate character
positions.2
You can use cut to extract as many different characters from a line as you want. Here, cut is used
to display just the username and login time of all logged-in users:
$ who | cut -c1-8,18root
Feb 24 08:54
steve
Feb 24 12:55
george
Feb 24 09:15
dawn
Feb 24 15:55
$

The option -c1-8,18- says extract characters 1 through 8 (the username) and also characters
18 through the end of the line (the login time).3

The -d and -f Options

The cut command as described previously is useful when you need to extract data from a file or
command provided that file or command has a fixed format.
For example, you could use cut on the who command because you know that the usernames are
always displayed in character positions 18, the terminal in 1016, and the login time in 1829.
Unfortunately, not all your data will be so well organized! For instance, take a look at the file /etc/
passwd:
$ cat /etc/passwd
root:*:0:0:The Super User:/:/usr/bin/ksh
cron:*:1:1:Cron Daemon for periodic tasks:/:
bin:*:3:3:The owner of system files:/:
uucp:*:5:5::/usr/spool/uucp:/usr/lib/uucp/uucico
asg:*:6:6:The Owner of Assignable Devices:/:
steve:*:203:100::/users/steve:/usr/bin/ksh
other:*:4:4:Needed by secure program:/:
$

/etc/passwd is the master file that contains the usernames of all users on your computer system.
It also contains other information such as your user id number, your home directory, and the name
of the program to start up when you log in. Getting back to the cut command, you can see that the
data in this file does not align itself the same way who's output does. So getting a list of all the
possible users of your system cannot be done using the -c option to cut.
One nice thing about the format of /etc/passwd, however, is that fields are delimited by a colon
character. So although each field may not be the same length from one line to the next, you know
that you can count colons to get the same field from each line.
The -d and -f options are used with cut when you have data that is delimited by a particular
character. The format of the cut command in this case becomes

2On

some versions of the Unix system, this field starts in character position 12 and not 10.

3Again,

on some systems the login time field starts in column 25.

Tools of the Trade

cut -ddchar ffields file

where dchar is the character that delimits each field of the data, and fields specifies the fields to be
extracted from file. Field numbers start at 1, and the same type of formats can be used to specify
field numbers as was used to specify character positions before (for example, -f1,2,8, -f1-3, f4-).
So to extract the names of all users of your system from /etc/passwd, you could type the following:
$ cut -d: -f1 /etc/passwd
root
cron
bin
uucp
asg
steve
other
$

Extract field 1

Given that the home directory of each user is in field 6, you can associate each user of the system
with his or her home directory as shown:
$ cut -d: -f1,6 /etc/passwd
root:/
cron:/
bin:/
uucp:/usr/spool/uucp
asg:/
steve:/users/steve
other:/
$

Extract fields 1 and 6

If the cut command is used to extract fields from a file and the -d option is not supplied, cut uses
the tab character as the default field delimiter.
The following depicts a common pitfall when using the cut command. Suppose that you have a file
called phonebook that has the following contents:
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
Barbara Swingle
Jeff Goldberg
Liz Stachiw
Susan Goldberg
Tony Iannino
$

973-555-2015
201-555-9257
201-555-3378
212-555-2298
201-555-7776
973-555-1295

If you just want to get the names of the people in your phone book, your first impulse would be to
use cut as shown:
$ cut -c1-15 phonebook
Alice Chebba
97
Barbara Swingle
Jeff Goldberg
2
Liz Stachiw
212
Susan Goldberg
Tony Iannino
97
$

Not quite what you want! This happened because the name is separated from the phone number
by a tab character and not blank spaces in the phonebook file. And as far as cut is concerned,
tabs count as a single character when using the -c option. So cut extracts the first 15 characters
from each line in the previous example, giving the results as shown.

Tools of the Trade

Given that the fields are separated by tabs, you should use the -f option to cut instead:
$ cut -f1 phonebook
Alice Chebba
Barbara Swingle
Jeff Goldberg
Liz Stachiw
Susan Goldberg
Tony Iannino
$

Much better! Recall that you don't have to specify the delimiter character with the -d option because
cut assumes that a tab character is the delimiter by default.
But how do you know in advance whether fields are delimited by blanks or tabs? One way to find
out is by trial and error as shown previously. Another way is to type the command
sed -n l file

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

at your terminal. If a tab character separates the fields, \t will be displayed instead of the tab:
$ sed -n l phonebook
Alice Chebba\t973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle\t201-555-9257
Jeff Goldberg\t201-555-3378
Liz Stachiw\t212-555-2298
Susan Goldberg\t201-555-7776
Tony Iannino\t973-555-1295
$

The output verifies that each name is separated from each phone number by a tab character.
sed is covered in more detail shortly.

paste
The paste command is sort of the inverse of cut: Instead of breaking lines apart, it puts them
together. The general format of the paste command is
paste files

where corresponding lines from each of the specified files are pasted together to form single lines
that are then written to standard output. The dash character - can be used in files to specify that
input is from standard input.
Suppose that you have a set of names in a file called names:
$ cat names
Tony
Emanuel
Lucy
Ralph
Fred
$

Suppose that you also have a file called numbers that contains corresponding phone numbers for
each name in names:

Tools of the Trade

$ cat
(307)
(212)
(212)
(212)
(212)
$

numbers
555-5356
555-3456
555-9959
555-7741
555-0040

You can use paste to print the names and numbers side-by-side as shown:
$ paste
Tony
Emanuel
Lucy
Ralph
Fred
$

names
(307)
(212)
(212)
(212)
(212)

numbers
555-5356
555-3456
555-9959
555-7741
555-0040

Paste them together

Each line from names is displayed with the corresponding line from numbers, separated by a tab.
The next example illustrates what happens when more than two files are specified:
$ cat addresses
55-23 Vine Street, Miami
39 University Place, New York
17 E. 25th Street, New York
38 Chauncey St., Bensonhurst
17 E. 25th Street, New York
$ paste names addresses numbers
Tony
55-23 Vine Street, Miami
Emanuel 39 University Place, New York
Lucy
17 E. 25th Street, New York
Ralph
38 Chauncey St., Bensonhurst
Fred
17 E. 25th Street, New York
$

(307)
(212)
(212)
(212)
(212)

555-5356
555-3456
555-9959
555-7741
555-0040

The -d Option
If you don't want the fields separated by tab characters, you can specify the -d option with the format
-dchars

where chars is one or more characters that will be used to separate the lines pasted together. That
is, the first character listed in chars will be used to separate lines from the first file that are pasted
with lines from the second file; the second character listed in chars will be used to separate lines
from the second file from lines from the third, and so on.
If there are more files than there are characters listed in chars, paste wraps around the list of
characters and starts again at the beginning.
In the simplest form of the -d option, specifying just a single delimiter character causes that character to be used to separate all pasted fields:
$ paste -d'+' names addresses numbers
Tony+55-23 Vine Street, Miami+(307) 555-5356
Emanuel+39 University Place, New York+(212) 555-3456
Lucy+17 E. 25th Street, New York+(212) 555-9959
Ralph+38 Chauncey St., Bensonhurst+(212) 555-7741
Fred+17 E. 25th Street, New York+(212) 555-0040

It's always safest to enclose the delimiter characters in single quotes. The reason why will be explained shortly.

Tools of the Trade

The -s Option
The -s option tells paste to paste together lines from the same file, not from alternate files. If just
one file is specified, the effect is to merge all the lines from the file together, separated by tabs, or
by the delimiter characters specified with the -d option.
$ paste -s names
Paste all lines from names
Tony
Emanuel Lucy
Ralph
Fred
$ ls | paste -d' ' -s - Paste ls's output, use space as delimiter
addresses intro lotsaspaces names numbers phonebook
$

In the preceding example, the output from ls is piped to paste, which merges the lines (-s option)
from standard input (-), separating each field with a space (-d' ' option). Of course, you'll recall
from Chapter 2, A Quick Review of the Basics, that the command
echo *

would have worked just as well (and is certainly more straightforward).

sed
sed is a program used for editing data. It stands for stream editor. Unlike ed, sed cannot be used
interactively. However, its commands are similar. The general form of the sed command is
sed command file

where command is an ed-style command applied to each line of the specified file. If no file is specified, standard input is assumed. As sed applies the indicated command to each line of the input, it
writes the results to standard output.
Recall the file intro from previous examples:
$ cat intro
The Unix operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the Unix system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

Suppose that you want to change all occurrences of Unix in the text to UNIX. This can be easily
done in sed as follows:
$ sed 's/Unix/UNIX/' intro
Substitute Unix with UNIX
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

For now, get into the habit of enclosing your sed command in a pair of single quotes. Later, you'll
know when the quotes are necessary and when to use double quotes instead.

Tools of the Trade

The sed command s/Unix/UNIX/ is applied to every line of intro. Whether or not the line gets
changed by the command, it gets written to standard output all the same. Note that sed makes no
changes to the original input file. To make the changes permanent, you must redirect the output
from sed into a temporary file and then move the file back to the old one:
$ sed 's/Unix/UNIX/' intro > temp Make the changes
$ mv temp intro
And now make them permanent
$

Always make sure that the correct changes were made to the file before you overwrite the original;
a cat of temp could have been included between the two commands shown previously to ensure
that the sed succeeded as planned.
If your text included more than one occurrence of Unix on a line, the preceding sed would have
changed just the first occurrence on each line to UNIX. By appending the global option g to the
end of the s command, you can ensure that multiple occurrences of the string on a line will be
changed. In this case, the sed command would read
$ sed 's/Unix/UNIX/g' intro > temp

Suppose that you wanted to extract just the usernames from the output of who. You already know
how to do that with the cut command:
$ who | cut -c1-8
root
ruth
steve
pat
$

Alternatively, you can use sed to delete all the characters from the first blank space (that marks the
end of the username) through the end of the line by using a regular expression in the edit command:
$ who | sed 's/ .*$//'
root
ruth
steve
pat
$

The sed command says to substitute a blank space followed by any characters up to the end of the
line ( .*$) with nothing (//); that is, delete the characters from the first blank to the end of the line
from each line of the input.

The -n Option
We pointed out that sed always writes each line of input to standard output, whether or not it gets
changed. Sometimes, however, you'll want to use sed just to extract some lines from a file. For
such purposes, use the -n option. This option tells sed that you don't want it to print any lines unless
explicitly told to do so. This is done with the p command. By specifying a line number or range of
line numbers, you can use sed to selectively print lines of text. So, for example, to print just the first
two lines from a file, the following could be used:
$ sed -n '1,2p' intro
Just print the first 2 lines
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
$

Tools of the Trade

If, instead of line numbers, you precede the p command with a string of characters enclosed in
slashes, sed prints just those lines from standard input that contain those characters. The following
example shows how sed can be used to display just the lines that contain a particular string:
$ sed -n '/UNIX/p' intro
Just print lines containing UNIX
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
$

Deleting Lines
To delete entire lines of text, use the d command. By specifying a line number or range of numbers,
you can delete specific lines from the input. In the following example, sed is used to delete the first
two lines of text from intro:
$ sed '1,2d' intro
Delete lines 1 and 2
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

Remembering that by default sed writes all lines of the input to standard output, the remaining lines
in textthat is, lines 3 through the endsimply get written to standard output.
By preceding the d command with a string of text, you can use sed to delete all lines that contain
that text. In the following example, sed is used to delete all lines of text containing the word UNIX:
$ sed '/UNIX/d' intro
Delete all lines containing UNIX
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

The power and flexibility of sed goes far beyond what we've shown here. sed has facilities that
enable you to loop, build text in a buffer, and combine many commands into a single editing script.
Table 4.2 shows some more examples of sed commands.
Table 4.2. sed Examples
sed Command

Description

sed '5d'

Delete line 5

sed '/[Tt]est/d'

Delete all lines containing Test or test

sed -n '20,25p' text

Print only lines 20 through 25 from text

sed '1,10s/unix/UNIX/g'
intro

Change unix to UNIX wherever it appears in the first 10 lines of intro

sed '/jan/s/-1/-5/'

Change the first -1 to -5 on all lines containing jan

sed 's/...//' data

Delete the first three characters from each line of data

sed 's/...$//' data

Delete the last 3 characters from each line of data

sed -n 'l' text

Print all lines from text, showing nonprinting characters as \nn (where nn is the octal value
of the character), and tab characters as \t

tr
The tr filter is used to translate characters from standard input. The general form of the command
is

Tools of the Trade

tr from-chars to-chars

where from-chars and to-chars are one or more single characters. Any character in from-chars
encountered on the input will be translated into the corresponding character in to-chars. The result
of the translation is written to standard output.
In its simplest form, tr can be used to translate one character into another. Recall the file intro
from earlier in this chapter:
$ cat intro
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

The following shows how tr can be used to translate all letter e's to x's:
$ tr e x < intro
Thx UNIX opxrating systxm was pionxxrxd by Kxn
Thompson and Dxnnis Ritchix at Bxll Laboratorixs
in thx latx 1960s. Onx of thx primary goals in
thx dxsign of thx UNIX systxm was to crxatx an
xnvironmxnt that promotxd xfficixnt program
dxvxlopmxnt.
$

The input to tr must be redirected from the file intro because tr always expects its input to come
from standard input. The results of the translation are written to standard output, leaving the original
file untouched. Showing a more practical example, recall the pipeline that you used to extract the
usernames and home directories of everyone on the system:
$ cut -d: -f1,6 /etc/passwd
root:/
cron:/
bin:/
uucp:/usr/spool/uucp
asg:/
steve:/users/steve
other:/
$

You can translate the colons into tab characters to produce a more readable output simply by tacking
an appropriate tr command to the end of the pipeline:
$ cut -d: -f1,6 /etc/passwd | tr : '
root
/
cron
/
bin
/
uucp
/usr/spool/uucp
asg
/
steve /users/steve
other /
$

Enclosed between the single quotes is a tab character (even though you can't see itjust take our
word for it). It must be enclosed in quotes to keep it from the shell and give tr a chance to see it.
The octal representation of a character can be given to tr in the format
\nnn

Tools of the Trade

where nnn is the octal value of the character. For example, the octal value of the tab character is
11. If you are going to use this format, be sure to enclose the character in quotes. The tr command
tr : '\11'

translates all colons to tabs, just as in the preceding example. Table 4.3 lists characters that you'll
often want to specify in octal format.
Table 4.3. Octal Values of Some ASCII Characters
Character

Octal Value

Bell

Backspace

Tab

Newline

Linefeed

Formfeed

Carriage Return

Escape

In the following example, tr takes the output from date and translates all spaces into newline
characters. The net result is that each field of output from date appears on a different line.
$ date | tr ' ' '\12'
Sun
Jul
28
19:13:46
EDT
2002
$

Translate spaces to newlines

tr can also take ranges of characters to translate. For example, the following shows how to translate
all lowercase letters in intro to their uppercase equivalents:
$ tr '[a-z]' '[A-Z]' < intro
THE UNIX OPERATING SYSTEM WAS PIONEERED BY KEN
THOMPSON AND DENNIS RITCHIE AT BELL LABORATORIES
IN THE LATE 1960S. ONE OF THE PRIMARY GOALS IN
THE DESIGN OF THE UNIX SYSTEM WAS TO CREATE AN
ENVIRONMENT THAT PROMOTED EFFICIENT PROGRAM
DEVELOPMENT.
$

The character ranges [a-z] and [A-Z] are enclosed in quotes to keep the shell from replacing
the first range with all the files in your directory named a through z, and the second range with all
the files in your directory named A through Z. (What do you think happens if no such files exist?)
By reversing the two arguments to tr, you can use it to translate all uppercase letters to lowercase:
$ tr '[A-Z]' '[a-z]' < intro
the unix operating system was pioneered by ken
thompson and dennis ritchie at bell laboratories
in the late 1960s. one of the primary goals in
the design of the unix system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

Tools of the Trade

The -s Option
You can use the -s option to tr to squeeze out multiple occurrences of characters in to-chars. In
other words, if more than one consecutive occurrence of a character specified in to-chars occurs
after the translation is made, the characters will be replaced by a single character.
For example, the following command translates all colons into tab characters, replacing multiple
tabs with single tabs:
tr -s ':' '\11'

So one colon or several consecutive colons on the input will be replaced by a single tab character
on the output.
Suppose that you have a file called lotsaspaces that has the contents as shown:
$ cat lotsaspaces
This
is
an example of a
file
that contains
a lot
of
blank spaces.
$

You can use tr to squeeze out the multiple spaces by using the -s option and by specifying a single
space character as the first and second argument:
$ tr s ' ' ' ' < lotsaspaces
This is an example of a
file that contains a lot
of blank spaces.
$

The options to tr in effect say translate space characters to space characters, replacing multiple
spaces in the output by a single space.

The d Option
tr can also be used to delete single characters from a stream of input. The general format of tr in
this case is
tr -d from-chars

where any single character listed in from-chars will be deleted from standard input. In the following
example, tr is used to delete all spaces from the file intro:
$ tr -d ' ' < intro
TheUNIXoperatingSystemwaspioneeredbyKen
ThompsonandDennisRitchieatBellLaboratories
inthelate1960s.Oneoftheprimarygoalsin
thedesignoftheUNIXSystemwastocreatean
environmentthatpromotedefficientprogram
development.
$

Of course, you probably realize that you could have also used sed to achieve the same results:
$ sed 's/ //g' intro
TheUNIXoperatingsystemwaspioneeredbyKen
ThompsonandDennisRitchieatBellLaboratories
inthelate1960s.Oneoftheprimarygoalsin
thedesignoftheUNIXsystemwastocreatean
environmentthatpromotedefficientprogram
development.
$

Tools of the Trade

This is not atypical for the Unix system; there's almost always more than one approach to solving
a particular problem. In the case we just saw, either approach is satisfactory (that is, tr or sed);
however, tr is probably a better choice in this case because it is a much smaller program and likely
to execute a bit faster.
Table 4.4 summarizes how to use tr for translating and deleting characters. Bear in mind that tr
works only on single characters. So if you need to translate anything longer than a single character
(say all occurrences of unix to UNIX), you have to use a different program such as sed instead.
Table 4.4. tr Examples
tr Command

Description

tr 'X' 'x'

Translate all capital X's to small x's

tr '()' '{}'

Translate all open parens to open braces, all closed parens to closed braces

tr '[a-z]' '[A-Z]'

Translate all lowercase letters to uppercase

tr '[A-Z]' '[N-ZA-M]'

Translate uppercase letters AM to NZ, and NZ to AM, respectively

tr ' ' ' '

Translate all tabs (character in first pair of quotes) to spaces

tr -s ' ' ' '

Translate multiple spaces to single spaces

tr -d '\14'

Delete all formfeed (octal 14) characters

tr -d '[0-9]'

Delete all digits

grep
grep allows you to search one or more files for particular character patterns. The general format of
this command is
grep pattern files

Every line of each file that contains pattern is displayed at the terminal. If more than one file is
specified to grep, each line is also immediately preceded by the name of the file, thus enabling you
to identify the particular file that the pattern was found in.
Let's say that you want to find every occurrence of the word shell in the file ed.cmd:
$ grep shell ed.cmd
files, and is independent of the shell.
to the shell, just type in a q.
$

This output indicates that two lines in the file ed.cmd contain the word shell.
If the pattern does not exist in the specified file(s), the grep command simply displays nothing:
$ grep cracker ed.cmd
$

You saw in the section on sed how you could print all lines containing the string UNIX from the file
intro with the command
sed -n '/UNIX/p' intro

But you could also use the following grep command to achieve the same result:
grep UNIX intro

Recall the phonebook file from before:

Tools of the Trade

$ cat phone_book
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Jeff Goldberg
201-555-3378
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$

When you need to look up a particular phone number, the grep command comes in handy:
$ grep Susan phone_book
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
$

The grep command is useful when you have a lot of files and you want to find out which ones
contain certain words or phrases. The following example shows how the grep command can be
used to search for the word shell in all files in the current directory:
$ grep shell *
cmdfiles:shell that enables sophisticated
ed.cmd:files, and is independent of the shell.
ed.cmd:to the shell, just type in a q.
grep.cmd:occurrence of the word shell:
grep.cmd:$ grep shell *
grep.cmd:every use of the word shell.
$

As noted, when more than one file is specified to grep, each output line is preceded by the name
of the file containing that line.
It's generally a good idea to enclose your grep pattern inside a pair of single quotes to protect it
from the shell. For instance, if you want to find all the lines containing asterisks inside the file
stars, typing
grep * stars

does not work as expected because the shell sees the asterisk and automatically substitutes the
names of all the files in your current directory!
$ ls
circles
polka.dots
squares
stars
stripes
$ grep * stars
$

In this case, the shell took the asterisk and substituted the list of files in your current directory. Then
it started execution of grep, which took the first argument (circles) and tried to find it in the files
specified by the remaining arguments, as shown in Figure 4.1.

Tools of the Trade

Figure 4.1. grep * stars.

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Enclosing the asterisk in quotes, however, removes its special meaning from the shell:
$ grep '*' stars
The asterisk (*) is a special character that
***********
5 * 4 = 20
$

The quotes told the shell to leave the enclosed characters alone. It then started execution of
grep, passing it the two arguments * (without the surrounding quotes; the shell removes them in
the process) and stars (see Figure 4.2).

Figure 4.2. grep '*' stars.

There are characters other than * that otherwise have a special meaning and must be quoted when
used in a pattern. The whole topic of how quotes are handled by the shell is fascinating; an entire
chapterChapter 6, Can I Quote You on That?is devoted to it.
grep takes its input from standard input if no filename is specified. So you can use grep on the
other side of a pipe to scan through the output of a command for something. For example, suppose
that you want to find out whether the user jim is logged in. You can use grep to search through
who's output:
$ who | grep jim
jim
tty16
$

Feb 20 10:25

Note that by not specifying a file to search, grep automatically scans its standard input. Naturally,
if the user jim were not logged in, you simply would get back a new prompt because grep would
not find jim in who's output:
$ who | grep jim
$

Tools of the Trade

Regular Expressions and grep

Let's take another look at the intro file:
$ cat intro
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

grep allows you to specify your pattern using regular expressions as in ed. Given this information,
it means that you can specify the pattern
[tT]he

to have grep search for either a lower- or uppercase T followed by the characters he.
So here's how to grep out all the lines containing the characters the or The:
$ grep '[tT]he' intro
The UNIX operating system was pioneered by Ken
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
the design of the UNIX system was to create an
$

The -i option to grep indicates that upper- and lowercase letters are not to be distinguished in the
matching process. That is, the command
grep i 'the' intro

tells grep to ignore case when matching the pattern against the lines in intro. Therefore, lines
containing the or The will be printed, as will lines containing THE, THe, tHE, and so on.
Table 4.5 shows other types of regular expressions that you can specify to grep and the types of
patterns they'll match.
Table 4.5. Some grep Examples
Command

Prints

grep '[A-Z]' list

Lines from list containing a capital letter

grep '[0-9]' data

Lines from data containing a number

grep '[A-Z]...[0-9]' list

Lines from list containing five-character patterns that start with a capital letter and end
with a digit

grep '\.pic$' filelist

Lines from filelist that end in .pic

The -v Option
Sometimes you're interested not in finding the lines that contain a specified pattern, but those that
don't. To do this with grep is simple: You use the -v option. In the next example, grep is used to
find all the lines in intro that don't contain the characters UNIX.
$ grep -v 'UNIX' intro Print all lines that don't contain UNIX
Thompson and Dennis Ritchie at Bell Laboratories
in the late 1960s. One of the primary goals in
environment that promoted efficient program
development.
$

Tools of the Trade

The -l Option
At times, you may not want to see the actual lines that match a pattern but may be interested in
knowing only the names of the files that contain the pattern. For example, suppose that you have
a set of C programs in your current directory (these filenames end with the characters .c), and you
want to know which files use a variable called Move_history. The following example shows one
way of finding the answer:
$ grep 'Move_history' *.c
Find Move_history in all C source files
exec.c:MOVE
Move_history[200] = {0};
exec.c:
cpymove(&Move_history[Number_half_moves -1],
exec.c: undo_move(&Move_history[Number_half_moves-1],;
exec.c: cpymove(&last_move,&Move_history[Number_half_moves-1]);
exec.c: convert_move(&Move_history[Number_half_moves-1]),
exec.c:
convert_move(&Move_history[i-1]),
exec.c: convert_move(&Move_history[Number_half_moves-1]),
makemove.c:IMPORT MOVE Move_history[];
makemove.c:
if ( Move_history[j].from != BOOK (i,j,from) OR
makemove.c:
Move_history[j] .to != BOOK (i,j,to) )
testch.c:GLOBAL MOVE Move_history[100] = {0};
testch.c:
Move_history[Number_half_moves-1].from = move.from;
testch.c:
Move_history[Number_half_moves-1].to = move.to;
$

Sifting through the preceding output, you discover that three filesexec.c, makemove.c, and
testch.cuse the variable.
The -l option to grep gives you just a list of files that contain the specified pattern, not the matching
lines from the files:
$ grep -l 'Move_history' *.c
exec.c
makemove.c
testch.c
$

List the files that contain Move_history

Because grep conveniently lists the files one per line, you can pipe the output from grep -l into
wc to count the number of files that contain a particular pattern:
$ grep -l 'Move_history' *.c | wc -l
3
$

So the preceding says that precisely three C program files reference the variable Move_history. (What are you counting if you use grep without the -l option?)

The -n Option
If the -n option is used with grep, each line from the file that matches the specified pattern is
preceded by its relative line number in the file. From previous examples, you saw that the file
testch.c was one of the three files that referenced the variable Move_history; the following
shows how you can pinpoint the precise lines in the file that reference the variable:
$ grep -n 'Move_history' testch.c
Precede matches with line numbers
13:GLOBAL MOVE Move_history[100] = {0};
197:
Move_history[Number_half_moves-1].from = move.from;
198:
Move_history[Number_half_moves-1].to = move.to;
$

As you can see, Move_history is used on lines 13, 197, and 198 in testch.c.

Tools of the Trade

sort
You're familiar with the basic operation of sort:
$ sort names
Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
Tony
$

By default, sort takes each line of the specified input file and sorts it into ascending order. Special
characters are sorted according to the internal encoding of the characters. For example, on a machine that encodes characters in ASCII, the space character is represented internally as the number
32, and the double quote as the number 34. This means that the former would be sorted before the
latter. Note that the sorting order is implementation dependent, so although you are generally assured that sort will perform as expected on alphabetic input, the ordering of numbers, punctuation,
and special characters is not always guaranteed. We will assume we're working with the ASCII
character set in all our examples here.
sort has many options that provide more flexibility in performing your sort. We'll just describe a
few of the options here.

The -u Option
The -u option tells sort to eliminate duplicate lines from the output.
$ sort -u names
Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
$

Here you see that the duplicate line that contained Tony was eliminated from the output.

The -r Option
Use the -r option to reverse the order of the sort:
$ sort -r names
Tony
Tony
Ralph
Lucy
Fred
Emanuel
Charlie
$

Reverse sort

The -o Option
By default, sort writes the sorted data to standard output. To have it go into a file, you can use
output redirection:

Tools of the Trade

$ sort names > sorted_names

Alternatively, you can use the -o option to specify the output file. Simply list the name of the output
file right after the -o:
$ sort names -o sorted_names
$

This sorts names and writes the results to sorted_names.

Frequently, you want to sort the lines in a file and have the sorted data replace the original. Typing
$ sort names > names
$

won't workit ends up wiping out the names file. However, with the -o option, it is okay to specify
the same name for the output file as the input file:
$ sort names -o names
$ cat names
Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
Tony
$

The -n Option
Suppose that you have a file containing pairs of (x, y) data points as shown:
$ cat data
5
27
2
12
3
33
23
2
-5
11
15
6
14
-9
$

Suppose that you want to feed this data into a plotting program called plotdata, but that the
program requires that the incoming data pairs be sorted in increasing value of x (the first value on
each line).
The -n option to sort specifies that the first field on the line is to be considered a number, and the
data is to be sorted arithmetically. Compare the output of sort used first without the -n option and
then with it:
$ sort
-5
14
15
2
23
3
5
$ sort
-5
2
3

data
11
-9
6
12
2
33
27
-n data
11
12
33

Sort arithmetically

Tools of the Trade

5
14
15
23
$

27
-9
6
2

Skipping Fields
If you had to sort your data file by the y valuethat is, the second number in each lineyou could
tell sort to skip past the first number on the line by using the option
+1n

instead of -n. The +1 says to skip the first field. Similarly, +5n would mean to skip the first five fields
on each line and then sort the data numerically. Fields are delimited by space or tab characters by
default. If a different delimiter is to be used, the -t option must be used.
$ sort
14
23
15
-5
2
5
3
$

+1n data
-9
2
6
11
12
27
33

Skip the first field in the sort

The -t Option
As mentioned, if you skip over fields, sort assumes that the fields being skipped are delimited by
space or tab characters. The -t option says otherwise. In this case, the character that follows the
-t is taken as the delimiter character.
Look at our sample password file again:
$ cat /etc/passwd
root:*:0:0:The super User:/:/usr/bin/ksh
steve:*:203:100::/users/steve:/usr/bin/ksh
bin:*:3:3:The owner of system files:/:
cron:*:1:1:Cron Daemon for periodic tasks:/:
george:*:75:75::/users/george:/usr/lib/rsh
pat:*:300:300::/users/pat:/usr/bin/ksh
uucp:*:5:5::/usr/spool/uucppublic:/usr/lib/uucp/uucico
asg:*:6:6:The Owner of Assignable Devices:/:
sysinfo:*:10:10:Access to System Information:/:/usr/bin/sh
mail:*:301:301::/usr/mail:
$

If you wanted to sort this file by username (the first field on each line), you could just issue the
command
sort /etc/passwd

To sort the file instead by the third colon-delimited field (which contains what is known as your user
id), you would want an arithmetic sort, skipping the first two fields (+2n), specifying the colon character as the field delimiter (-t:):
$ sort +2n -t: /etc/passwd
Sort by user id
root:*:0:0:The Super User:/:/usr/bin/ksh
cron:*:1:1:Cron Daemon for periodic tasks:/:
bin:*:3:3:The owner of system files:/:
uucp:*:5:5::/usr/spool/uucppublic:/usr/lib/uucp/uucico
asg:*:6:6:The Owner of Assignable Devices:/:

Tools of the Trade

sysinfo:*:10:10:Access to System Information:/:/usr/bin/sh

george:*:75:75::/users/george:/usr/lib/rsh
steve:*:203:100::/users/steve:/usr/bin/ksh
pat:*:300:300::/users/pat:/usr/bin/ksh
mail:*:301:301::/usr/mail:
$

Here we've emboldened the third field of each line so that you can easily verify that the file was
sorted correctly by user id.

Other Options
Other options to sort enable you to skip characters within a field, specify the field to end the sort
on, merge sorted input files, and sort in dictionary order (only letters, numbers, and spaces are
used for the comparison). For more details on these options, look under sort in your Unix User's
Manual.

uniq
The uniq command is useful when you need to find duplicate lines in a file. The basic format of the
command is
uniq in_file out_file

In this format, uniq copies in_file to out_file, removing any duplicate lines in the process. uniq's
definition of duplicated lines are consecutive-occurring lines that match exactly.
If out_file is not specified, the results will be written to standard output. If in_file is also not specified,
uniq acts as a filter and reads its input from standard input.
Here are some examples to see how uniq works. Suppose that you have a file called names with
contents as shown:
$ cat names
Charlie
Tony
Emanuel
Lucy
Ralph
Fred
Tony
$

You can see that the name Tony appears twice in the file. You can use uniq to remove such
duplicate entries:
$ uniq names
Charlie
Tony
Emanuel
Lucy
Ralph
Fred
Tony
$

Print unique lines

Tony still appears twice in the preceding output because the multiple occurrences are not consecutive in the file, and thus uniq's definition of duplicate is not satisfied. To remedy this situation,
sort is often used to get the duplicate lines adjacent to each other. The result of the sort is then
run through uniq:

Tools of the Trade

$ sort names | uniq

Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
$

So the sort moves the two Tony lines together, and then uniq filters out the duplicate line (recall
that sort with the -u option performs precisely this function).

The -d Option
Frequently, you'll be interested in finding the duplicate entries in a file. The -d option to uniq should
be used for such purposes: It tells uniq to write only the duplicated lines to out_file (or standard
output). Such lines are written just once, no matter how many consecutive occurrences there are.
$ sort names | uniq -d
Tony
$

List duplicate lines

As a more practical example, let's return to our /etc/passwd file. This file contains information
about each user on the system. It's conceivable that over the course of adding and removing users
from this file that perhaps the same username has been inadvertently entered more than once. You
can easily find such duplicate entries by first sorting /etc/passwd and piping the results into uniq
-d as done previously:
$ sort /etc/passwd | uniq -d
$

Find duplicate entries in /etc/passwd

So there are no duplicate entries. But we think that you really want to find duplicate entries for the
same username. This means that you want to just look at the first field from each line of /etc/
passwd (recall that the leading characters of each line of /etc/passwd up to the colon are the
username). This can't be done directly through an option to uniq, but can be accomplished indirectly
by using cut to extract the username from each line of the password file before sending it to uniq.
$ sort /etc/passwd | cut -f1 -d: | uniq -d
cem
harry
$

Find duplicates

So there are multiple entries in /etc/passwd for cem and harry. If you wanted more information
on the particular entries, you could grep them from /etc/passwd:
$ grep -n 'cem' /etc/passwd
20:cem:*:91:91::/users/cem:
166:cem:*:91:91::/users/cem:
$ grep -n 'harry' /etc/passwd
29:harry:*:103:103:Harry Johnson:/users/harry:
79:harry:*:90:90:Harry Johnson:/users/harry:
$

The -n option was used to find out where the duplicate entries occur. In the case of cem, there are
two entries on lines 20 and 166; in harry's case, the two entries are on lines 29 and 79.
If you now want to remove the second cem entry, you could use sed:

Tools of the Trade

$ sed '166d' /etc/passwd > /tmp/passwd

$ mv /tmp/passwd /etc/passwd
mv: /etc/passwd: 444 modey
mv: cannot unlink /etc/passwd
$

Remove duplicate

Naturally, /etc/passwd is one of the most important files on a Unix system. As such, only the
superuser is allowed to write to the file. That's why the mv command failed.

Other Options
The -c option to uniq behaves like uniq with no options (that is, duplicate lines are removed),
except that each output line gets preceded by a count of the number of times the line occurred in
the input.
$ sort names | uniq c
1 Charlie
1 Emanuel
1 Fred
1 Lucy
1 Ralph
2 Tony
$

Count line occurrences

Two other options that won't be described enable you to tell uniq to ignore leading characters/fields
on a line. For more information, consult your Unix User's Manual.
We would be remiss if we neglected to mention the programs awk and perl that can be useful
when writing shell programs. However, to do justice to these programs requires more space than
we can provide in this text. We'll refer you to the document AwkA Pattern Scanning and Processing Language, by Aho, et al., in the Unix Programmer's Manual, Volume II for a description of
awk. Kernighan and Pike's The Unix Programming Environment (Prentice Hall, 1984) contains a
detailed discussion of awk. Learning Perl and Programming Perl, both from O'Reilly and Associates,
present a good tutorial and reference on the language, respectively.

Exercises
1: What will be matched by the following regular expressions?
x*
xx*
x\{1,5\}
x\{5,\}
x\{10\}
[0-9]
[0-9]*
[0-9][0-9][0-9]

[0-9]\{3\}
[0-9]\{3,5\}
[0-9]\{1,3\},[0-9]\{3\}
^\...
[A-Za-z_][A-Za-z_0-9]*
$[A-Za-z0-9]\{1,\}$\1
^Begin$
^$.$.*\1$

2: What will be the effect of the following commands?

who | grep 'mary'
who | grep '^mary'
grep '[Uu]nix' ch?/*
ls -l | sort +4n
sed '/^$/d' text > text.out
sed 's/$[Uu]nix$/\1(TM)/g' text > text.out
date | cut -c12-16
date | cut -c5-11,25- | sed 's/$[0-9]\{1,2\}$/\1,/'

3: Write the commands to

Find all logged-in users with usernames of at least four characters.

Tools of the Trade

b.
c.
d.

Find all users on your system whose user ids are greater than 99.
Find the number of users on your system whose user ids are greater than 99.
List all the files in your directory in decreasing order of file size.

Chapter 5. And Away We Go

IN THIS CHAPTER

Command Files
Variables
Built-in Integer Arithmetic
Exercises

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Based on the discussions in Chapter 3, What Is the Shell?, you should realize that whenever you
type something like
who | wc -l

that you are actually programming in the shell! That's because the shell is interpreting the command
line, recognizing the pipe symbol, connecting the output of the first command to the input of the
second, and initiating execution of both commands.
In this chapter, you'll learn how to write your own commands and how to use shell variables.

Command Files
A shell program can be typed directly at the terminal, as in
$ who | wc -l

or it can be first typed into a file and then the file can be executed by the shell. For example, suppose
that you need to find out the number of logged-in users several times throughout the day. It's not
unreasonable to type in the preceding pipeline each time you want the information, but for the sake
of example, let's type this pipeline into a file. We'll call the file nu (for number of users), and its
contents will be just the pipeline shown previously:
$ cat nu
who | wc l
$

To execute the commands contained inside the file nu, all you now have to do is type nu as the
command name to the shell: 1
$ nu
sh: nu: cannot execute
$

Oops! We forgot to mention one thing. Before you can execute a program this way, you must change
the file's permissions and make it executable. This is done with the change mode command
chmod. To add execute permission to the file nu, you simply type
1Note

that the error produced here varies between different shells.

And Away We Go

chmod +x file(s)

The +x says make the file(s) that follow executable. The shell requires that a file be both readable
and executable by you before you can execute it.
$ ls -l nu
-rw-rw-r-1 steve
$ chmod +x nu
$ ls -l nu
-rwxrwxr-x
1 steve
$

steve
12 Jul 10 11:42 nu
Make it executable
steve

12 Jul 10 11:42 nu

Now that you've made it executable, try it again:

$ nu
8
$

This time it worked.

You can put any commands at all inside a file, make the file executable, and then execute its contents
simply by typing its name to the shell. It's that simple and that powerful.
The standard shell mechanisms such as I/O redirection and pipes can be used on your own programs as well:
$ nu > tally
$ cat tally
8
$

Suppose that you're working on a proposal called sys.caps and that the following command sequence is needed every time you want to print a new copy of the proposal:
tbl sys.caps | nroff -mm Tlp | lp

Once again, you can save yourself some typing by simply placing this command sequence into a
filelet's call it runmaking it executable, and then just typing the name run whenever you want
to get a new copy of the proposal:
$ cat run
tbl sys.caps | nroff -mm -Tlp | lp
$ chmod +x run
$ run
request id is laser1-15 (standard input)
$

(The request id message is issued by the lp command.) For the next example, suppose that
you want to write a shell program called stats that prints the date and time, the number of users
logged in, and your current working directory. You know that the three command sequences you
need to use to get this information are date, who | wc -l, and pwd:
$ cat stats
date
who | wc l
pwd
$ chmod +x stats
$ stats
Try it out
Wed Jul 10 11:55:50 EDT 2002
13
/users/steve/documents/proposals
$

And Away We Go

You can add some echo commands to stats to make the output a bit more informative:
$ cat stats
echo The current date and time is:
date
echo
echo The number of users on the system is:
who | wc l
echo
echo Your current working directory is:
pwd
$ stats
Execute it
The current date and time is:
Wed Jul 10 12:00:27 EDT 2002
The number of users on the system is:
13
Your current working directory is:
/users/steve/documents/proposals
$

Recall that echo without any arguments simply skips a line in the display. Shortly, you'll see how
to have the message and the data displayed on the same line, like this:
The current date and time is: Wed Jul 10 12:00:27 EDT 2002

Comments
The shell programming language would not be complete without a comment statement. A comment
is a way for you to insert remarks or comments inside the program that otherwise have no effect on
its execution.
Whenever the shell encounters the special character # at the start of a word, it takes whatever
characters follow the # to the end of the line as comments and simply ignores them. 2 If the # starts
the line, the entire line is treated as a comment by the shell. Here are examples of valid comments:
# Here is an entire commentary line
who | wc l
# count the number of users
#
#
#

Test to see if the correct arguments were supplied

Comments are useful for documenting commands or sequences of commands whose purposes
may not be obvious or are sufficiently complex so that if you were to look at the program again in a
week you might forget why they're there or what they do. Judicious use of comments can help make
shell programs easier to debug and to maintainboth by you and by someone else who may have
to support your programs.
Let's go back to the stats program and insert some comments:
$ cat stats
#
# stats -- prints: date, number of users logged on,
#
and current working directory
#
echo The current date and time is:
date

2Note

that the # may be your default erase character. If so, to enter the character into an editor such as ed or vi, you'll have to escape it
by preceding it with a \. Alternatively, you can change your erase character to something else with the stty command.

And Away We Go

echo
echo The number of users on the system is:
who | wc -l
echo
echo Your current working directory is:
pwd
$

The extra blank lines cost little in terms of program space yet add much in terms of program readability. They're simply ignored by the shell.

Variables
Like virtually all programming languages, the shell allows you to store values into variables. A shell
variable begins with an alphabetic or underscore (_) character and is followed by zero or more
alphanumeric or underscore characters.
To store a value inside a shell variable, you simply write the name of the variable, followed immediately by the equals sign =, followed immediately by the value you want to store in the variable:
variable=value

For example, to assign the value 1 to the shell variable count, you simply write
count=1

and to assign the value /users/steve/bin to the shell variable my_bin, you simply write
my_bin=/users/steve/bin

A few important points here. First, spaces are not permitted on either side of the equals sign. Keep
that in mind, especially if you're in the good programming habit of inserting spaces around operators.
In the shell language, you can't put those spaces in.
Second, unlike most other programming languages, the shell has no concept whatsoever of data
types. Whenever you assign a value to a shell variable, no matter what it is, the shell simply interprets
that value as a string of characters. So when you assigned 1 to the variable count previously, the
shell simply stored the character 1 inside the variable count, making no observation whatsoever
that an integer value was being stored in the variable.
If you're used to programming in a language such as C or Pascal, where all variables must be
declared, you're in for another readjustment. Because the shell has no concept of data types, variables are not declared before they're used; they're simply assigned values when you want to use
them.
As you'll see later in this chapter, the shell does support integer operations on shell variables that
contain strings that are also valid numbers through special built-in operations.
Because the shell is an interpretive language, you can assign values to variables directly at your
terminal:
$ count=1
$ my_bin=/users/steve/bin
$

Assign character 1 to count

Assign /users/steve/bin to my_bin

So now that you know how to assign values to variables, what good is it? Glad you asked.

And Away We Go

Displaying the Values of Variables

The echo command is used to display the value stored inside a shell variable. To do this, you simply
write
echo $variable

The $ character is a special character to the shell. If a valid variable name follows the $, the shell
takes this as an indication that the value stored inside that variable is to be substituted at that point.
So, when you type
echo $count

the shell replaces $count with the value stored there; then it executes the echo command:
$ echo $count
1
$

Remember, the shell performs variable substitution before it executes the command (see Figure
5.1).

Figure 5.1. echo $count.

You can have the value of more than one variable substituted at a time:
$ echo $my_bin
/users/steve/bin
$ echo $my_bin $count
/users/steve/bin 1
$

In the second example, the shell substitutes the value of my_bin and count and then executes
the echo command (see Figure 5.2).

Figure 5.2. echo $my_bin $count.

The values of variables can be used anywhere on the command line, as the next examples illustrate:
$ ls $my_bin
mon
nu
testx
$ pwd
Where are we?
/users/steve/documents/memos
$ cd $my_bin
Change to my bin directory
$ pwd
/users/steve/bin

And Away We Go

$ number=99
$ echo There are $number bottles of beer on the wall
There are 99 bottles of beer on the wall
$

Here are some more examples:

$ command=sort
$ $command names
Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
Tony
$ command=wc
$ option=-l
$ file=names
$ $command $option $file
7 names
$

So you see, even the name of a command can be stored inside a variable. Because the shell
performs its substitution before determining the name of the program to execute and its arguments,
it scans the line
$command $option $file

and turns it into

wc -l names

Then it executes wc, passing the two arguments -l and names.

Variables can even be assigned to other variables, as shown in the next example:
$ value1=10
$ value2=value1
$ echo $value2
value1
$ value2=$value1
$ echo $value2
10
$

Didn't do that right

That's better

Remember that a dollar sign must always be placed before the variable name whenever you want
to use the value stored in that variable.

The Null Value

What do you think happens when you try to display the value of a variable that has no value assigned
to it? Try it and see:
$ echo $nosuch

Never assigned it a value

You don't get an error message. Did the echo command display anything at all? Let's see whether
we can more precisely determine that:
$ echo :$nosuch:
::
$

Surround its value with colons

And Away We Go

So you see no characters were substituted by the shell for the value of nosuch.
A variable that contains no value is said to contain the null value. It is the default case for variables
that you never store values in. When the shell performs its variable substitution, any values that are
null are completely removed from the command line, without a trace:
$ wc

$nosuch -l $nosuch $nosuch names

7 names

The shell scans the command line substituting the null value for the variable nosuch. After the scan
is completed, the line effectively looks like this:
wc -l names

which explains why it works.

Sometimes you may want to explicitly set a variable null in a program. This can be done by simply
assigning no value to the variable, as in
dataflag=

Alternatively, you can list two adjacent pairs of quotes after the =. So
dataflag=""

and
dataflag=''

both have the same effect of assigning the null value to dataflag. Be advised that the assignment
dataflag=" "

is not equivalent to the three previous ones because it assigns a single space character to dataflag; that's different from assigning no characters to it.

Filename Substitution and Variables

Here's a puzzle for you: If you type
x=*

will the shell store the character * into the variable x, or will it store the names of all the files in your
current directory into the variable x? Let's try it out and see:
$ ls
What files do we have?
addresses
intro
lotsaspaces
names
nu
numbers
phonebook
stat
$ x=*
$ echo $x
addresses intro lotsaspaces names nu numbers phonebook stat
$

And Away We Go

There's a lot to be learned from this small example. Was the list of files stored into the variable x
when
x=*

was executed, or did the shell do the substitution when

echo $x

was executed?
The answer is that the shell does not perform filename substitution when assigning values to variables. Therefore,
x=*

assigns the single character * to x. This means that the shell did the filename substitution when
executing the echo command. In fact, the precise sequence of steps that occurred when
echo $x

was executed is as follows:

The shell scanned the line, substituting * as the value of x.

The shell rescanned the line, encountered the *, and then substituted the names of all files in
the current directory.
The shell initiated execution of echo, passing it the file list as arguments (see Figure 5.3).

And Away We Go

Figure 5.3. echo $x.

This order of evaluation is important. Remember, first the shell does variable substitution, then does
filename substitution, and then parses the line into arguments.

The ${variable} Construct

Suppose that you have the name of a file stored in the variable filename. If you wanted to rename
that file so that the new name was the same as the old, except with an X added to the end, your first
impulse would be to type
mv $filename $filenameX

When the shell scans this command line, it substitutes the value of the variable filename and also
the value of the variable filenameX. The shell thinks filenameX is the full name of the variable
because it's composed entirely of valid variable name characters. To avoid this problem, you can
delimit the end of the variable name by enclosing the entire name (but not the leading dollar sign)
in a pair of curly braces, as in
${filename}X

This removes the ambiguity, and the mv command then works as desired:
mv $filename ${filename}X

And Away We Go

Remember that the braces are necessary only if the last character of the variable name is followed
by an alphanumeric character or an underscore.

Built-in Integer Arithmetic

The POSIX standard shell provides a mechanism for performing integer arithmetic on shell variables
called arithmetic expansion. Note that some older shells do not support this feature.
The format for arithmetic expansion is
$((expression))

where expression is an arithmetic expression using shell variables and operators. Valid shell variables are those that contain numeric values (leading and trailing whitespace is allowed). Valid operators are taken from the C programming language and are listed in Appendix A, Shell Summary.
The result of computing expression is substituted on the command line. For example,
echo $((i+1))

adds one to the value in the shell variable i and prints the result. Notice that the variable i doesn't
have to be preceded by a dollar sign. That's because the shell knows that the only valid items that
can appear in arithmetic expansions are operators, numbers, and variables. If the variable is not
defined or contains a NULL string, its value is assumed to be zero. So if we have not assigned any
value yet to the variable a, we can still use it in an integer expression:
$ echo $a
$
$ echo $((a = a + 1))
1
$ echo $a
1
$

Variable a not set

Equivalent to a = 0 + 1
Now a contains 1

Note that assignment is a valid operator, and the value of the assignment is substituted in the second
echo command in the preceding example.
Parentheses may be used freely inside expressions to force grouping, as in
echo $((i = (i + 10) * j))

If you want to perform an assignment without echo or some other command, you can move the
assignment before the arithmetic expansion.
So to multiply the variable i by 5 and assign the result back to i you can write
i=$(( i * 5 ))

Note that spaces are optional inside the double parentheses, but are not allowed when the assignment is outside them.
Finally, to test to see whether i is greater than or equal to 0 and less than or equal to 100, you can
write
result=$(( i >= 0

i <= 100 ))

which assigns result 1 if the expression is true and 0 if it's false:

And Away We Go
$ i=$(( 100 * 200 / 10 ))
$ j=$(( i < 1000 ))
$ echo $i $j
2000 0
$

86
If i is < 1000, set j = 0; otherwise 1
i

is 2000, so j was set to 0

That concludes our introduction to writing commands and using variables. The next chapter goes
into detail on the quoting mechanisms in the shell.

Exercises
1: Which of the following are valid variable names?
XxXxXx

12345

HOMEDIR

file.name

_date

file_name

x0-9

file1

Slimit

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

2: Suppose that your HOME directory is /users/steve and that you have subdirectories as shown
in the following figure:

Assuming that you just logged in to the system and executed the following commands:
$ docs=/users/steve/documents
$ let=$docs/letters
$ prop=$docs/proposals
$

write the commands in terms of these variables to

List the contents of the documents directory.

Copy all files from the letters directory to the proposals directory.

Move all files whose names contain a capital letter from the letters directory to the current directory.
Count the number of files in the memos directory.

What would be the effect of the following commands?

And Away We Go

ls $let/..
a.
cat $prop/sys.A >> $let/no.JSK
b.
echo $let/*
c.
cp $let/no.JSK $progs
d.
cd $prop
e.
3: Write a program called nf to display the number of files in your current directory. Type in the
program and test it out.
4: Write a program called whos to display a sorted list of the logged-in users. Just display the
usernames and no other information. Type in the program and test it out.

Chapter 6. Can I Quote You on That?

IN THIS CHAPTER
The Single Quote

The Double Quote

The Backslash
Command Substitution
Exercises

This chapter teaches you about a unique feature of the shell programming language: the way it
interprets quote characters. Basically, the shell recognizes four different types of quote characters:
The single quote character '
The double quote character "
The backslash character \
The back quote character `
The first two and the last characters in the preceding list must occur in pairs, whereas the backslash
character is unary in nature. Each of these quotes has a distinct meaning to the shell. We'll cover
them in separate sections of this chapter.

The Single Quote

There are several reasons that you might need to use quotes in the shell. One of these is to keep
characters otherwise separated by whitespace characters together. Let's look at an example. Here's
a file called phonebook that contains names and phone numbers:
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
Barbara Swingle
Liz Stachiw
Susan Goldberg
Susan Topple
Tony Iannino
$

973-555-2015
201-555-9257
212-555-2298
201-555-7776
212-555-4932
973-555-1295

To look up someone in our phonebook filewhich has been kept small here for the sake of example
you use grep:
$ grep Alice phonebook
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
$

Look what happens when you look up Susan:

Can I Quote You on That?

$ grep Susan phonebook

Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$

There are two lines that contain Susan, thus explaining the two lines of output. One way to overcome
this problem would be to further qualify the name. For example, you could specify the last name as
well:
$ grep Susan Goldberg phonebook
grep: can't open Goldberg
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$

Recalling that the shell uses one or more whitespace characters to separate the arguments on the
line, the preceding command line results in grep being passed three arguments: Susan, Goldberg, and phonebook (see Figure 6.1).

Figure 6.1. grep Susan Goldberg phonebook.

When grep is executed, it takes the first argument as the pattern and the remaining arguments as
the names of the files to search for the pattern. In this case, grep thinks it's supposed to look for
Susan in the files Goldberg and phonebook. So it tries to open the file Goldberg, can't find it,
and issues the error message:
grep: can't open Goldberg

Then it goes to the next file, phonebook, opens it, searches for the pattern Susan, and prints the
two matching lines. The problem boils down to trying to pass whitespace characters as arguments
to programs. This can be done by enclosing the entire argument inside a pair of single quotes, as in
grep 'Susan Goldberg' phonebook

When the shell sees the first single quote, it ignores any otherwise special characters that follow
until it sees the closing quote.
$ grep 'Susan Goldberg' phonebook
Susan Goldberg
201-555-7776
$

In this case, the shell encountered the first ', and ignored any special characters until it found the
closing '. So the space between Susan and Goldberg, which would have normally delimited the
two arguments, was ignored by the shell. The shell therefore divided the command line into two
arguments, the first Susan Goldberg (which includes the space character) and the second phonebook. It then executed grep, passing it these two arguments (see Figure 6.2).

Can I Quote You on That?

Figure 6.2. grep 'Susan Goldberg' phonebook.

grep then took the first argument, Susan Goldberg, and looked for it in the file specified by the
second argument, phonebook. Note that the shell removes the quotes from the command line and
does not pass them to the program.
No matter how many space characters are enclosed between quotes, they are preserved by the
shell.
$ echo one
one two three four
$ echo 'one
one
two
$

two

three

four

two
three

three
four

four'

In the first case, the shell removes the extra whitespace characters from the line and passes
echo the four arguments one, two, three, and four (see Figure 6.3).

Figure 6.3. echo one two three four.

In the second case, the space characters are preserved, and the shell treats the entire string of
characters enclosed between the quotes as a single argument when executing echo (see Figure
6.4).

Figure 6.4. echo 'one two three four'.

As we mentioned, all special characters are ignored by the shell if they appear inside single quotes.
That explains the output from the following:
$ file=/users/steve/bin/prog1
$ echo $file
/users/steve/bin/progl
$ echo '$file'
$ not interpreted
$file
$ echo *
addresses intro lotsaspaces names nu numbers phonebook stat
$ echo '*'

Can I Quote You on That?

*
$ echo '< > | ; ( ) { } >> " ` &'
< > | ; ( ) { } >> " ` &
$

Even the Enter key will be ignored by the shell if it's enclosed in quotes:
$ echo 'How are you today,
> John'
How are you today,
John
$

After typing the first line, the shell sees that the quote isn't matched, so it waits for you to type in the
closing quote. As an indication that the shell is waiting for you to finish typing in a command, it
changes your prompt character from $ to >. This is known as your secondary prompt character and
is displayed by the shell whenever it's waiting for you to finish typing a command.
Quotes are also needed when assigning values containing whitespace or special characters to shell
variables:
$ message='I must say, this sure is fun'
$ echo $message
I must say, this sure is fun
$ text='* means all files in the directory'
$ echo $text
names nu numbers phonebook stat means all files in the directory
$

The quotes are needed in the assignments made to the variables message and text because of the
embedded spaces. In the preceding example, you are reminded that the shell still does filename
substitution after variable name substitution, meaning that the * is replaced by the names of all the
files in the current directory before the echo is executed. There is a way to overcome this annoyance, and it's through the use of double quotes.

The Double Quote

Double quotes work similarly to single quotes, except that they're not as restrictive. Whereas the
single quotes tell the shell to ignore all enclosed characters, double quotes say to ignore most. In
particular, the following three characters are not ignored inside double quotes:
Dollar signs
Back quotes
Backslashes
The fact that dollar signs are not ignored means that variable name substitution is done by the shell
inside double quotes.
$ x=*
$ echo $x
addresses intro lotsaspaces names nu numbers phonebook stat
$ echo '$x'
$x
$ echo "$x"
*
$

Can I Quote You on That?

Here you see the major differences between no quotes, single quotes, and double quotes. In the
first case, the shell sees the asterisk and substitutes all the filenames from the current directory. In
the second case, the shell leaves the characters enclosed within the single quotes alone, which
results in the display of $x. In the final case, the double quotes indicate to the shell that variable
name substitution is still to be performed inside the quotes. So the shell substitutes * for $x. Because
filename substitution is not done inside double quotes, * is then passed to echo as the value to be
displayed.
So if you want to have the value of a variable substituted, but don't want the shell to treat the
substituted characters specially, you must enclose the variable inside double quotes.
Here's another example illustrating the difference between double quotes and no quotes:
$ address="39 East 12th Street
> New York, N. Y. 10003"
$ echo $address
39 East 12th Street New York, N. Y. 10003
$ echo "$address"
39 East 12th Street
New York, N. Y. 10003
$

It makes no difference whether the value assigned to address is enclosed in single quotes or
double quotes. The shell displays the secondary command prompt in either case to tell you it's
waiting for the corresponding closed quote.
After assigning the two-line address to address, the value of the variable is displayed by echo.
Notice that the address is displayed on a single line. The reason is the same as what caused
echo one

two

three

four

to be displayed as
one two three four

Recalling that the shell removes spaces, tabs, and newlines (that is, whitespace characters) from
the command line and then cuts it up into arguments, in the case of
echo $address

the shell simply removes the embedded newline character, treating it as it would a space or tab: as
an argument delimiter. Then it passes the nine arguments to echo to be displayed. echo never gets
a chance to see that newline; the shell gets to it first (see Figure 6.5).

Can I Quote You on That?

Figure 6.5. echo $address.

When the command

echo "$address"

is used instead, the shell substitutes the value of address as before, except that the double quotes
tell it to leave any embedded whitespace characters alone. So in this case, the shell passes a single
argument to echoan argument that contains an embedded newline. echo simply displays its
single argument at the terminal; Figure 6.6 illustrates this. The newline character is depicted by the
characters \n.

Figure 6.6. echo "$address".

Double quotes can be used to hide single quotes from the shell, and vice versa:
$ x="' Hello,' he said"
$ echo $x
'Hello,' he said
$ article=' "Keeping the Logins from Lagging," Bell Labs Record'
$ echo $article
"Keeping the Logins from Lagging," Bell Labs Record
$

The Backslash
Basically, the backslash is equivalent to placing single quotes around a single character, with a few
minor exceptions. The backslash quotes the single character that immediately follows it. The general
format is
\c

where c is the character you want to quote. Any special meaning normally attached to that character
is removed. Here is an example:

Can I Quote You on That?

$ echo >
syntax error: 'newline or ;' unexpected
$ echo \>
>
$

In the first case, the shell sees the > and thinks that you want to redirect echo's output to a file. So
it expects a filename to follow. Because it doesn't, the shell issues the error message. In the next
case, the backslash removes the special meaning of the >, so it is passed along to echo to be
displayed.
$ x=*
$ echo \$x
$x
$

In this case, the shell ignores the $ that follows the backslash, and as a result, variable substitution
is not performed.
Because a backslash removes the special meaning of the character that follows, can you guess
what happens if that character is another backslash? Right, it removes the special meaning of the
backslash:
$ echo \\
\
$

Naturally, you could have also written

$ echo '\'
\
$

Using the Backslash for Continuing Lines

As mentioned at the start of this section, \c is basically equivalent to 'c'. One exception to this rule
is when the backslash is used as the very last character on the line:
$ lines=one'
> 'two
Single quotes tell shell to ignore newline
$ echo "$lines"
one
two
$ lines=one\
Try it with a \ instead
> two
$ echo "$lines"
onetwo
$

The shell treats a backslash at the end of the line as a line continuation. It removes the newline
character that follows and also does not treat the newline as an argument delimiter (it's as if it wasn't
even typed). This construct is most often used for typing long commands over multiple lines.

The Backslash Inside Double Quotes

We noted earlier that the backslash is one of the three characters interpreted by the shell inside
double quotes. This means that you can use the backslash inside these quotes to remove the
meaning of characters that otherwise would be interpreted inside double quotes (that is, other
backslashes, dollar signs, back quotes, newlines, and other double quotes). If the backslash precedes any other character inside double quotes, the backslash is ignored by the shell and passed
on to the program:

Can I Quote You on That?

$ echo "\$x"
$x
$ echo "\ is the backslash character"
\ is the backslash character
$ x=5
$ echo "The value of x is \"$x\""
The value of x is "5"
$

In the first example, the backslash precedes the dollar sign, interpreted by the shell inside double
quotes. So the shell ignores the dollar sign, removes the backslash, and executes echo. In the
second example, the backslash precedes a space, not interpreted by the shell inside double quotes.
So the shell ignores the backslash and passes it on to the echo command. The last example shows
the backslash used to enclose double quotes inside a double-quoted string.
As an exercise in the use of quotes, let's say that you want to display the following line at the terminal:
<<< echo $x >>> displays the value of x, which is $x

The intention here is to substitute the value of x in the second instance of $x, but not in the first.
Let's first assign a value to x:
$ x=1
$

Now try displaying the line without using any quotes:

$ echo <<< echo $x >>> displays the value of x, which is $x
syntax error: '<' unexpected
$

The < signals input redirection to the shell; this is the reason for the error message.
If you put the entire message inside single quotes, the value of x won't be substituted at the end. If
you enclose the entire string in double quotes, both occurrences of $x will be substituted. Here are
two different ways to do the quoting properly (realize that there are usually several different ways
to quote a string of characters to get the results you want):
$ echo "<<<
<<< echo $x
$ echo '<<<
<<< echo $x
$

echo \$x >>> displays the value of x, which is $x"

>>> displays the value of x, which is 1
echo $x >>> displays the value of x, which is' $x
>>> displays the value of x, which is 1

In the first case, everything is enclosed in double quotes, and the backslash is used to prevent the
shell from performing variable substitution in the first instance of $x. In the second case, everything
up to the last $x is enclosed in single quotes. If the variable x might have contained some filename
substitution or whitespace characters, a safer way of writing the echo would have been
echo '<<< echo $x >>> displays the value of x, which is' "$x"

Command Substitution
Command substitution refers to the shell's capability to insert the standard output of a command at
any point in a command line. There are two ways in the shell to perform command substitution: by
enclosing a shell command with back quotes and with the $(...) construct.

Can I Quote You on That?

The Back Quote

The back quote is unlike any of the previously encountered types of quotes. Its purpose is not to
protect characters from the shell but to tell the shell to execute the enclosed command and to insert
the standard output from the command at that point on the command line. The general format for
using back quotes is
`command`
where command is the name of the command to be executed and whose output is to be inserted at
that point.1
Here is an example:
$ echo The date and time is: `date`
The date and time is: Wed Aug 28 14:28:43 EDT 2002
$

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

When the shell does its initial scan of the command line, it notices the back quote and expects the
name of a command to follow. In this case, the shell finds that the date command is to be executed.
So it executes date and replaces the `date` on the command line with the output from the
date. After that, it divides the command line into arguments in the normal manner and then initiates
execution of the echo command.
$ echo Your current working directory is `pwd`
Your current working directory is /users/steve/shell/ch6
$

Here the shell executes pwd, inserts its output on the command line, and then executes the echo.
Note that in the following section, back quotes can be used in all the places where the $(...)
construct is used.

The $(...) Construct

The POSIX standard shell supports the newer $(...) construct for command substitution. The
general format is
$(command)

where, as in the back quoting method, command is the name of the command whose standard
output is to be substituted on the command line. For example:
$ echo The date and time is: $(date)
The date and time is: Wed Aug 28 14:28:43 EDT 2002
$

This construct is better than back quotes for a couple of reasons. First, complex commands that
use combinations of forward and back quotes can be difficult to read, particularly if the typeface
you're using doesn't have visually different single quotes and back quotes; second, $(...) constructs can be easily nested, allowing command substitution within command substitution. Although
nesting can also be performed with back quotes, it's a little trickier. You'll see an example of nested
command substitution later in this section.

1Note

that using the back quote for command substitution is no longer the preferred method; however, we cover it here because of the large
number of older, canned shell programs that still use this construct. Also, you should know about back quotes in case you ever need to write
shell programs that are portable to older Unix systems with shells that don't support the newer $(...) construct.

Can I Quote You on That?

You are not restricted to executing a single command between the parentheses: Several commands
can be executed if separated by semicolons. Also, pipelines can be used. Here's a modified version
of the nu program that displays the number of logged-in users:
$ cat nu
echo There are $(who | wc l) users logged in
$ nu
Execute it
There are 13 users logged in
$

Because single quotes protect everything, the following output should be clear:
$ echo '$(who | wc l) tells how many users are logged in'
$(who | wc l) tells how many users are logged in
$

But command substitution is interpreted inside double quotes:

$ echo "You have $(ls | wc l) fi1es in your directory"
You have
7 files in your directory
$

(What causes those leading spaces before the 7?) Remember that the shell is responsible for executing the command enclosed between the parentheses. The only thing the echo command sees
is the output that has been inserted by the shell.
Suppose that you're writing a shell program and want to assign the current date and time to a variable
called now, perhaps to display it later at the top of a report, or log it into a file. The problem here is
that you somehow want to take the output from date and assign it to the variable. Command substitution can be used for this:
$ now=$(date)
Execute date and store the output in now
$ echo $now
See what got assigned
Wed Aug 28 14:47:26 EDT 2002
$

When you write

now=$(date)

the shell realizes that the entire output from date is to be assigned to now. Therefore, you don't
need to enclose $(date) inside double quotes.
Even commands that produce more than a single line of output can be stored inside a variable:
$ filelist=$(ls)
$ echo $filelist
addresses intro lotsaspaces names nu numbers phonebook stat
$

What happened here? You end up with a horizontal listing of the files even though the newlines
from ls were stored inside the filelist variable (take our word for it). The newlines got eaten
up when the value of filelist was substituted by the shell in processing the echo command line.
Double quotes around the variable will preserve the newlines:
$ echo "$filelist"
addresses
intro
lotsaspaces
names
nu

Can I Quote You on That?

numbers
phonebook
stat
$

To store the contents of a file into a variable, you can use cat:
$ namelist=$(cat names)
$ echo "$names"
Charlie
Emanuel
Fred
Lucy
Ralph
Tony
Tony
$

If you want to mail the contents of the file memo to all the people listed in the names file (who we'll
assume here are users on your system), you can do the following:
$ mail $(cat names) < memo
$

Here the shell executes the cat and inserts the output on the command line so it looks like this:
mail Charlie Emanuel Fred Lucy Ralph Tony Tony < memo

Then it executes mail, redirecting its standard input from the file memo and passing it the names
of seven users who are to receive the mail.
Notice that Tony receives the same mail twice because he's listed twice in the names file. You can
remove any duplicate entries from the file by using sort with the -u option (remove duplicate lines)
rather than cat to ensure that each person only receives mail once:
$ mail $(sort -u names) < memo
$

It's worth noting that the shell does filename substitution after it substitutes the output from commands. Enclosing the commands inside double quotes prevents the shell from doing the filename
substitution on this output if desired.
Command substitution is often used to change the value stored in a shell variable. For example, if
the shell variable name contains someone's name, and you want to convert every character in that
variable to uppercase, you could use echo to get the variable to tr's input, perform the translation,
and then assign the result back to the variable:
$ name="Ralph Kramden"
$ name=$(echo $name | tr '[a-z]' '[A-Z]')
$ echo $name
RALPH KRAMDEN
$

Translate to uppercase

The technique of using echo in a pipeline to write data to the standard input of the following command is a simple yet powerful technique; it's used often in shell programs.
The next example shows how cut is used to extract the first character from the value stored in a
variable called filename:

Can I Quote You on That?

$ filename=/users/steve/memos
$ firstchar=$(echo $filename | cut -c1)
$ echo $firstchar
/
$

sed is also often used to edit the value stored in a variable. Here it is used to extract the last
character from the variable file:
$ file=exec.o
$ lastchar=$(echo $file | sed 's/.*$.$$/\1/')
$ echo $lastchar
o
$

The sed command says to replace all the characters on the line with the last one. The result of the
sed is stored in the variable lastchar. The single quotes around the sed command are important
because they prevent the shell from messing around with the backslashes (would double quotes
also have worked?).
Finally, command substitutions can be nested. Suppose that you want to change every occurrence
of the first character in a variable to something else. In a previous example, firstchar=$(echo
$filename | cut -c1) gets the first character from filename, but how do we use this character
to change every occurrence in filename? A two-step process is one way:
$ filename=/users/steve/memos
$ firstchar=$(echo $filename | cut -c1)
$ filename=$(echo $filename | tr "$firstchar" "^")
$ echo $filename
^users^steve^memos
$

translate / to ^

Or a single, nested command substitution can perform the same operation:

$ filename=/users/steve/memos
$ filename=$(echo $filename | tr "$(echo $filename | cut -c1)" "^")
$ echo $filename
^users^steve^memos
$

If you have trouble understanding this example, compare it to the previous one: Note how the
firstchar variable in the earlier example is replaced by the nested command substitution; otherwise, the two examples are the same.

The expr Command

Although the POSIX standard shell supports built-in integer arithmetic operations, older shells don't.
It's likely that you may see command substitution with a Unix program called expr, which evaluates
an expression given to it on the command line:
$ expr 1 + 2
3
$

Each operator and operand given to expr must be a separate argument, thus explaining the output
from the following:
$ expr 1+2
1+2
$

Can I Quote You on That?

100

The usual arithmetic operators are recognized by expr: + for addition, - for subtraction, / for division, * for multiplication, and % for modulus (remainder).
$ expr 10 + 20 / 2
20
$

Multiplication, division, and modulus have higher precedence than addition and subtraction. Thus,
in the preceding example the division was performed before the addition.
$ expr 17 * 6
expr: syntax error
$

What happened here? The answer: The shell saw the * and substituted the names of all the files
in your directory! It has to be quoted to keep it from the shell:
$ expr "17 * 6"
17 * 6
$

That's not the way to do it. Remember that expr must see each operator and operand as a separate
argument; the preceding example sends the whole expression in as a single argument.
$ expr 17 \* 6
102
$

Naturally, one or more of the arguments to expr can be the value stored inside a shell variable
because the shell takes care of the substitution first anyway:
$ i=1
$ expr $i + 1
2
$

This is the older method for performing arithmetic on shell variables. Do the same type of thing as
shown previously only use the command substitution mechanism to assign the output from expr
back to the variable:
$ i=1
$ i=$(expr $i + 1)
$ echo $i
2
$

Add 1 to i

In legacy shell programs, you're more likely to see expr used with back quotes:
$ i=`expr $i + 1`
$ echo $i
3
$

Add 1 to i

Note that like the shell's built-in integer arithmetic, expr only evaluates integer arithmetic expressions. You can use awk or bc if you need to do floating point calculations. Also note that expr has
other operators. One of the most frequently used ones is the : operator, which is used to match
characters in the first operand against a regular expression given as the second operand. By default,
it returns the number of characters matched.
The expr command
expr "$file" : ".*"

Can I Quote You on That?

101

returns the number of characters stored in the variable file, because the regular expression .*
matches all the characters in the string. For more details on expr, consult your Unix User's Manual.
Table A.5 in Appendix A summarizes the way quotes are handled by the shell.

Exercises
1: Given the following assignments:
$
$
$
>
>
$
$
$

x=*
y=?
z='one
two
three'
now=$(date)
symbol='>'

and these files in your current directory:

$ echo *
names test1 u vv zebra
$

What will the output be from the following commands?

echo *** error ***

echo 'Is 5 * 4 > 18 ?'

echo $x

echo What is your name?

echo $y

echo Would you like to play a game?

echo "$y"

echo \*\*\*

echo $z | wc -l

echo \$$symbol

echo "$z" | wc -l

echo $\$symbol

echo '$z' I wc -l

echo "\"

echo _$now_

echo "\\"

echo hello $symbol out

echo \\

echo "\""

echo I don't understand

2: Write the commands to remove all the space characters stored in the shell variable text. Be
sure to assign the result back to text. First use tr to do it and then do the same thing with sed.
3: Write the commands to count the number of characters stored in the shell variable text. Then
write the commands to count all the alphabetic characters. (Hint: Use sed and wc.) What happens to special character sequences such as \n if they're stored inside text?
4: Write the commands to assign the unique lines in the file names to the shell variable namelist.

102

Chapter 7. Passing Arguments

IN THIS CHAPTER
The shift Command
Exercises
Shell programs become far more useful after you learn how to process arguments passed to them.
In this chapter, you'll learn how to write shell programs that take arguments typed on the command
line. Recall the program run that you wrote in Chapter 5, And Away We Go, to run the file
sys.caps through tbl, nroff, and lp:
$ cat run
tbl sys.caps | nroff -mm Tlp | lp
$

Suppose that you need to run other files besides sys.caps through this same command sequence.
You could make a separate version of run for each such file; or, you could modify the run program
so that you could specify the name of the file to be run on the command line. That is, you could
change run so that you could type
run new.hire

for example, to specify that the file new.hire is to be run through this command sequence, or
run sys.caps

to specify the file sys.caps.

Whenever you execute a shell program, the shell automatically stores the first argument in the
special shell variable 1, the second argument in the variable 2, and so on. These special variables
more formally known as positional parametersare assigned after the shell has done its normal
command-line processing (that is, I/O redirection, variable substitution, filename substitution, and
so on).
To modify the run program to accept the name of the file as an argument, all you do to the program
is change the reference to the file sys.caps so that it instead references the first argument typed
on the command line:
$ cat run
tbl $1 | nroff -mm -Tlp | lp
$ run new.hire
Execute it with new.hire as the argument
request id is laser1-24 (standard input)
$

Passing Arguments

103

Each time you execute the run program, whatever word follows on the command line will be stored
inside the first positional parameter by the shell. In the example, new.hire will be stored in this
parameter. Substitution of positional parameters is identical to substitution of other types of variables, so when the shell sees
tbl $1

it replaces the $1 with the first argument supplied to the program: new.hire.
As another example, the following program, called ison, lets you know if a specified user is logged
on:
$ cat ison
who | grep $1
$ who
root
console
barney
tty03
fred
tty04
joanne
tty07
tony
tty19
lulu
tty23
$ ison tony
tony
tty19
$ ison pat
$

See who's on
Jul
Jul
Jul
Jul
Jul
Jul

7
8
8
8
8
8

08:37
12:28
13:40
09:35
08:30
09:55

Jul 8 08:30
Not logged on

The $# Variable
Whenever you execute a shell program, the special shell variable $# gets set to the number of
arguments that were typed on the command line. As you'll see in the next chapter, this variable can
be tested by the program to determine whether the correct number of arguments was typed by the
user.
The next program called args was written just to get you more familiar with the way arguments are
passed to shell programs. Study the output from each example and make sure that you understand
it:
$ cat args
Look at the program
echo $# arguments passed
echo arg 1 = :$1: arg 2 = :$2: arg 3 = :$3:
$ args a b c
Execute it
3 arguments passed
arg 1 = :a: arg 2 = :b: arg 3 = :c:
$ args a b
Try it with two arguments
2 arguments passed
arg 1 = :a: arg 2 = :b: arg 3 = ::
Unassigned args are null
$ args
Try it with no arguments
0 arguments passed
arg 1 =:: arg 2 =:: arg 3 = ::
$ args "a b c"
Try quotes
1 arguments passed
arg 1 = :a b c: arg 2 = :: arg 3 = ::
$ ls x*
See what files start with x
xact
xtra
$ args x*
Try file name substitution
2 arguments passed
arg 1 = :xact: arg 2 = :xtra: arg 3 = ::
$ my_bin=/users/steve/bin
$ args $my_bin
And variable substitution
1 arguments passed
arg 1 = :/users/steve/bin: arg 2 = :: arg 3 = ::

Passing Arguments

104

$ args $(cat names)

Pass the contents of names
7 arguments passed
arg 1 = :Charlie: arg 2 = :Emanuel: arg3 = :Fred:
$

As you can see, the shell does its normal command-line processing even when it's executing your
shell programs. This means that you can take advantage of the normal niceties such as filename
substitution and variable substitution when specifying arguments to your programs.

The $* Variable
The special variable $* references all the arguments passed to the program. This is often useful in
programs that take an indeterminate or variable number of arguments. You'll see some more practical examples later. Here's a program that illustrates its use:
$ cat args2
echo $# arguments passed
echo they are :$*:
$ args2 a b c
3 arguments passed
they are :a b c:
$ args2 one
two
2 arguments passed
they are :one two:
$ args2
0 arguments passed
they are ::
$ args2 *
8 arguments passed
they are :args args2 names nu phonebook stat xact xtra:
$

A Program to Look Up Someone in the Phone Book

Here's the phonebook file from previous examples:
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
Barbara Swingle
Liz Stachiw
Susan Goldberg
Susan Topple
Tony Iannino
$

973-555-2015
201-555-9257
212-555-2298
201-555-7776
212-555-4932
973-555-1295

You know how to look up someone in the file by using grep:

$ grep Cheb phonebook
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
$

And you know that if you want to look up someone by the full name, you'd better put quotes around
it to keep the argument together:
$ grep "Susan T" phonebook
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$

It would be nice to write a shell program that you could use to look up someone. Let's call the program
lu and have it take as its argument the name of the person to look up:

Passing Arguments

105

$ cat lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book
#
grep $1 phonebook
$

Here's a sample use of lu:

$ lu Alice
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
$ lu Susan
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$ lu "Susan T"
grep: can't open T
phonebook:Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
phonebook:Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$

In the preceding example, you were careful to enclose Susan T in double quotes; so what happened? Look again at the grep executed in the lu program:
grep $1 phonebook

Even though enclosing Susan T inside double quotes results in its getting passed to lu as a single
argument, when the shell substitutes this value for $1 on grep's command line, it then passes it as
two arguments to grep. (Remember we had this same sort of discussion when we talked about
variable substitutionfirst the shell substitutes the value of the variable; then it divides the line into
arguments.)
You can alleviate this problem by enclosing $1 inside double quotes (why not single?) in the lu
program:
$ cat lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book -- version 2
#
grep "$1" phonebook
$

Now let's try it again:

$ lu Tony
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$ lu "Susan T"
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
$

This still works

Now try this again

A Program to Add Someone to the Phone Book

Let's continue with the development of programs that work with the phonebook file. You'll probably
want to add someone to the file, particularly because our phonebook file is so small. You can write
a program called add that takes two arguments: the name of the person to be added and the number.
Then you can simply write the name and number, separated from each other by a tab character,
onto the end of the phonebook file:

Passing Arguments

106

$ cat add
#
# Add someone to the phone book
#
echo "$1
$

$2" >> phonebook

Although you can't tell, there's a tab character that separates the $1 from the $2 in the preceding
echo command. This tab must be quoted to make it to echo without getting gobbled up by the shell.
Let's try out the program:
$ add 'Stromboli Pizza' 973-555-9478
$ lu Pizza
See if we can find the new entry
Stromboli Pizza 973-555-9478
So far, so good
$ cat phonebook
See what happened
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
Stromboli Pizza 973-555-9478
$

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Stromboli Pizza was quoted so that the shell passed it along to add as a single argument (what
would have happened if it wasn't quoted?). After add finished executing, lu was run to see whether
it could find the new entry, and it did. The cat command was executed to see what the modified
phonebook file looked like. The new entry was added to the end, as intended. Unfortunately, the
new file is no longer sorted. This won't affect the operation of the lu program, but you can add a
sort to the add program to keep the file sorted after new entries are added:
$ cat add
#
# Add someone to the phonebook file -- version 2
#
echo "$1
$2" >> phonebook
sort -o phonebook phonebook
$

Recall that the -o option to sort specifies where the sorted output is to be written, and that this can
be the same as the input file:
$ add 'Billy Bach' 201-555-7618
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Billy Bach
201-555-7618
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Stromboli Pizza 973-555-9478
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$

So each time a new entry is added, the phonebook file will get re-sorted.

Passing Arguments

107

A Program to Remove Someone from the Phone Book

No set of programs that enable you to look up or add someone to the phone book would be complete
without a program to remove someone from the phone book. We'll call the program rem and have
it take as its argument the name of the person to be removed. What should the strategy be for
developing the program? Essentially, you want to remove the line from the file that contains the
specified name. The -v option to grep can be used here because it prints lines from a file that
don't match a pattern:
$ cat rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book
#
grep -v "$1" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook
mv /tmp/phonebook phonebook
$

The grep writes all lines that don't match into the file /tmp/phonebook. 1 After the grep is done,
the old phonebook file is replaced by the new one from /tmp.
$ rem 'Stromboli Pizza'
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Billy Bach
201-555-7618
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Susan Goldberg 201-555-7776
Susan Topple
212-555-4932
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$ rem Susan
$ cat phonebook
Alice Chebba
973-555-2015
Barbara Swingle 201-555-9257
Billy Bach
201-555-7618
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$

Remove this entry

The first case, where Stromboli Pizza was removed, worked fine. In the second case, however,
both Susan entries were removed because they both matched the pattern. You can use the add
program to add them back to the phone book:
$ add 'Susan Goldberg' 201-555-7776
$ add 'Susan Topple' 212-555-4932
$

In Chapter 8, Decisions, Decisions, you'll learn how to determine whether more than one matching
entry is found and take some other action if that's the case. For example, you might want to alert
the user that more than one match has been found and further qualification of the name is required.
(This can be very helpful, because most implementations of grep will match everything if an empty
string is passed as the pattern.)
Incidentally, before leaving this program, note that sed could have also been used to delete the
matching entry. In such a case, the grep could be replaced with
sed "/$1/d" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook

1/tmp is a directory on all Unix systems that anyone can write to. It's used by programs to create temporary files. Each time the system gets

rebooted, all the files in /tmp are usually removed.

Passing Arguments

108

to achieve the same result. The double quotes are needed around the sed command to ensure that
the value of $1 is substituted, while at the same time ensuring that the shell doesn't see a command
line like
sed /Stromboli Pizza/d phonebook > /tmp/phonebook

and pass three arguments to sed rather than two.

${n}
If you supply more than nine arguments to a program, you cannot access the tenth and greater
arguments with $10, $11, and so on. If you try to access the tenth argument by writing
$10

the shell actually substitutes the value of $1 followed by a 0. Instead, the format
${n}

must be used. So to directly access argument 10, you must write

${10}

in your program.

The shift Command

The shift command allows you to effectively left shift your positional parameters. If you execute
the command
shift

whatever was previously stored inside $2 will be assigned to $1, whatever was previously stored
in $3 will be assigned to $2, and so on. The old value of $1 will be irretrievably lost.
When this command is executed, $# (the number of arguments variable) is also automatically decremented by one:
$ cat tshift
echo $# $*
shift
echo $# $*
shift
echo $# $*
shift
echo $# $*
shift
echo $# $*
shift
echo $# $*
$ tshift a b c d e
5 a b c d e
4 b c d e
3 c d e
2 d e
1 e
0
$

Program to test the shift

Passing Arguments

109

If you try to shift when there are no variables to shift (that is, when $# already equals zero), you'll
get an error message from the shell (the error will vary from one shell to the next):
prog: shift: bad number

where prog is the name of the program that executed the offending shift.
You can shift more than one place at once by writing a count immediately after shift, as in
shift 3

This command has the same effect as performing three separate shifts:
shift
shift
shift

The shift command is useful when processing a variable number of arguments. You'll see it put
to use when you learn about loops in Chapter 9, 'Round and 'Round She Goes.

Exercises
1: Modify lu so that it ignores case when doing the lookup.
2: What happens if you forget to supply an argument to the lu program? What happens if the
argument is null (as in, lu "")?
3: The program ison from this chapter has a shortcoming as shown in the following example:
$ ison ed
fred
tty03
$

Sep

4 14:53

The output indicates that fred is logged on, while we were checking to see whether ed was
logged on.
Modify ison to correct this problem.
4: Write a program called twice that takes a single integer argument and doubles its value:
$ twice 15
30
$ twice 0
0
$

What happens if a noninteger value is typed? What if the argument is omitted?

5: Write a program called home that takes the name of a user as its single argument and prints that
user's home directory. So
home steve

would print
/users/steve

if /users/steve is steve's home directory. (Hint: Recall that the home directory is the sixth
field stored in the file /etc/passwd.)
6: Write a program called suffix that renames a file by adding the characters given as the second
argument to the end of the name of the file given as the first argument. So

Passing Arguments

110

suffix memo1 .sv

should rename memo1 to memo1.sv.

7: Write a program called unsuffix that removes the characters given as the second argument
from the end of the name of the file given as the first argument. So
unsuffix memo1.sv .sv

should rename memo1.sv to memo1. Be sure that the characters are removed from the end, so
unsuffix test1test test

should result in test1test being renamed to test1. (Hint: Use sed and command substitution.)

111

Chapter 8. Decisions, Decisions

IN THIS CHAPTER

Exit Status
The test Command
The else Construct
The exit Command

The elif Construct

The case Command
The Null Command :
The && and || Constructs
Exercises

This chapter introduces a statement that is present in almost all programming languages: if. It
enables you to test a condition and then change the flow of program execution based on the result
of the test.
The general format of the if command is
if commandt
then
command
command
...
fi

where commandt is executed and its exit status is tested. If the exit status is zero, the commands
that follow between the then and the fi are executed; otherwise, they are skipped.

Exit Status
Whenever any program completes execution under the Unix system, it returns an exit status back
to the system. This status is a number that usually indicates whether the program successfully ran.
By convention, an exit status of zero indicates that a program succeeded, and nonzero indicates
that it failed. Failures can be caused by invalid arguments passed to the program, or by an error
condition detected by the program. For example, the cp command returns a nonzero exit status if
the copy fails for some reason (for example, if it can't create the destination file), or if the arguments
aren't correctly specified (for example, wrong number of arguments, or more than two arguments
and the last one isn't a directory). In the case of grep, an exit status of zero (success) is returned
if it finds the specified pattern in at least one of the files; a nonzero value is returned if it can't find
the pattern or if an error occurs (the arguments aren't correctly specified, or it can't open one of the
files).
In a pipeline, the exit status is that of the last command in the pipe. So in

Decisions, Decisions

112

who | grep fred

the exit status of the grep is used by the shell as the exit status for the pipeline. In this case, an
exit status of zero means that fred was found in who's output (that is, fred was logged on at the
time that this command was executed).

The $? Variable
The shell variable $? is automatically set by the shell to the exit status of the last command executed.
Naturally, you can use echo to display its value at the terminal.
$ cp phonebook phone2
$ echo $?
0
Copy "succeeded"
$ cp nosuch backup
cp: cannot access nosuch
$ echo $?
2
Copy "failed"
$ who
See who's logged on
root
console Jul 8 10:06
wilma
tty03
Jul 8 12:36
barney tty04
Jul 8 14:57
betty
tty15
Jul 8 15:03
$ who | grep barney
barney tty04
Jul 8 14:57
$ echo $?
Print exit status of last command (grep)
0
grep "succeeded"
$ who | grep fred
$ echo $?
1
grep "failed"
$ echo $?
0
Exit status of last echo
$

Note that the numeric result of a failure for some commands can vary from one Unix version to
the next, but success is always signified by a zero exit status.
Let's now write a shell program called on that tells us whether a specified user is logged on to the
system. The name of the user to check will be passed to the program on the command line. If the
user is logged on, we'll print a message to that effect; otherwise we'll say nothing. Here is the program:
$ cat on
#
# determine if someone is logged on
#
user="$1"
if who | grep "$user"
then
echo "$user is logged on"
fi
$

This first argument typed on the command line is stored in the shell variable user. Then the if
command executes the pipeline
who | grep "$user"

Decisions, Decisions

113

and tests the exit status returned by grep. If the exit status is zero, grep found user in who's
output. In that case, the echo command that follows is executed. If the exit status is nonzero, the
specified user is not logged on, and the echo command is skipped. The echo command is indented
from the left margin for aesthetic reasons only (tab characters are usually used for such purposes
because it's easier to type a tab character than an equivalent number of spaces). In this case, just
a single command is enclosed between the then and fi. When more commands are included, and
when the nesting gets deeper, indentation can have a dramatic effect on the program's readability.
Later examples will help illustrate this point.
Here are some sample uses of on:
$ who
root
console Jul
barney
tty03
Jul
fred
tty04
Jul
joanne
tty07
Jul
tony
tty19
Jul
lulu
tty23
Jul
$ on tony
tony
tty19
Jul
tony is logged on
$ on steve
$ on ann
joanne
tty07
Jul
ann is logged on
$

8
8
8
8
8
8

10:37
12:38
13:40
09:35
08:30
09:55

8 08:30

We know he's on
Where did this come from?
We know he's not on
Try this one

8 09:35

We seem to have uncovered a couple of problems with the program. When the specified user is
logged on, the corresponding line from who's output is also displayed. This may not be such a bad
thing, but the program requirements called for only a message to be displayed and nothing else.
This line is displayed because not only does grep return an exit status in the pipeline
who | grep "$user"

but it also goes about its normal function of writing any matching lines to standard output, even
though we're really not interested in that. We can dispose of grep's output by redirecting it to the
system's garbage can, /dev/null. This is a special file on the system that anyone can read from
(and get an immediate end of file) or write to. When you write to it, the bits go to that great bit bucket
in the sky!
who | grep "$user" > /dev/null

The second problem with on appears when the program is executed with the argument ann. Even
though ann is not logged on, grep matches the characters ann for the user joanne. What you
need here is a more restrictive pattern specification, which you learned how to do in Chapter 4,
Tools of the Trade, where we talked about regular expressions. Because who lists each username
in column one of each output line, we can anchor the pattern to match the beginning of the line by
preceding the pattern with the character ^:
who | grep "^$user" > /dev/null

But that's not enough. grep still matches a line like

bobby

tty07

Jul 8 09:35

if you ask it to search for the pattern bob. What you need to do is also anchor the pattern on the
right. Realizing that who ends each username with one or more spaces, the pattern

Decisions, Decisions

114

"^$user "

now only matches lines for the specified user.

Let's try the new and improved version of on:
$ cat on
#
# determine if someone is logged on -- version 2
#
user="$1"
if who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
then
echo "$user is logged on"
fi
$ who
Who's on now?
root
console Jul 8 10:37
barney
tty03
Jul 8 12:38
fred
tty04
Jul 8 13:40
joanne
tty07
Jul 8 09:35
tony
tty19
Jul 8 08:30
lulu
tty23
Jul 8 09:55
$ on lulu
lulu is logged on
$ on ann
Try this again
$ on
What happens if we don't give any arguments?
$

If no arguments are specified, user will be null. grep will then look through who's output for lines
that start with a blank (why?). It won't find any, and so just a command prompt will be returned. In
the next section, you'll see how to test whether the correct number of arguments has been supplied
to a program and, if not, take some action.

The test Command

A built-in shell command called test is most often used for testing one or more conditions in an
if command. Its general format is
test expression

where expression represents the condition you're testing. test evaluates expression, and if the
result is true, it returns an exit status of zero; otherwise, the result is false, and it returns a nonzero
exit status.

String Operators
As an example of the use of test, the following command returns a zero exit status if the shell
variable name contains the characters julio:
test "$name" = julio

The = operator is used to test whether two values are identical. In this case, we're testing to see
whether the contents of the shell variable name are identical to the characters julio. If it is,
test returns an exit status of zero; nonzero otherwise.
Note that test must see all operands ($name and julio) and operators (=) as separate arguments, meaning that they must be delimited by one or more whitespace characters.

Decisions, Decisions

115

Getting back to the if command, to echo the message Would you like to play a game? if name
contains the characters julio, you would write your if command like this:
if test "$name" = julio
then
echo "Would you like to play a game?"
fi

(Why is it better to play it safe and enclose the message that is displayed by echo inside quotes?)
When the if command gets executed, the command that follows the if is executed, and its exit
status is tested. The test command is passed the three arguments $name (with its value substituted, of course), =, and julio. test then tests to see whether the first argument is identical to
the third argument and returns a zero exit status if it is and a nonzero exit status if it is not.
The exit status returned by test is then tested. If it's zero, the commands between then and
fi are executed; in this case, the single echo command is executed. If the exit status is nonzero,
the echo command is skipped.
It's good programming practice to enclose shell variables that are arguments to test inside a pair
of double quotes (to allow variable substitution). This ensures that test sees the argument in the
case where its value is null. For example, consider the following example:
$ name=
$ test $name = julio
sh: test: argument expected
$

Set name null

Because name was null, only two arguments were passed to test: = and julio because the shell
substituted the value of name before parsing the command line into arguments. In fact, after
$name was substituted by the shell, it was as if you typed the following:
test = julio

When test executed, it saw only two arguments (see Figure 8.1) and therefore issued the error
message.

Figure 8.1. test $name = julio with name null.

By placing double quotes around the variable, you ensure that test sees the argument because
quotes act as a placeholder when the argument is null.
$ test "$name" = julio
$ echo $?
1
$

Print the exit status

Even if name is null, the shell still passes three arguments to test, the first one null (see Figure 8.2).

Decisions, Decisions

116

Figure 8.2. test $name = julio with name null.

Other operators can be used to test character strings. These operators are summarized in Table 8.1.
Table 8.1. test String Operators
Operator

Returns TRUE (exit status of 0) if

string1 = string2

string1 is identical to string2.

string1 != string2

string1 is not identical to string2.

string

string is not null.

-n string

string is not null (and string must be seen by test).

-z string

string is null (and string must be seen by test).

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

You've seen how the = operator is used. The != operator is similar, only it tests two strings for
inequality. That is, the exit status from test is zero if the two strings are not equal, and nonzero if
they are.
Let's look at three similar examples.
$ day="monday"
$ test "$day" = monday
$ echo $?
0
$

True

The test command returns an exit status of 0 because the value of day is equal to the characters
monday. Now look at the following:
$ day="monday "
$ test "$day" = monday
$ echo $?
1
$

False

Here we assigned the characters mondayincluding the space character that immediately followed
to day. Therefore, when the previous test was made, test returned false because the characters
"monday " were not identical to the characters "monday".
If you wanted these two values to be considered equal, omitting the double quotes would have
caused the shell to eat up the trailing space character, and test would have never seen it:
$ day="monday "
$ test $day = monday
$ echo $?
0
$

True

Although this seems to violate our rule about always quoting shell variables that are arguments to
test, it's okay to omit the quotes if you're sure that the variable is not null (and not composed
entirely of whitespace characters).

Decisions, Decisions

117

You can test to see whether a shell variable has a null value with the third operator listed in Table 8.1:
test "$day"

This returns true if day is not null and false if it is. Quotes are not necessary here because test
doesn't care whether it sees an argument in this case. Nevertheless, you are better off using them
here as well because if the variable consists entirely of whitespace characters, the shell will get rid
of the argument if not enclosed in quotes.
$
$
$
1
$
$
0
$

blanks="
"
test $blanks
echo $?

Is it not null?
Falseit's null
And now?

test "$blanks"
echo $?

Trueit's not null

In the first case, test was not passed any arguments because the shell ate up the four spaces in
blanks. In the second case, test got one argument consisting of four space characters; obviously
not null.
In case we seem to be belaboring the point about blanks and quotes, realize that this is a sticky
area that is a frequent source of shell programming errors. It's good to really understand the principles here to save yourself a lot of programming headaches in the future.
There is another way to test whether a string is null, and that's with either of the last two operators
listed previously in Table 8.1. The -n operator returns an exit status of zero if the argument that
follows is not null. Think of this operator as testing for nonzero length.
The -z operator tests the argument that follows to see whether it is null and returns an exit status
of zero if it is. Think of this operator as testing to see whether the following argument has zero length.
So the command
test -n "$day"

returns an exit status of 0 if day contains at least one character. The command
test -z "$dataflag"

returns an exit status of 0 if dataflag doesn't contain any characters.

Be forewarned that both of the preceding operators expect an argument to follow; therefore, get into
the habit of enclosing that argument inside double quotes.
$
$
$
$
1
$
$
0
$
$
0
$
$
1
$

nullvar=
nonnullvar=abc
test -n "$nullvar"
echo $?
test -n "$nonnullvar"
echo $?
test -z "$nullvar"
echo $?
test -z "$nonnullvar"
echo $?

Does nullvar have nonzero length?

No
And what about nonnullvar?
Yes
Does nullvar have zero length?
Yes
And nonnullvar?
No

Decisions, Decisions

118

Note that test can be picky about its arguments. For example, if the shell variable symbol contains
an equals sign, look at what happens if you try to test it for zero length:
$ echo $symbol
=
$ test -z "$symbol"
sh: test: argument expected
$

The = operator has higher precedence than the -z operator, so test expects an argument to follow.
To avoid this sort of problem, you can write your command as
test X"$symbol" = X

which will be true if symbol is null, and false if it's not. The X in front of symbol prevents test from
interpreting the characters stored in symbol as an operator.

An Alternative Format for test

The test command is used so often by shell programmers that an alternative format of the command is recognized. This format improves the readability of the command, especially when used in
if commands.
You'll recall that the general format of the test command is
test expression

This can also be expressed in the alternative format as

[ expression ]

The [ is actually the name of the command (who said anything about command names having to
be alphanumeric characters?). It still initiates execution of the same test command, only in this
format, test expects to see a closing ] at the end of the expression. Naturally, spaces must appear
after the [ and before the ].
You can rewrite the test command shown in a previous example with this alternative format as
shown:
$ [ -z "$nonnullvar" ]
$ echo $?
1
$

When used in an if command, this alternative format looks like this:

if [ "$name" = julio ]
then
echo "Would you like to play a game?"
fi

Which format of the if command you use is up to you; we prefer the [...] format, so that's what
we'll use throughout the remainder of the book.

Integer Operators
test has an assortment of operators for performing integer comparisons. Table 8.2 summarizes
these operators.

Decisions, Decisions

119

Table 8.2. test Integer Operators

Operator

Returns TRUE (exit status of 0) if

int1 -eq int2

int1 is equal to int2.

int1 -ge int2

int1 is greater than or equal to int2.

int1 -gt int2

int1 is greater than int2.

int1 -le int2

int1 is less than or equal to int2.

int1 -lt int2

int1 is less than int2.

int1 -ne int2

int1 is not equal to int2.

For example, the operator -eq tests to see whether two integers are equal. So if you had a shell
variable called count and you wanted to see whether its value was equal to zero, you would write
[ "$count" -eq 0 ]

Other integer operators behave similarly, so

[ "$choice" -lt 5 ]

tests to see whether the variable choice is less than 5; the command
[ "$index" -ne "$max" ]

tests to see whether the value of index is not equal to the value of max; and, finally
[ "$#" -ne 0 ]

tests to see whether the number of arguments passed to the command is not equal to zero.
The test command interprets the value as an integer when an integer operator is used, and not
the shell, so these comparisons work regardless of the shell variable's type.
Let's reinforce the difference between test's string and integer operators by taking a look at a few
examples.
$
$
$
$
1
$
$
0
$
$
1
$
$
0
$

x1="005"
x2=" 10"
[ "$x1" = 5 ]
echo $?
[ "$x1" -eq 5 ]
echo $?
[ "$x2" = 10 ]
echo $?
[ "$x2" -eq 10 ]
echo $?

String comparison
False
Integer comparison
True
String comparison
False
Integer comparison
True

The first test

[ "$x1" = 5 ]

uses the string comparison operator = to test whether the two strings are identical. They're not,
because the first string is composed of the three characters 005, and the second the single character
5.

Decisions, Decisions

120

In the second test, the integer comparison operator -eq is used. Treating the two values as integers,
005 is equal to 5, as verified by the exit status returned by test.
The third and fourth tests are similar, only in this case you can see how even a leading space stored
in the variable x2 can influence a test made with a string operator versus one made with an integer
operator.

File Operators
Virtually every shell program deals with one or more files. For this reason, a wide assortment of
operators is provided by test to enable you to ask various questions about files. Each of these
operators is unary in nature, meaning that they expect a single argument to follow. In all cases, this
argument is the name of a file (and that includes a directory file, of course).
Table 8.3 lists the commonly used file operators.
Table 8.3. Commonly Used test File Operators
Operator

Returns TRUE (exit status of 0) if

-d file

file is a directory.

-e file

file exists.

-f file

file is an ordinary file.

-r file

file is readable by the process.

-s file

file has nonzero length.

-w file

file is writable by the process.

-x file

file is executable.

-L file

file is a symbolic link.

The command
[ -f /users/steve/phonebook ]

tests whether the file /users/steve/phonebook exists and is an ordinary file (that is, not a directory and not a special file).
The command
[ -r /users/steve/phonebook ]

tests whether the indicated file exists and is also readable by you.
The command
[ -s /users/steve/phonebook ]

tests whether the indicated file contains at least one byte of information in it. This is useful, for
example, if you create an error log file in your program and you want to see whether anything was
written to it:
if [ -s $ERRFILE ]
then
echo "Errors found:"
cat $ERRFILE
fi

A few more test operators, when combined with the previously described operators, enable you
to make more complex types of tests.

Decisions, Decisions

121

The Logical Negation Operator !

The unary logical negation operator ! can be placed in front of any other test expression to
negate the result of the evaluation of that expression. For example,
[ ! -r /users/steve/phonebook ]

returns a zero exit status (true) if /users/steve/phonebook is not readable; and

[ ! -f "$mailfile" ]

returns true if the file specified by $mailfile does not exist or is not an ordinary file. Finally,
[ ! "$x1" = "$x2" ]

returns true if $x1 is not identical to $x2 and is obviously equivalent to

[ "$x1" != "$x2" ]

The Logical AND Operator a

The operator -a performs a logical AND of two expressions and returns true only if the two joined
expressions are both true. So
[ -f "$mailfile"

-a

-r "$mailfile" ]

returns true if the file specified by $mailfile is an ordinary file and is readable by you. An extra
space was placed around the -a operator to aid in the expression's readability and obviously has
no effect on its execution.
The command
[ "$count" -ge 0

-a

"$count" -lt 10 ]

will be true if the variable count contains an integer value greater than or equal to zero but less
than 10. The -a operator has lower precedence than the integer comparison operators (and the
string and file operators, for that matter), meaning that the preceding expression gets evaluated as
("$count" -ge 0) -a ("$count" -lt 10)

as you would expect.

Parentheses
Incidentally, you can use parentheses in a test expression to alter the order of evaluation; just
make sure that the parentheses are quoted because they have a special meaning to the shell. So
to translate the preceding example into a test command, you would write
[ $ "$count" -ge 0 $ -a $ "$count" -lt 10 $ ]

As is typical, spaces must surround the parentheses because test expects to see them as separate
arguments.

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122

The Logical OR Operator o

The -o operator is similar to the -a operator, only it forms a logical OR of two expressions. That is,
evaluation of the expression will be true if either the first expression is true or the second expression
is true.
[ -n "$mailopt" -o -r $HOME/mailfile ]

This command will be true if the variable mailopt is not null or if the file $HOME/mailfile is
readable by you.
The -o operator has lower precedence than the -a operator, meaning that the expression
"$a" -eq 0

-o

"$b" -eq 2

-a

"$c" -eq 10

gets evaluated by test as

"$a" -eq 0

-o

("$b" -eq 2

-a

"$c" -eq 10)

Naturally, you can use parentheses to change this order if necessary:

\( "$a" -eq 0

-o

"$b" -eq 2 \) -a "$c" -eq 10

You will see many uses of the test command throughout the book. Table A.11 in Appendix A,
Shell Summary, summarizes all available test operators.

The else Construct

A construct known as the else can be added to the if command, with the general format as shown:
if commandt
then
command
command
...
else
command
command
...
fi

Execution of this form of the command starts as before; commandt is executed and its exit status
tested. If it's zero, the commands that follow between the then and the else are executed, and
the commands between the else and fi are skipped. Otherwise, the exit status is nonzero and
the commands between the then and else are skipped and the commands between the else and
fi are executed. In either case, only one set of commands gets executed: the first set if the exit
status is zero, and the second set if it's nonzero.
Let's now write a modified version of on. Instead of printing nothing if the requested user is not
logged on, we'll have the program print a message to that effect. Here is version 3 of the program:
$ cat on
#
# determine if someone is logged on -- version 3
#
user="$1"
if who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
then
echo "$user is logged on"

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123

else
echo "$user is not logged on"
fi
$

If the user specified as the first argument to on is logged on, the grep will succeed and the message
$user is logged on will be displayed; otherwise, the message $user is not logged on
will be displayed.
$ who
root
console Jul
barney
tty03
Ju1
fred
tty04
Jul
joanne
tty07
Jul
tony
tty19
Jul
lulu
tty23
Jul
$ on pat
pat is not logged on
$ on tony
tony is logged on
$

Who's on?
8
8
8
8
8
8

10:37
12:38
13:40
09:35
08:30
09:55

Another nice touch when writing shell programs is to make sure that the correct number of arguments
is passed to the program. If an incorrect number is supplied, an error message to that effect can be
displayed, together with information on the proper usage of the program.
$ cat on
#
# determine if someone is logged on -- version 4
#
#
# see if the correct number of arguments were supplied
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: on user"
else
user="$1"
if who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
then
echo "$user is logged on"
else
echo "$user is not logged on"
fi
fi
$

Compare this program with the previous version and note the changes that were made. An additional
if command was added to test whether the correct number of arguments was supplied. If $# is not
equal to 1, the program prints two messages; otherwise, the commands after the else clause are
executed. These commands are the same as appeared in the last version of on: They assign $1 to
user and then see whether user is logged on, printing a message in either case. Note that two
fis are required because two if commands are used.
The indentation used goes a long way toward aiding the program's readability. Make sure that you
get into the habit of setting and following indentation rules in your programs.
$ on
Incorrect number of arguments
Usage: on user
$ on priscilla
priscilla is not logged on

No arguments
One argument

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$ on jo anne
Incorrect number of arguments
Usage: on user
$

124
Two arguments

The exit Command

A built-in shell command called exit enables you to immediately terminate execution of your shell
program. The general format of this command is
exit n

where n is the exit status that you want returned. If none is specified, the exit status used is that of
the last command executed before the exit.
Be advised that executing the exit command directly from your terminal will log you off the system
because it will have the effect of terminating execution of your login shell.

A Second Look at the rem Program

exit is frequently used as a convenient way to terminate execution of a shell program. For example,
let's take another look at the rem program, which removes an entry from the phonebook file:
$ cat rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book
#
grep -v "$1" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook
mv /tmp/phonebook phonebook
$

This program has the potential to do unintended things to the phonebook file. For example, suppose
that you type
rem Susan Topple

Here the shell will pass two arguments to rem. The rem program will end up removing all Susan
entries, as specified by $1.
It's always best to take precautions with a potentially destructive program like rem and to be certain
as possible that the action intended by the user is consistent with the action that the program is
taking.
One of the first checks that can be made in rem is for the correct number of arguments, as was
done before with the on program. This time, we'll use the exit command to terminate the program
if the correct number of arguments isn't supplied:
$ cat rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book -- version 2
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments."
echo "Usage: rem name"
exit 1
fi
grep -v "$1" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook

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mv /tmp/phonebook phonebook
$ rem Susan Goldberg
Incorrect number of arguments.
Usage: rem name
$

125
Try it out

The exit command returns an exit status of 1, to signal failure, in case some other program wants
to check it. How could you have written the preceding program with an if-else instead of using
the exit (hint: look at the last version of on)?
Whether you use the exit or an if-else is up to you. Sometimes the exit is a more convenient
way to get out of the program quickly, particularly if it's done early in the program.

The elif Construct

As your programs become more complex, you may find yourself needing to write nested if statements of the following form:
if command1
then
command
command
...
else
if command2
then
command
command
...
else
...
if commandn
then
command
command
...
else
command
command
...
fi
...
fi
fi

This type of command sequence is useful when you need to make more than just a two-way decision
as afforded by the if-else construct. In this case, a multiway decision is made, with the last
else clause executed if none of the preceding conditions is satisfied.
As an example, suppose that you wanted to write a program called greetings that would print a
friendly Good morning, Good afternoon, or Good evening whenever you logged on to the system. For purposes of the example, consider any time from midnight to noon to be the morning, noon
to 6:00 p.m. the afternoon, and 6:00 p.m. to midnight the evening.
To write this program, you have to find out what time it is. date serves just fine for this purpose.
Take another look at the output from this command:
$ date
Wed Aug 29 10:42:01 EDT 2002
$

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126

The format of date's output is fixed, a fact that you can use to your advantage when writing
greetings because this means that the time will always appear in character positions 12 through
19. Actually, for this program, you really only need the hour displayed in positions 12 and 13. So to
get the hour from date, you can write
$ date | cut -c12-13
10
$

Now the task of writing the greetings program is straightforward:

$ cat greetings
#
# Program to print a greeting
#
hour=$(date | cut -c12-13)

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

if [ "$hour" -ge 0 -a "$hour" -le 11 ]

then
echo "Good morning"
else
if [ "$hour" -ge 12 -a "$hour" -le 17 ]
then
echo "Good afternoon"
else
echo "Good evening"
fi
fi
$

If hour is greater than or equal to 0 (midnight) and less than or equal to 11 (up to 11:59:59), Good
morning is displayed. If hour is greater than or equal to 12 (noon) and less than or equal to 17 (up
to 5:59:59 p.m.), Good afternoon is displayed. If neither of the preceding two conditions is satisfied,
Good evening is displayed.
$ greetings
Good morning
$

As noted, the nested if command sequence used in greetings is so common that a special
elif construct is available to more easily express this sequence. The general format of this construct is
if commandl
then
command
command
...
elif command2
then
command
command
...
elif commandn
then
command
command
...
else
command
command
...
fi

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127

command1, command2, ..., commandn are executed in turn and their exit statuses tested. As soon
as one returns an exit status of zero, the commands listed after the then that follows are executed
up to another elif, else, or fi. If none of the commands returns a zero exit status, the commands
listed after the optional else are executed.
You could rewrite the greetings program using this new format as shown:
$ cat greetings
#
# Program to print a greeting -- version 2
#
hour=$(date | cut -c12-13)
if [ "$hour" -ge 0
then
echo "Good
elif [ "$hour" -ge
then
echo "Good
else
echo "Good
fi
$

-a "$hour" -le 11 ]
morning"
12 -a "$hour" -le 17 ]
afternoon"
evening"

This version is easier to read, and it doesn't have the tendency to disappear off the right margin due
to excessive indentation. Incidentally, you should note that date provides a wide assortment of
options. One of these, %H, can be used to get the hour directly from date:
$ date +%H
10
$

As an exercise, you should change greetings to make use of this fact.

Yet Another Version of rem

Another way to add some robustness to the rem program would be to check the number of entries
that matched before doing the removal. If there's more than one match, you could issue a message
to the effect and then terminate execution of the program. But how do you determine the number
of matching entries? One approach is to do a normal grep on the phonebook file and then count
the number of matches that come out with wc. If the number of matches is greater than one, the
appropriate message can be issued.
$ cat rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book -- version 3
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments."
echo "Usage: rem name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
#
# Find number of matching entries
#
matches=$(grep "$name" phonebook | wc l)

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128

#
# If more than one match, issue message, else remove it
#
if [ "$matches" -gt 1 ]
then
echo "More than one match; please qualify further"
elif [ "$matches" -eq 1 ]
then
grep -v "$name" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook
mv /tmp/phonebook phonebook
else
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
$

The positional parameter $1 is assigned to the variable name after the number of arguments check
is performed to add readability to the program. Subsequently using $name is a lot clearer than using
$1.
The if...elif...else command first checks to see whether the number of matches is greater than
one. If it is, the More than one match message is printed. If it's not, a test is made to see whether
the number of matches is equal to one. If it is, the entry is removed from the phone book. If it's not,
the number of matches must be zero, in which case a message is displayed to alert the user of this
fact.
Note that the grep command is used twice in this program: first to determine the number of matches
and then with the -v option to remove the single matching entry.
Here are some sample runs of the third version of rem:
$ rem
Incorrect number of arguments.
Usage: rem name
$ rem Susan
More than one match; please qualify further
$ rem 'Susan Topple'
$ rem 'Susan Topple'
I couldn't find Susan Topple in the phone book
$

She's history

Now you have a fairly robust rem program: It checks for the correct number of arguments, printing
the proper usage if the correct number isn't supplied; it also checks to make sure that precisely one
entry is removed from the phonebook file.

The case Command

The case command allows you to compare a single value against other values and to execute one
or more commands when a match is found. The general format of this command is
case value in
pat1)
command
command
...
command;;
pat2)
command
command
...
command;;
...
patn)
command

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129

command
...
command;;
esac

The word value is successively compared against the values pat1, pat2, ..., patn, until a match is
found. When a match is found, the commands listed after the matching value, up to the double
semicolons, are executed. After the double semicolons are reached, execution of the case is terminated. If a match is not found, none of the commands listed in the case is executed.
As an example of the use of the case, the following program called number takes a single digit and
translates it to its English equivalent:
$ cat number
#
# Translate a digit to English
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Usage: number digit"
exit 1
fi
case "$1"
in
0)
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
9)
esac
$

echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
echo
echo

zero;;
one;;
two;;
three;;
four;;
five;;
six;;
seven;;
eight;;
nine;;

Now to test it:

$ number 0
zero
$ number 3
three
$ number
Usage: number digit
$ number 17
$

Try no arguments
Try a two-digit number

The last case shows what happens when you type in more than one digit: $1 doesn't match any of
the values listed in the case, so none of the echo commands is executed.

Special Pattern Matching Characters

The shell lets you use the same special characters for specifying the patterns in a case as you can
with filename substitution. That is, ? can be used to specify any single character; * can be used to
specify zero or more occurrences of any character; and [...] can be used to specify any single
character enclosed between the brackets.

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130

Because the pattern * matches anything (just as when it's used for filename substitution it matches
all the files in your directory), it's frequently used at the end of the case as the catchall value. That
is, if none of the previous values in the case match, this one is guaranteed to match. Here's a second
version of the number program that has such a catchall case.
$ cat number
#
# Translate a digit to English -- version 2
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Usage: number digit"
exit 1
fi
case "$1"
in
0) echo zero;;
1) echo one;;
2) echo two;;
3) echo three;;
4) echo four;;
5) echo five;;
6) echo six;;
7) echo seven;;
8) echo eight;;
9) echo nine;;
*) echo "Bad argument; please specify a single digit";;
esac
$ number 9
nine
$ number 99
Bad argument; please specify a single digit
$

Here's another program called ctype that prints the type of the single character given as an argument. Character types recognized are digits, uppercase letters, lowercase letters, and special characters (anything not in the first three categories). As an added check, the program makes sure that
just a single character is given as the argument.
$ cat ctype
#
# Classify character given as argument
#
if [ $# -ne 1 ]
then
echo Usage: ctype char
exit 1
fi
#
# Ensure that only one character was typed
#
char="$1"
numchars=$(echo "$char" | wc c)
if [ "$numchars" -ne 1 ]
then
echo Please type a single character
exit 1
fi
#
# Now classify it

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131

#
case "$char"
in
[0-9]
[a-z]
[A-Z]
*
esac
$

)
)
)
)

echo
echo
echo
echo

digit;;
lowercase letter;;
uppercase letter;;
special character;;

Some sample runs:

$ ctype a
Please type a single character
$ ctype 7
Please type a single character
$

The -x Option for Debugging Programs

Something seems to be amiss. The counting portion of our program doesn't seem to be working
properly. This seems like a good point to introduce the shell's -x option. You can trace the execution
of any program by typing sh -x followed by the name of the program and its arguments. This starts
up a new shell to execute the indicated program with the -x option enabled. In this mode, commands
are printed at the terminal as they are executed, preceded by a plus sign. Let's try it out.
$ sh -x ctype a
Trace execution
+ [ 1 -ne 1 ]
$# equals 1
+ char=a
Assignment of $1 to char
+ echo a
+ wc c
+ numchars=
2
wc returned 2???
+ [
2 -ne 1 ]
That's why this test succeeded
+ echo please type a single character
please type a single character
+ exit 1
$

The trace output indicates that wc returned 2 when

echo "$char" | wc -c

was executed. But why? There seemed to be only one character in wc's input. The truth of the matter
is that two characters were actually given to wc: the single character a and the invisible newline
character that echo automatically prints at the end of each line. So the program really should be
testing for the number of characters equal to two: the character typed plus the newline added by
echo.
Go back to the ctype program and replace the if command that reads
if [ "$numchars" -ne 1 ]
then
echo Please type a single character
exit 1
fi

with

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132

if [ "$numchars" -ne 2 ]
then
echo Please type a single character
exit 1
fi

and try it again.

$ ctype a
lowercase letter
$ ctype abc
Please type a single character
$ ctype 9
digit
$ ctype K
uppercase letter
$ ctype :
special character
$ ctype
Usage: ctype char
$

Now it seems to work just fine. (What do you think happens if you use ctype * without enclosing
the * in quotes?)
In Chapter 12, More on Parameters, you'll learn how you can turn this trace feature on and off at
will from inside your program.
Before leaving the ctype program, here's a version that avoids the use of wc and handles everything with the case:
$ cat ctype
#
# Classify character given as argument -- version 2
#
if [ $# -ne 1 ]
then
echo Usage: ctype char
exit 1
fi
#
# Now classify char, making sure only one was typed
#
char=$1
case "$char"
in
[0-9]
[a-z]
[A-Z]
?
*
esac
$

)
)
)
)
)

echo
echo
echo
echo
echo

digit;;
lowercase letter;;
uppercase letter;;
special character;;
Please type a single character;;

The ? matches any single character. If this pattern is matched, the character is a special character.
If this pattern isn't matched, more than one character was typed, so the catchall case is executed
to print the message.

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133

$ ctype u
lowercase letter
$ ctype '>'
special character
$ ctype xx
Please type a single character
$

Back to the case

The symbol | has the effect of a logical OR when used between two patterns. That is, the pattern
pat1 | pat2

specifies that either pat1 or pat2 is to be matched. For example,

-l | -list

matches either the value -l or -list, and

dmd | 5620 | tty5620

matches either dmd or 5620 or tty5620.

The greetings program that you saw earlier in this chapter can be rewritten to use a case statement rather than the if-elif. Here is such a version of the program. This time, we took advantage
of the fact that date with the +%H option writes a two-digit hour to standard output.
$ cat greetings
#
# Program to print a greeting -- case version
#
hour=$(date +%H)
case "$hour"
in
0? | 1[01] ) echo "Good morning";;
1[2-7]
) echo "Good afternoon";;
*
) echo "Good evening";;
esac
$

The two-digit hour obtained from date is assigned to the shell variable hour. Then the case statement is executed. The value of hour is compared against the first pattern:
0? | 1[01]

which matches any value that starts with a zero followed by any character (midnight through 9:00
a.m.), or any value that starts with a one and is followed by a zero or one (10:00 or 11:00 a.m.).
The second pattern
1[2-7]

matches a value that starts with a one and is followed by any one of the digits two through seven
(noon through 5:00 p.m.).
The last case, the catchall, matches anything else (6:00 p.m. through 11:00 p.m.).

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134

$ date
Wed Aug 28 15:45:12 EDT 2002
$ greetings
Good afternoon
$

The Null Command :

This seems about as good a time as any to talk about the shell's built-in null command. The format
of this command is simply
:

and the purpose of it isyou guessed itto do nothing. So what good is it? Well, in most cases it's
used to satisfy the requirement that a command appear, particularly in if commands. Suppose that
you want to make sure that the value stored in the variable system exists in the file /users/
steve/mail/systems, and if it doesn't, you want to issue an error message and exit from the
program. So you start by writing something like
if grep "^$system" /users/steve/mail/systems > /dev/null
then

but you don't know what to write after the then because you want to test for the nonexistence of
the system in the file and don't want to do anything special if the grep succeeds. Unfortunately, the
shell requires that you write a command after the then. Here's where the null command comes to
the rescue:
if grep "^$system" /users/steve/mail/systems > /dev/null
then
:
else
echo "$system is not a valid system"
exit 1
fi

So if the system is valid, nothing is done. If it's not valid, the error message is issued and the program
exited.
Remember this simple command when these types of situations arise.

The && and || Constructs

The shell has two special constructs that enable you to execute a command based on whether the
preceding command succeeds or fails. In case you think this sounds similar to the if command,
well it is. It's sort of a shorthand form of the if.
If you write
commandl && command2

anywhere where the shell expects to see a command, commandl will be executed, and if it returns
an exit status of zero, command2 will be executed. If commandl returns an exit status of nonzero,
command2 gets skipped.
For example, if you write
sort bigdata > /tmp/sortout && mv /tmp/sortout bigdata

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135

then the mv command will be executed only if the sort is successful. Note that this is equivalent to
writing
if sort bigdata > /tmp/sortout
then
mv /tmp/sortout bigdata
fi

The command
[ -z "$EDITOR" ] && EDITOR=/bin/ed

tests the value of the variable EDITOR. If it's null, /bin/ed is assigned to it.
The || construct works similarly, except that the second command gets executed only if the exit
status of the first is nonzero. So if you write
grep "$name" phonebook || echo "Couldn't find $name"

the echo command will get executed only if the grep fails (that is, if it can't find $name in phonebook, or if it can't open the file phonebook). In this case, the equivalent if command would look like
if grep "$name" phonebook
then
:
else
echo "Couldn't find $name"
fi

You can write a pipeline on either the left- or right-hand sides of these constructs. On the left, the
exit status tested is that of the last command in the pipeline; thus
who | grep "^$name " > /dev/null || echo "$name's not logged on"

causes execution of the echo if the grep fails.

The && and || can also be combined on the same command line:
who | grep "^$name " > /dev/null && echo "$name's not logged on" \
|| echo "$name is logged on"

(Recall that when \is used at the end of the line, it signals line continuation to the shell.) The first
echo gets executed if the grep succeeds; the second if it fails.
These constructs are also often used in if commands:
if validsys "$sys" && timeok
then
sendmail "$user@$sys" < $message
fi

If validsys returns an exit status of zero, timeok is executed. The exit status from this program
is then tested for the if. If it's zero, then the sendmail program is executed. If validsys returns
a nonzero exit status, timeok is not executed, and this is used as the exit status that is tested by
the if. In that case, sendmail won't be executed.
The use of the && operator in the preceding case is like a logical AND; both programs must return
an exit status of zero for the sendmail program to be executed. In fact, you could have even written
the preceding if as
validsys "$sys" && timeok && sendmail "$user@$sys" < $message

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136

When the || is used in an if, the effect is like a logical OR:

if endofmonth || specialrequest
then
sendreports
fi

If endofmonth returns a zero exit status, sendreports is executed; otherwise, specialrequest is executed and if its exit status is zero, sendreports is executed. The net effect is that
sendreports is executed if endofmonth or specialrequest return an exit status of zero.
In Chapter 9, 'Round and 'Round She Goes, you'll learn about how to write loops in your programs.
However, before proceeding to that chapter, try the exercises that follow.

Exercises

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

1: Write a program called valid that prints yes if its argument is a valid shell variable name and
no otherwise:
$ valid foo_bar
yes
$ valid 123
no
$

(Hint: Define a regular expression for a valid variable name and then enlist the aid of grep or
sed.)
2: Write a program called t that displays the time of day in a.m. or p.m. notation rather than in 24hour clock time. Here's an example showing t run at night:
$ date
Wed Aug 28 19:34:01 EDT 2002
$ t
7:21 pm
$

Use the shell's built-in integer arithmetic to convert from 24-hour clock time. Then rewrite the
program to use a case command instead. Rewrite it again to perform arithmetic with the expr
command.
3: Write a program called mysed that applies the sed script given as the first argument against the
file given as the second. If the sed succeeds (that is, exit status of zero), replace the original file
with the modified one. So
mysed '1,10d' text

will use sed to delete the first 10 lines from text, and, if successful, will replace text with the
modified file.
4: Write a program called isyes that returns an exit status of 0 if its argument is yes, and 1
otherwise. For purposes of this exercise, consider y, yes, Yes, YES, and Y all to be valid yes
arguments:

Decisions, Decisions
$
$
0
$
$
1
$

137

isyes yes
echo $?
isyes no
echo $?

Write the program using an if command and then rewrite it using a case command. This program can be useful when reading yes/no responses from the terminal (which you'll learn about
in Chapter 10, Reading and Printing Data).
5: Use the date and who commands to write a program called conntime that prints the number
of hours and minutes that a user has been logged on to the system (assume that this is less than
24 hours).

138

Chapter 9. 'Round and 'Round She Goes

IN THIS CHAPTER

The for Command

The until Command
More on Loops
The getopts Command
Exercises

In this chapter you'll learn how to set up program loops. These loops will enable you to execute
repeatedly a set of commands either a specified number of times or until some condition is met. The
three built-in looping commands are
for
while
until
You'll learn about each one of these loops in separate sections of this chapter.

The for Command

The for command is used to execute a set of commands a specified number of times. Its basic
format is as shown:
for var in word1 word2 ... wordn
do
command
command
...
done

The commands enclosed between the do and the done form what's known as the body of the loop.
These commands are executed for as many words as you have listed after the in. When the loop
is executed, the first word, word1, is assigned to the variable var, and the body of the loop is then
executed. Next, the second word in the list, word2, is assigned to var, and the body of the loop is
executed. This process continues with successive words in the list being assigned to var and the
commands in the loop body being executed until the last word in the list, wordn, is assigned to var
and the body of the loop executed. At that point, no words are left in the list, and execution of the
for command is then finished. Execution then continues with the command that immediately follows
the done. So if there are n words listed after the in, the body of the loop will have been executed
a total of n times after the loop has finished.
Here's a loop that will be executed a total of three times:

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139

for i in 1 2 3
do
echo $i
done

To try it out, you can type this in directly at the terminal, just like any other shell command:
$ for i in 1 2 3
> do
>
echo $i
> done
1
2
3
$

While the shell is waiting for the done to be typed to close off the for command, it displays your
secondary command prompt. When it gets the done, the shell then proceeds to execute the loop.
Because three words are listed after the in (1, 2, and 3), the body of the loopin this case a single
echo commandwill be executed a total of three times.
The first time through the loop, the first word in the list, 1, is assigned to the variable i. Then the
body of the loop is executed. This displays the value of i at the terminal. Then the next word in the
list, 2, is assigned to i and the echo command re-executed, resulting in the display of 2 at the
terminal. The third word in the list, 3, is assigned to i the third time through the loop and the
echo command executed. This results in 3 being displayed at the terminal. At that point, no more
words are left in the list, so execution of the for command is then complete, and the shell displays
your command prompt to let you know it's done.
Recall the run program from Chapter 7, Passing Arguments, that enabled you to run a file through
tbl, nroff, and lp:
$ cat run
tbl $1 | nroff -mm -Tlp | lp
$

If you wanted to run the files memo1 through memo4 through this program, you could type the following at the terminal:
$ for file in
> do
>
run
> done
request id is
request id is
request id is
request id is
$

memo1 memo2 memo3 memo4

$file
laser1-33
laser1-34
laser1-35
laser1-36

(standard
(standard
(standard
(standard

input)
input)
input)
input)

The four words memo1, memo2, memo3, and memo4 will be assigned to the variable file in order,
and the run program will be executed with the value of this variable as the argument. Execution
will be just as if you typed in the four commands:
$ run memo1
request id is
$ run memo2
request id is
$ run memo3
request id is
$ run memo4
request id is
$

laser1-33 (standard input)

laser1-34 (standard input)
laser1-35 (standard input)
laser1-36 (standard input)

'Round and 'Round She Goes

140

Incidentally, the shell permits filename substitution in the list of words in the for, meaning that the
previous loop could have also been written this way:
for file in memo[1-4]
do
run $file
done

And if you wanted to run all the files in your current directory through run, you could type
for file in *
do
run $file
done

If the file filelist contains a list of the files that you want to run through run, you can type
files=$(cat filelist)
for file in $files
do
run $file
done

to run each of the files, or, more succinctly,

for file in $(cat filelist)
do
run $file
done

If you found that you were using the run program often to process several files at once, you could
go inside the run program and modify it to allow any number of files to be passed as arguments to
the program.
$ cat run
#
# process files through nroff -- version 2
#
for file in $*
do
tbl $file | nroff -rom -Tlp | lp
done
$

Recall that the special shell variable $* stands for all the arguments typed on the command line.
So if you executed the new version of run by typing
run memo1 memo2 memo3 memo4

the $* in the for's list would be replaced by the four arguments memo1, memo2, memo3, and
memo4. Of course, you could also type
run memo[1-4]

to achieve the same results.

The $@ Variable
While we're on the subject of $*, let's look at it in a bit more detail. We'll write a program called
args that displays all the arguments typed on the command line, one per line.

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141

$ cat args
echo Number of arguments passed is $#
for arg in $*
do
echo $arg
done
$

Now to try it:

$ args
Number
a
b
c
$ args
Number
a
b
c
$

a b c
of arguments passed is 3

'a b' c
of arguments passed is 2

In the second case, even though a b was passed as a single argument to args, the $* in the
for command was replaced by the shell with a b c, which is three words. Thus the loop was
executed three times.
Whereas the shell replaces the value of $* with $1, $2, ..., if you instead use the special shell
variable "$@" it will be replaced with "$1", "$2", ... . The double quotes are necessary around
$@ because without them this variable behaves just like $*.
Go back to the args program and replace the $* with "$@":
$ cat args
echo Number of arguments passed is $#
for arg in "$@"
do
echo $arg
done
$

Now try it:

$ args
Number
a
b
c
$ args
Number
a b
c
$ args
Number
$

a b c
of arguments passed is 3

'a b' c
of arguments passed is 2
Try it with no arguments
of arguments passed is 0

In the last case, no arguments were passed to the program. So the variable "$@" was replaced by
nothing. The net result is that the body of the loop was not executed at all.

The for Without the List

A special notation is recognized by the shell when writing for commands. If you write

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142

for var
do
command
command
...
done

(note the absence of the in), the shell automatically sequences through all the arguments typed on
the command line, just as if you had written
for var in "$@"
do
command
command
...
done

Here's the third and last version of the args program:

$ cat args
echo Number of arguments passed is $#
for arg
do
echo $arg
done
$ args
Number
a
b
c
$ args
Number
a b
c
$

a b c
of arguments passed is 3

'a b' c
of arguments passed is 2

The while Command

The second type of looping command to be described in this chapter is the while. The format of
this command is
while commandt
do
command
command
...
done

commandt is executed and its exit status tested. If it's zero, the commands enclosed between the
do and done are executed. Then commandt is executed again and its exit status tested. If it's zero,
the commands enclosed between the do and done are once again executed. This process continues until commandt returns a nonzero exit status. At that point, execution of the loop is terminated.
Execution then proceeds with the command that follows the done.
Note that the commands between the do and done might never be executed if commandt returns
a nonzero exit status the first time it's executed.
Here's a program called twhile that simply counts to 5:
$ cat twhile
i=1
while [ "$i" -le 5 ]
do

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143

echo $i
i=$((i + 1))
done
$ twhile
1
2
3
4
5
$

Run it

The variable i is used as the counting variable and is initially set equal to 1. Then the while loop
is entered. It continues execution as long as i is less than or equal to 5. Inside the loop, the value
of i is displayed at the terminal. Then it is incremented by one.
The while loop is often used in conjunction with the shift command to process a variable number
of arguments typed on the command line. The next program, called prargs, prints each of the
command-line arguments one per line.
$ cat prargs
#
# Print command line arguments one per line
#
while [ "$#" -ne 0 ]
do
echo "$1"
shift
done
$ prargs a b c
a
b
c
$ prargs 'a b' c
a b
c
$ prargs *
addresses
intro
lotsaspaces
names
nu
numbers
phonebook
stat
$ prargs
No arguments
$

While the number of arguments is not equal to zero, the value of $1 is displayed and then a
shift executed. Recall that this shifts down the variables (that is, $2 to $1, $3 to $2, and so on)
and also decrements $#. When the last argument has been displayed and shifted out, $# will equal
zero, at which point execution of the while will be terminated. Note that if no arguments are given
to prargs (as was done in the last case), the echo and shift are never executed because $# is
equal to zero as soon as the loop is entered.

The until Command

The while command continues execution as long as the command listed after the while returns
a zero exit status. The until command is similar to the while, only it continues execution as long
as the command that follows the until returns a nonzero exit status. As soon as a zero exit status
is returned, the loop is terminated. Here is the general format of the until:

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144

until commandt
do
command
command
...
done

Like the while, the commands between the do and done might never be executed if commandt
returns a zero exit status the first time it's executed.
The until command is useful for writing programs that wait for a particular event to occur. For
example, suppose that you want to see whether sandy is logged on because you have to give her
something important. You could send her electronic mail, but you know that she usually doesn't get
around to reading her mail until late in the day. One approach is to use the on program from Chapter
8, Decisions, Decisions, to see whether sandy's logged on:
$ on sandy
sandy is not logged on
$

You could execute this program periodically throughout the day, until sandy eventually logs on, or
you could write your own program to continually check until she does. Let's call the program mon
and have it take a single argument: the name of the user you want to monitor. Instead of having the
program continually check for that user logging on, we'll have it check only once every minute. To
do this, you have to know about a command called sleep that suspends execution of a program
for a specified number of seconds. So the Unix command (this isn't a shell built-in)
sleep n

suspends execution of the program for n seconds. At the end of that interval, the program resumes
execution where it left offwith the command that immediately follows the sleep.
$ cat mon
#
# Wait until a specified user logs on
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Usage: mon user"
exit 1
fi
user="$1"
#
# Check every minute for user logging on
#
until who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
do
sleep 60
done
#
# When we reach this point, the user has logged on
#
echo "$user has logged on"
$

'Round and 'Round She Goes

145

After checking that one argument was provided, the program assigns $1 to user. Then an
until loop is entered. This loop will be executed until the exit status returned by grep is zero; that
is, until the specified user logs on. As long as the user isn't logged on, the body of the loopthe
sleep commandis executed. This command suspends execution of the program for one minute
(60 seconds). At the end of the minute, the pipeline listed after the until is re-executed and the
process repeated.
When the until loop is exitedsignaling that the monitored user has logged ona message is
displayed at the terminal to that effect.
$ mon sandy
sandy has logged on
$

Time passes

Using the program as shown here is not very practical because it ties up your terminal until
sandy logs on. A better idea is to run mon in the background so that you can use your terminal for
other work:
$ mon sandy &
[1] 4392
$ nroff newmemo
...
sandy has logged on

Run it in the background

Job number and process id
Do other work
Happens sometime later

So now you can do other work and the mon program continues executing in the background until
sandy logs on, or until you log off the system.1
Because mon only checks once per minute for the user's logging on, it won't hog the system's
resources while it's running (an important consideration when submitting programs to the background for execution).
Unfortunately, after the specified user logs on, there's a chance you might miss that one-line message (you may be cating a file and might not even notice it come and go right off your screen). Also
if you're editing a file with a screen editor such as vi when the message comes, it may turn your
screen into a mess, and you still might miss the message. A better alternative to writing the message
to the terminal might be to mail it instead. Actually, you can let the user select his or her preference
by adding an option to the program that, if selected, indicates that the message is to be mailed. If
the option is not selected, the message can be displayed at the terminal.
In the version of mon that follows, a -m option has been added for this purpose:
$ cat mon
#
# Wait until a specified user logs on -- version 2
#
if [ "$1" = -m ]
then
mailopt=TRUE
shift
else
mailopt=FALSE
fi
if [ "$#" -eq 0 -o "$#" -gt 1 ]
then
echo "Usage: mon [-m] user"
echo"
-m means to be informed by mail"

1All your processes are automatically terminated when you log off the system. If you want a program to continue executing after you've logged

off, you can run it with the nohup command, or schedule it to run with at or from the cron. Consult your Unix User's Manual for more details.

'Round and 'Round She Goes

146

exit 1
fi
user="$1"
#
# Check every minute for user logging on
#
until who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
do
sleep 60
done
#
# When we reach this point, the user has logged on
#
if [ "$mailopt" = FALSE ]
then
echo "$user has logged on"
else
echo "$user has logged on" | mail steve
fi
$

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

The first test checks to see whether the -m option was supplied. If it was, the characters TRUE are
assigned to the variable mailopt, and shift is executed to shift out the first argument (moving
the name of the user to be monitored to $1 and decrementing $#). If the -m option wasn't specified
as the first argument, the characters FALSE are assigned to mailopt.
Execution then proceeds as in the previous version. However, this time when the loop is exited a
test is made to see whether the -m option was selected. If it wasn't, the message is written to
standard output; otherwise, it's mailed to steve.
$ mon sandy -m
Usage: mon [-m] user
-m means to be informed by mail
$ mon -m sandy &
[1] 5435
$ vi newmemo
Work continues
...
you have mail
$ mail
From steve Wed Aug 28 17:44:46 EDT 2002
sandy has logged on
?d
$

Of course, we could have written mon to accept the -m option as either the first or second argument,
but that goes against the recommended command syntax standard, which specifies that all options
should precede any other types of arguments on the command line.2
Also note that the old version of mon could have been executed as follows:
$ mon sandy | mail steve &
[1] 5522
$

to achieve the same net result as adding the -m option.

2The

command syntax standard consists of a set of rules as outlined in the Utility Argument Syntax section of the POSIX standard.

'Round and 'Round She Goes

147

Two last points before leaving the discussion of mon: First, you'll probably always want to run this
program in the background. It would be nice if mon itself could take care of that. Later you'll see how
to do it.
Second, the program always sends mail to steve; not very nice if someone else wants to run it. A
better way is to determine the user running the program and then send him or her the mail if the m option is selected. But how do you do that? One way is to execute the who command with the am
i options and get the user name that comes back. This tells you who's logged on to the terminal
that the program was run from. You can then use cut to extract the username from who's output
and use that name as the recipient of the mail. All this can be done in the last if command of
mon if it's changed to read as shown:
if [ "$#" -eq 1 ]
then
echo "$user has logged on"
else
runner=$(who am i | cut -c1-8)
echo "$user has logged on" | mail $runner
fi

Now the program can be run by anyone, and the mail will be properly sent.

More on Loops
Breaking Out of a Loop
Sometimes you may want to make an immediate exit from a loop. To just exit from the loop (and
not from the program), you can use the break command, whose format is simply
break

When the break is executed, control is sent immediately out of the loop, where execution then
continues as normal with the command that follows the done.
The Unix command true serves no purpose but to return an exit status of zero. The command
false also does nothing but return a nonzero exit status. If you write
while true
do
...
done

the while loop will theoretically be executed forever because true always returns a zero exit
status. By the way, the : command also does nothing but return a zero exit status, so an infinite
loop can also be set up with
while :
do
...
done

Because false always returns a nonzero exit status, the loop

until false
do
...
done

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148

will theoretically execute forever.

The break command is often used to exit from these sorts of infinite loops, usually when some
error condition or the end of processing is detected:
while true
do
cmd=$(getcmd)
if [ "$cmd" = quit ]
then
break
else
processcmd "$cmd"
fi
done

Here the while loop will continue to execute the getcmd and processcmd programs until cmd is
equal to quit. At that point, the break command will be executed, thus causing the loop to be
exited.
If the break command is used in the form
break n

the n innermost loops are immediately exited, so in

for file
do
...
while [ "$count" -lt 10 ]
do
...
if [ -n "$error" ]
then
break 2
fi
...
done
...
done

both the while and the for loops will be exited if error is nonnull.

Skipping the Remaining Commands in a Loop

The continue command is similar to break, only it doesn't cause the loop to be exited, merely
the remaining commands in the loop to be skipped. Execution of the loop then continues as normal.
Like the break, an optional number can follow the continue, so
continue n

causes the commands in the innermost n loops to be skipped; but execution of the loops then
continues as normal.
for file
do
if [ ! -e "$file" ]
then
echo "$file not found!"
continue
fi
#

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149

# Process the file

#
...
done

Each value of file is checked to make sure that the file exists. If it doesn't, a message is printed,
and further processing of the file is skipped. Execution of the loop then continues with the next value
in the list. Note that the preceding example is equivalent to writing
for file
do
if [ ! -e "$file" ]
then
echo "$file not found!"
else
#
# Process the file
#
...
fi
done

Executing a Loop in the Background

An entire loop can be sent to the background for execution simply by placing an ampersand after
the done:
$ for file in
> do
>
run
> done &
[1] 9932
$
request id is
request id is
request id is
request id is

memo[1-4]
$file
Send it to the background
laser1-85
laser1-87
laser1-88
laser1-92

(standard
(standard
(standard
(standard

input)
input)
input)
input)

I/O Redirection on a Loop

You can also perform I/O redirection on the entire loop. Input redirected into the loop applies to all
commands in the loop that read their data from standard input. Output redirected from the loop to
a file applies to all commands in the loop that write to standard output:
$
>
>
>
$
1
2
3
4
$

for i in 1 2 3 4
do
echo $i
done > loopout
cat loopout

Redirect loop's output to loopout

You can override redirection of the entire loop's input or output by explicitly redirecting the input and/
or output of commands inside the loop. To force input or output of a command to come from or go
to the terminal, use the fact that /dev/tty always refers to your terminal. In the following loop, the
echo command's output is explicitly redirected to the terminal to override the global output redirection applied to the loop:

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150

for file
do
echo "Processing file $file" > /dev/tty
...
done > output

echo's output is redirected to the terminal while the rest goes to the file output.
Naturally, you can also redirect the standard error output from a loop, simply by tacking on a 2>
file after the done:
while [ "$endofdata" -ne TRUE ]
do
...
done 2> errors

Here output from all commands in the loop writing to standard error will be redirected to the file
errors.

Piping Data Into and Out of a Loop

A command's output can be piped into a loop, and the entire output from a loop can be piped into
another command in the expected manner. Here's a highly manufactured example of the output
from a for command piped into wc:
$ for i in 1 2 3 4
> do
>
echo $i
> done | wc l
4
$

Typing a Loop on One Line

If you find yourself frequently executing loops directly at the terminal, you'll want to use the following
shorthand notation to type the entire loop on a single line: Put a semicolon after the last item in the
list and one after each command in the loop. Don't put a semicolon after the do.
Following these rules, the loop
for i in 1 2 3 4
do
echo $i
done

becomes
for i in 1 2 3 4; do echo $i; done

And you can type it in directly this way:

$ for i in 1 2 3 4; do echo $i; done
1
2
3
4
$

The same rules apply to while and until loops.

if commands can also be typed on the same line using a similar format:

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151

$ if [ 1 = 1 ]; then echo yes; fi

yes
$ if [ 1 = 2 ]; then echo yes; else echo no; fi
no
$

Note that no semicolons appear after the then and the else.

The getopts Command

Let's extend our mon program further. We'll add a -t option to it that specifies the time interval, in
seconds, to perform the check. Now our mon program takes both -m and -t options. We'll allow it
to take these options in any order on the command line, provided that if they are used, they appear
before the name of the user that we're monitoring. So valid mon command lines look like this:
mon
mon
mon
mon
mon

ann
-m ann
-t 600 ann
-m -t 600 ann
-t 600 -m ann

and invalid ones look like this:

mon
mon -t600 ann
mon ann -m
mon -t ann

Missing user name

Need a space after -t
Options must appear first
Missing argument after -t

If you start writing the code to allow this sort of flexibility on the command line, you will soon discover
that it can start to get a bit complex. Luckily, the shell provides a built-in command called
getopts that exists for the express purpose of processing command-line arguments. The general
format of the command is
getopts options variable

The getopts command is designed to be executed inside a loop. Each time through the loop,
getopts examines the next command line argument and determines whether it is a valid option.
This determination is made by checking to see whether the argument begins with a minus sign and
is followed by any single letter contained inside options. If it does, getopts stores the matching
option letter inside the specified variable and returns a zero exit status.
If the letter that follows the minus sign is not listed in options, getopts stores a question mark inside
variable before returning with a zero exit status. It also writes an error message to standard error.
If no more arguments are left on the command line or if the next argument doesn't begin with a
minus sign, getopts returns a nonzero exit status.
Suppose that you want getopts to recognize the options -a, -i, and -r for a command called
foo. Your getopts call might look like this:
getopts air option

Here the first argumentairspecifies the three acceptable options to the command, and
option specifies the variable that getopts will use as previously described.
The getopts command permits options to be stacked together on the command line. This is done
by following a single minus sign with one or more consecutive options letters. For example, our
foo command can be executed like this:

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152

foo -a -r -i

or like this:
foo -ari

using this stacking feature.

The getopts command also handles the case where an option must be followed by an argument.
For example, the new -t option to be added to the mon command requires a following argument.
To handle options that take arguments, getopts requires that at least one whitespace character
separate the option from the argument. Furthermore, such options cannot be stacked.
To indicate to getopts that an option takes a following argument, you write a colon character after
the option letter on the getopts command line. So our mon program, which takes -m and -t options, should call getopts like this:
getopts mt: option

If getopts doesn't find an argument after an option that requires one, it stores a question mark
inside the specified variable and writes an error message to standard error. Otherwise, it stores the
actual argument inside a special variable called OPTARG.
One final note about getopts: Another special variable called OPTIND is used by the command.
This variable is initially set to one and is updated each time getopts returns to reflect the number
of the next command-line argument to be processed.
Here is the third version of mon that uses the getopts command to process the command-line
arguments. It also incorporates the previously noted change to send mail to the user running the
program.
$ cat mon
#
# Wait until a specified user logs on -- version 3
#
# Set up default values
mailopt=FALSE
interval=60
# process command options
while getopts mt: option
do
case "$option"
in
m) mailopt=TRUE;;
t) interval=$OPTARG;;
\?) echo "Usage: mon [-m] [-t n] user"
echo "
-m means to be informed by mail"
echo "
-t means check every n secs."
exit 1;;
esac
done
# Make sure a user name was specified
if [ "$OPTIND" -gt "$#" ]
then
echo "Missing user name!"
exit 2
fi

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153

shiftcount=$((OPTIND 1))
shift $shiftcount
user=$1
#
# Check for user logging on
#
until who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
do
sleep $interval
done
#
# When we reach this point, the user has logged on
#
if [ "$mailopt" = FALSE]
then
echo "$user has logged on"
else
runner=$(who am i | cut -c1-8)
echo "$user has logged on" | mail $runner
fi
$ mon -m
Missing user name!
$ mon -x fred
mon: illegal option -- x
Usage: mon [-m] [-t n] user
-m means to be informed by mail
-t means check every n secs.
$ mon -m -t 600 ann &
[1] 5792
$

Illegal option

Check every 10 min. for ann

When the line

mon -m -t 600 ann &

is executed, the following occurs inside the while loop in mon: getopts is executed, and it stores
the character m inside the variable option, sets OPTIND to two, and returns a zero exit status. The
case command is then executed to determine what was stored inside option. A match on the
character m indicates that the send mail option was selected, so mailopt is set to TRUE. (Note
that the ? inside the case is quoted. This is to remove its special meaning as a pattern-matching
character from the shell.)
The second time getopts is executed, getopts stores the character t inside option, stores the
next command-line argument (600) inside OPTARG, sets OPTIND to three, and returns a zero exit
status. The case command then matches the character t stored inside option. The code associated with that case copies the value of 600 that was stored in OPTARG into the variable interval.
The third time getopts is executed, getopts returns a nonzero exit status, indicating the end of
options. The program then checks the value of OPTIND against $# to make sure that the username
was typed on the command line. If OPTIND is greater than $#, then no more arguments remain on
the command line and the user forgot the username argument. Otherwise, the shift command is
executed to move the username argument into $1. The actual number of places to shift is one less
than the value of OPTIND.
The rest of the mon program remains as before; the only change is the use of the interval variable
to specify the number of seconds to sleep.

'Round and 'Round She Goes

154

Exercises
1: Modify the prargs program to precede each argument by its number. So typing
prargs a 'b c' d

should give the following output:

1: a
2: b c
3: d

2: Modify the mon program to also print the tty number that the user logs on to. That is, the output
should say
sandy logged onto tty13

if sandy logs on to tty13.

3: Add a -f option to mon to have it periodically check for the existence of a file (ordinary file or
directory) instead of for a user logging on. So typing
mon -f /usr/spool/uucppublic/steve/newmemo &

should cause mon to periodically check for the existence of the indicated file and inform you when
it does (by displaying a message or by mail if the -m option is also selected).
4: Add a -n option to mon that inverts the monitoring function. So
mon -n sandy

checks for sandy logging off the system, and

mon -n -f /tmp/dataout &

periodically checks for the removal of the specified file.

5: Write a program called collect that runs in the background and counts the number of users
logged in at the end of each interval and also the number of processes run during that interval.
Allow the interval to be specified with a -t option (see the previous exercise), with the default
10 minutes. Use the fact that the special shell variable $! is set to the process number of the
last command executed in the background and that
: &

runs a null command in the background. Also make sure that the program correctly handles the
case where the process number loops back around to 1 after the maximum is reached.
So
collect -t 900 > stats &

should start up collect to gather the desired statistics every 15 minutes and write them into
the file stats.
6: Write a shell program called wgrep that searches a file for a given pattern, just as grep does.
For each line in the file that matches, print a window around the matching line. That is, print the
line preceding the match, the matching line, and the line following the match. Be sure to properly
handle the special cases where the pattern matches the first line of the file and where the pattern
matches the last line of the file.

'Round and 'Round She Goes

155

7: Modify wgrep to take an optional -w option that specifies the window size; so
wgrep -w 3 UNIX text

should print three lines before and after each line from text that contains the pattern UNIX.
8: Modify wgrep to take a variable number of filenames as arguments. Precede each output line
with the name of the file in which the match occurs (as grep does).

156

Chapter 10. Reading and Printing Data

IN THIS CHAPTER
The read Command
The printf Command
Exercises

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

In this chapter you'll learn how to read data from the terminal or from a file using the read command
and how to print formatted data to standard output using the printf command.

The read Command

The general format of the read command is

read variables

When this command is executed, the shell reads a line from standard input and assigns the first
word read to the first variable listed in variables, the second word read to the second variable, and
so on. If there are more words on the line than there are variables listed, the excess words get
assigned to the last variable. So for example, the command
read x y

reads a line from standard input, storing the first word read in the variable x, and the remainder of
the line in the variable y. It follows from this that the command
read text

reads and stores an entire line into the shell variable text.

A Program to Copy Files

Let's put the read command to work. We'll write a simplified version of the cp command that will
be a bit more user friendly than the standard Unix one. We'll call it mycp, and we'll have it take two
arguments: the source file and the destination file. If the destination file already exists, we'll tell the
user and then ask him (or her) if he wants to proceed with the copy. If the answer is yes, we'll go
ahead with it; otherwise, we won't.
$ cat mycp
#
# Copy a file
#
if [ "$#" -ne 2 ]
then
echo "Usage: mycp from to"
exit 1

Reading and Printing Data

157

fi
from="$1"
to="$2"
#
# See if the destination file already exists
#
if [ -e "$to" ]
then
echo "$to already exists; overwrite (yes/no)?"
read answer
if [ "$answer" != yes ]
then
echo "Copy not performed"
exit 0
fi
fi
#
# Either destination doesn't exist or "yes" was typed
#
cp $from $to
$

# proceed with the copy

And now for the test:

$ ls
What files are around?
addresses
intro
lotsaspaces
mycp
names
nu
numbers
phonebook
stat
$ mycp
No arguments
Usage: mycp from to
$ mycp names names2
Make a copy of names
$ ls -l names*
Did it work?
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
43 Jul 20 11:12 names
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
43 Jul 21 14:16 names2
$ mycp names numbers
Try to overwrite an existing file
numbers already exists; overwrite (yes/no)?
no
Copy not performed
$

To complete the test cases, try answering yes and ensuring that the program proceeds with the copy.
There are a few things worthy of mention with the mycp program. First, if the file already exists, the
echo command that prompts for the yes/no response is executed. The read command that follows
causes the shell to wait for you to type something in. Note that the shell does not prompt you when
it's waiting for you to enter data; it's up to you to add your own prompt message to the program.
The data that is typed is stored in the variable answer and is then tested against the characters
yes to determine whether the copy is to proceed. The quotes around answer in the test
[ "$answer" != yes]

are necessary in case the user just presses the Enter key without typing any data. In that case, the
shell would store a null value in answer, and test would issue an error message if the quotes were
omitted.

Reading and Printing Data

158

Special echo Escape Characters

A slight annoyance with mycp is that after the echo command is executed to alert the user that the
file already exists, the response that is typed by the user appears on the next line. This happens
because the echo command always automatically displays a terminating newline character after
the last argument.
This can be suppressed if the last two characters given to echo are the special escape characters
\c. This tells echo to leave the cursor right where it is after displaying the last argument and not to
go to the next line. So if you changed the echo command in mycp to read like this:
echo "$to already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? \c"

the user's input would be typed right after the message on the same line. Bear in mind that the \c
is interpreted by echo and not by the shell, meaning that it must be quoted so that the backslash
makes it to echo.
echo interprets other special characters. These must each be preceded by a backslash. They're
summarized in Table 10.1.
Table 10.1. echo Escape Characters
Character

Prints

Backspace

The line without a terminating newline

Formfeed

Newline

Carriage return

Tab character

Backslash character

\0nnn

The character whose ASCII value is nnn, where nnn is a one- to three-digit octal number

An Improved Version of mycp

Suppose that you have a program called prog1 in your current directory and you want to copy it
into your bin directory directly below. Take another look at the mycp program and determine what
happens if you type in
mycp prog1 bin

The -e test on bin will succeed (because e tests for existence of a file), and mycp will display the
already exists message and wait for a yes/no answer.
If the second argument is a directory, mycp should check to see whether the from file exists
inside this directory. The next version of mycp performs this check. It also has the modified echo
command that includes the \c to suppress the terminating newline.
$ cat mycp
#
# Copy a file -- version 2
#
if [ "$#" -ne 2 ]
then
echo "Usage: mycp from to"
exit 1
fi

Reading and Printing Data

159

from="$1"
to="$2"
#
# See if destination file is a directory
#
if [ -d "$to" ]
then
to="$to/$(basename $from)"
fi
#
# See if the destination file already exists
#
if [ -e "$to" ]
then
echo "$to already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? \c"
read answer
if [ "$answer" != yes ]
then
echo "Copy not performed"
exit 0
fi
fi
#
# Either destination doesn't exist or ''yes'' was typed
#
cp $from $to
$

# proceed with the copy

If the destination file is a directory, the program changes the variable to to more precisely identify
the file inside the directory as $to/$(basename $from). This ensures that the following test on
the existence of the ordinary file $to will be done on the file in the directory, not on the directory
itself as the previous version of mycp did. The basename command gives the base filename of its
argument (for example, basename /usr/bin/troff gives troff; basename troff gives
troff). This ensures that the copy is made to the correct place. (For example, if mycp /tmp/data
bin is typed, where bin is a directory, you want to copy /tmp/data into bin/data and not into
bin/tmp/data.)
Here's some sample output. Note the effect of the \c escape characters.
$ ls
Check out current directory
bin
prog1
$ ls bin
Look inside bin
lu
nu
prog1
$ mycp prog1 prog2
Simple case
$ mycp prog1 bin
Copy into directory
bin/prog1 already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? yes
$

A Final Version of mycp

The last modification to mycp makes the program virtually equivalent to the standard Unix cp command by allowing a variable number of arguments. Recall that any number of files can precede the
name of a directory, as in
cp prog1 prog2 greetings bin

Reading and Printing Data

160

To modify mycp to accept any number of files, you can use this approach:
1.

Get each argument but the last from the command line and store it in the shell variable filelist.

Store the last argument in the variable to.

If $to is not a directory, there must be exactly two arguments.

For each file in $filelist, check whether the file already exists. If it does, ask the user
whether the file should be overwritten. If the answer is yes, or if the file doesn't already exist,
add the file to the variable copylist.

If copylist is nonnull, copy the files in it to $to.

If this algorithm seems a bit fuzzy, perhaps the program, followed by a detailed explanation, will
help clear things up. Note the modified command usage message.
$ cat mycp
#
# Copy a file -- final version
#
numargs=$#
filelist=
copylist=

# save this for later use

#
# Process the arguments, storing all but the last in filelist
#
while [ "$#" -gt 1 ]
do
filelist="$filelist $1"
shift
done
to="$1"
#
# If less than two args, or if more than two args and last arg
# is not a directory, then issue an error message
#
if [ "$numargs" -lt 2 -o "$numargs" -gt 2
then
echo "Usage: mycp file1 file2"
echo "
mycp file(s) dir"
exit 1
fi

-a

! -d "$to" ]

#
# Sequence through each file in filelist
#
for from in $filelist
do
#
# See if destination file is a directory
#
if [ -d "$to" ]
then
tofile="$to/$(basename $from)"
else
tofile="$to"
fi
#

Reading and Printing Data

161

# Add file to copylist if file doesn't already exist

# or if user says it's okay to overwrite
#
if [ -e "$tofile" ]
then
echo "$tofile already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? \c"
read answer
if [ "$answer" = yes ]
then
copylist="$copylist $from"
fi
else
copylist="$copylist $from"
fi
done
#
# Now do the copy -- first make sure there's something to copy
#
if [ -n "$copylist" ]
then
cp $copylist $to
# proceed with the copy
fi
$

Let's look at some sample output before getting into the explanation.
$ ls
See what's around
bin
lu
names
prog1
prog2
$ ls bin
And what's in bin?
lu
nu
prog1
$ mycp
No arguments
Usage: mycp file1 file2
mycp file(s) dir
$ mycp names prog1 prog2
Last arg isn't a directory
Usage: mycp file1 file2
mycp file(s) dir
$ mycp names prog1 prog2 lu bin
Legitimate use
bin/prog1 already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? yes
bin/lu already exists; overwrite (yes/no)? no
$ ls -l bin
See what happened
total 5
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
543 Jul 19 14:10 lu
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
949 Jul 21 17:11 names
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
38 Jul 19 09:55 nu
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
498 Jul 21 17:11 prog1
-rw-r--r-1 steve
steve
498 Jul 21 17:11 prog2
$

In the last case, prog1 was overwritten and lu wasn't, as per the user's request.
When the program starts execution, it saves the number of arguments in the variable numargs.
This is done because it's changed later in the program by the shift command.
Next a loop is entered that is executed as long as the number of arguments is greater than one. The
purpose of this loop is to get the last argument on the line. While doing this, the loop stashes away
the first argument into the shell variable filelist, which contains a list of all the files to be copied.
The statement
filelist="$filelist $1"

Reading and Printing Data

162

says to take the previous value of filelist, add on a space followed by the value of $1, and then
store the result back into filelist. Then the shift command is executed to move all the arguments over by one. Eventually, $# will be equal to one, and the loop will be exited. At that point,
filelist will contain a space-delimited list of all the files to be copied, and $1 will contain the last
argument, which is the destination file (or directory). To see how this works, consider execution of
the while loop when the command is executed as
mycp names prog1 prog2 lu bin

Figure 10.1 depicts the changing values of the variables through each iteration of the loop. The first
line shows the state of the variables before the loop is entered.

Figure 10.1. Processing command-line arguments.

After the loop is exited, the last argument contained in $1 is stored in the variable to. Next, a test
is made to ensure that at least two arguments were typed on the command line and if more than
two were typed, that the last argument is a directory. If either condition isn't satisfied, usage information is displayed to the user, and the program exits with a status of 1.
Following this, a for loop is entered for the purpose of individually examining each file in the list to
see whether it already exists. If it does, the user is prompted as before. If the user wants to overwrite
the file, or if the file doesn't already exist, the file is added to the shell variable copylist. The
technique used here is the same used to accumulate the arguments inside filelist.
When the for loop is exited, copylist contains a list of all the files to be copied. This list can be
null if each of the destination files exists and the user types no for each one. So a test is made to
ensure copylist is nonnull, and if it is, the copy is performed.
Take some time to review the logic of the final version of mycp; it does a good job at illustrating
many of the features you've learned so far in this book. Some exercises at the end of this chapter
will help test your understanding of this program.

A Menu-Driven Phone Program

One nice thing about the read command is that it enables you to write menu-driven shell programs.
As an example, we'll return to our phone book programs add, lu, and rem and gather their execution
together under one program, which we'll call rolo (for rolodex program). rolo will display a list of
choices to the user and then execute the appropriate program depending on the selection. It will
also prompt for the proper arguments to the program. Here, then, is the program:
$ cat rolo
#
# rolo - rolodex program to look up, add, and
#
remove people from the phone book
#

Reading and Printing Data

163

#
# Display menu
#
echo '
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): \c'
#
# Read and process selection
#
read choice
echo
case "$choice"
in
1) echo "Enter name to look up: \c"
read name
lu "$name";;
2) echo "Enter name to be added: \c"
read name
echo "Enter number: \c"
read number
add "$name" "$number";;
3) echo "Enter name to be removed: \c"
read name
rem "$name";;
*) echo "Bad choice";;
esac
$

A single echo command is used to display the menu at the terminal, taking advantage of the fact
that the quotes preserve the embedded newline characters. Then the read command is executed
to get the selection from the user and store it in the variable choice.
A case statement is next entered to determine what choice was made. If choice 1 was selected,
the user wants to look up someone in the phone book. In that case, the user is asked to enter the
name to be looked up, and the lu program is called, passing it the name typed in by the user as
the argument. Note that the double quotes around name in
lu "$name"

are necessary to ensure that two or more words typed in by the user are handed over to lu as a
single argument.
A similar sequence occurs if the user selects menu items 2 or 3.
The programs lu, rem, and add are from earlier chapters (lu is from page 137 rem from page 167,
and add from page 138).
Here are some sample runs of rolo:
$ rolo
Would you like to:
1.
2.
3.

Look someone up
Add someone to the phone book
Remove someone from the phone book

Please select one of the above (1-3): 2

Reading and Printing Data

164

Enter name to be added: El Coyote

Enter number: 212-555-3232
$ rolo
Try it again
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 1
Enter name to look up: Coyote
El Coyote
212-555-3232
$ rolo
Once again
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 4
Bad choice
$

When an invalid choice is entered, the program simply displays Bad choice and then terminates.
A friendlier approach would be to reprompt the user until a proper choice is made. This can be done
by enclosing the entire program inside an until loop that will be executed until a valid selection is
made. To determine when a valid choice has been made, we can test a variable in the until that
won't be assigned a value in the program until either 1, 2, or 3 is selected by the user.
Another change to make to rolo involves the way it will be used. Because the most common
operation performed will be one of lookup, there will probably be a tendency on the part of the user
to avoid typing rolo, then making selection 1, and then typing the name to be found when instead
he or she can still type in
lu name

directly. Given all this, it might be a good idea to allow rolo to take command-line arguments. If
any arguments are typed, rolo can assume that a lookup is being requested and just call lu directly. So if the user wants to perform a quick lookup, he or she can type rolo followed by the name.
On the other hand, if the user wants to see the menu, typing just rolo causes the program to display
its menu and prompt for a choice.
The preceding two changes (looping until a valid choice is selected and doing a quick lookup) were
added to version 2 of rolo that is shown next.
$ cat rolo
#
# rolo - rolodex program to look up, add, and
#
remove people from the phone book -- version 2
#
#
# If arguments are supplied, then do a lookup
#
if [ "$#" -ne 0 ]
then
lu "$@"
exit
fi
validchoice=""

# set it null

Reading and Printing Data

165

#
# Loop until a valid selection is made
#
until [ -n "$validchoice" ]
do
#
# Display menu
#
echo '
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): \c'
#
# Read and process selection
#
read choice
echo
case "$choice"
in
1) echo "Enter name to look up: \c"
read name
lu "$name"
validchoice=TRUE;;
2) echo "Enter name to be added: \c"
read name
echo "Enter number: \c"
read number
add "$name" "$number"
validchoice=TRUE;;
3) echo "Enter name to be removed: \c"
read name
rem "$name"
validchoice=TRUE;;
*) echo "Bad choice";;
esac
done
$

If $# is nonzero, lu is called directly with the arguments typed on the command line. Then the
program exits. Otherwise, the until loop is executed until the variable validchoice is nonnull.
The only way it can ever become nonnull is if the command
validchoice=TRUE

is executed inside the case on selection of either 1, 2, or 3. Otherwise, the program continues to
loop until one of these three choices is made.
$ rolo Bill
Billy Bach
201-555-7618
$ rolo
Would you like to:

Quick lookup
Let's have the menu this time

1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 4
Bad choice

Reading and Printing Data

166

Would you like to:

1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 0
Bad choice
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 1

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Enter name to look up: Tony

Tony Iannino
973-555-1295
$

The $$ Variable and Temporary Files

If two or more people on your system use the rolo program at the same time, a potential problem
may occur. Look at the rem program and see whether you can spot it. The problem occurs with the
temporary file /tmp/phonebook that is used to create a new version of the phone book file.
grep -v "$name" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook
mv /tmp/phonebook phonebook

If more than one person uses rolo to remove an entry at the same time, there's a chance that the
phone book file can get messed up because the same temporary file will be used by all rolo users.
1 Naturally, the chances of this happening (that is, the preceding two commands being executed at
the same time by more than one user) are rather small, but, nevertheless there still is that chance.
Anyway, it brings up an important point when dealing with temporary files in general.
When writing shell programs to be run by more than one person, make your temporary files unique.
One way is to create the temporary file in the user's home directory, for example. Another way is to
choose a temporary filename that will be unique for that particular process. To do this, you can use
the special $$ shell variable, which contains the process id number (PID) of the current process:
$ echo
4668
$ ps
PID
4668
6470
$

$$
TTY TIME COMMAND
co 0:09 sh
co 0:03 ps

As you can see, $$ is equal to the process id number of your login shell. Because each process on
the Unix system is given a unique process id number, using the value of $$ in the name of a file
minimizes the possibility of another process using the same file. So you can replace the two lines
from rem with these

1Actually,

it depends on the users' default file creation mask (known as umask). If one person has created /tmp/phonebook and it's not
writable by anyone else, the next person who comes along and tries to create it will get an error message from the shell. The net result is
that the first user's file will get properly updated, and the second user's won't; neither file will get corrupted.

Reading and Printing Data

167

grep -v "$name" phonebook > /tmp/phonebook$$

mv /tmp/phonebook$$ phonebook

to circumvent any potential problems. Each person running rolo will run it as a different process,
so the temporary file used in each case will be different.

The Exit Status from read

read always returns an exit status of zero unless an end of file condition is detected on the input.
If the data is coming from the terminal, this means that Ctrl+d has been typed. If the data is coming
from a file, it means that there's no more data to read from the file.
Knowing about the exit status returned by read makes it easy to write a loop that will read any
number of lines of data from a file or from the terminal. The next program, called addi, reads in
lines containing pairs of integers. Each pair of numbers is summed, and the result written to standard
output.
$ cat addi
#
# add pairs of integers on standard input
#
while read n1 n2
do
echo $((n1 + n2))
done
$

The while loop is executed as long as the read command returns an exit status of zero; that is,
as long as there's still data to be read. Inside the loop, the two values read from the line (presumably
integersno error checking is done here) are summed and the result written to standard output by
echo.
$ addi
10 25
35
-5 12
7
123 3
126
Ctrl+d
$

It goes without saying that standard input for addi can be redirected, as can standard output:
$ cat data
1234 7960
593 -595
395 304
3234 999
-394 -493
$ addi < data > sums
$ cat sums
9194
-2
699
4233
-887
$

The following program, called number, is a simplified version of the standard Unix nl command: It
takes one or more files given as arguments and displays them preceded by line numbers. If no
arguments are supplied, it uses standard input instead.

Reading and Printing Data

168

$ cat number
#
# Number lines from files given as argument or from
# standard input if none supplied
#
lineno=1
cat $* |
while read line
do
echo "$lineno: $line"
lineno=$((lineno + 1))
done
$

The variable linenothe line number countis initially set to 1. Then the arguments typed to
number are given to cat to be collectively written to standard output. If no arguments are supplied,
$* will be null, and cat will be passed no arguments. This will cause it to read from standard input.
The output from cat is piped into the while loop. For each line read by read, the line is echoed
at the terminal, preceded by the value of lineno, whose value is then incremented by one.
$ number phonebook
1: Alice Chebba
2: Barbara Swingle
3: Billy Bach
4: El Coyote
5: Liz Stachiw
6: Susan Goldberg
7: Teri Zak
8: Tony Iannino
$ who | number
1: root
console
2: pat
tty03
3: steve
tty04
4: george
tty13
$

973-555-2015
201-555-9257
201-555-7618
212-555-3232
212-555-2298
201-555-7776
201-555-6000
973-555-1295
Jul
Jul
Jul
Jul

25
25
25
25

Try from standard input

07:55
09:26
10:58
08:05

Note that number won't work too well for lines that contain backslashes or leading whitespace
characters. The following example illustrates this point.
$ number
Here are some backslashes: \ \*
1: Here are some backslashes: *
$

Leading whitespace characters are removed from any line that's read. The backslash characters
are also interpreted by the shell when it reads the line. You can use the r option to read to prevent
it from interpreting the backslash character. If we change the
while read line

in number to
while read r line

the output will look better:

$ number
Here are some backslashes: \ \*
1: Here are some backslashes: \ \*
$

Reading and Printing Data

169

In Chapter 12, More on Parameters, you'll learn how to preserve the leading whitespace characters
and also how to have some control over the parsing of the input data.

The printf Command

Although echo is adequate for displaying simple messages, sometimes you'll want to print formatted output: for example, lining up columns of data. Unix systems provide the printf command.
Those of you familiar with the C programming language will notice many similarities.
The general format of the printf command is
printf "format" arg1 arg2 ...

where format is a string that describes how the remaining arguments are to be displayed. (Note that
the format string is a single argument, so it's a good idea to get into the habit of enclosing it in quotes
because it often contains whitespace.) Characters in the format string that are not preceded by a
percent sign (%) are written to standard output. One or more characters preceded by a percent sign
are called conversion specifications and tell printf how the corresponding argument should be
displayed. So, for each percent sign in the format string there should be a corresponding argument,
except for the special conversion specification %%, which causes a single percent sign to be displayed.
Here's a simple example of printf:
$ printf "This is a number: %d\n" 10
This is a number: 10
$

printf doesn't add a newline character to its output like echo; however, printf understands the
same escape characters that echo does (refer to Table 10.1 earlier in this chapter), so adding \n
to the end of the format string causes the prompt to appear on the next line.
Although this is a simple case that could easily be handled by echo, it helps to illustrate how the
conversion specification (%d) is interpreted by printf: When the format string is scanned by
printf, it outputs each character in the string without modification until it sees the percent sign;
then it reads the d and recognizes that the %d should be replaced by the next argument, which must
be an integer number. After that argument (10) is sent to standard output, printf sees the \n and
outputs a newline.
Table 10.2 summarizes the different conversion specification characters.
Table 10.2. printf Conversion Specification Characters
Character

Use for Printing

Integers

Unsigned integers

Octal integers

Hexadecimal integers, using a-f

Hexadecimal integers, using A-F

Single characters

Literal strings

Strings containing backslash escape characters

Percent signs

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170

The first five conversion specification characters are all used for displaying integers. %d displays
signed integers, and %u displays unsigned integers; %u can also be used to display the positive
representation of a negative number (note that the result is machine dependent). By default, integers
displayed as octal or hexadecimal numbers do not have a leading 0 or 0x, but we'll show you how
to enable this later in this section.
Strings are printed using %s or %b. %s is used to print strings literally, without any processing of
backslash escape characters; %b is used to force interpretation of the backslash escape characters
in the string argument.
Here are a few printf examples:
$ printf "The octal value for %d is %o\n" 20 20
The octal value for 20 is 24
$ printf "The hexadecimal value for %d is %x\n" 30 30
The hexadecimal value for 30 is 1e
$ printf "The unsigned value for %d is %u\n" 1000 1000
The unsigned value for -1000 is 4294966296
$ printf "This string contains a backslash escape: %s\n" "test\nstring"
This string contains a backslash escape: test\nstring
$ printf "This string contains an interpreted escape: %b\n" "test\nstring"
This string contains an interpreted escape: test string
$ printf "A string: %s and a character: %c\n" hello A
A string: hello and a character: A
$

In the last printf, %c is used to display a single character. If the corresponding argument is longer
than one character, only the first is displayed:
$ printf "Just the first character: %c\n" abc
a
$

The general format of a conversion specification is

%[flags][width][.precision]type

The type is the conversion specification character from Table 10.2. As you can see, only the percent
sign and type are required; the other parameters are called modifiers and are optional. Valid flags
are -, +, #, and the space character. left justifies the value being printed; this will make more
sense when we discuss the width modifier. + causes printf to precede integers with a + or sign
(by default, only negative integers are printed with a sign). # causes printf to precede octal integers with 0 and hexadecimal integers with 0x or 0X for %#x or %#X, respectively. The space
character causes printf to precede positive integers with a space and negative integers with a -.
$ printf "%+d\n%+d\n%+d\n" 10 10 20
+10
10
+20
$ printf "% d\n% d\n% d\n" 10 10 20
10
-10
20
$ printf "%#o %#x\n" 100 200
0144 0xc8
$

As you can see, using + or space as the flag lines up columns of positive and negative numbers
nicely.
The width modifier is a positive number that specifies the minimum field width for printing an argument. The argument is right justified within this field unless the flag is used:

Reading and Printing Data

171

$ printf "%20s%20s\n" string1 string2

string1
string2
$ printf "%-20s%-20s\n" string1 string2
string1
string2
$ printf "%5d%5d%5d\n" 1 10 100
1
10 100
$ printf "%5d%5d%5d\n" -1 -10 -100
-1 -10 100
$ printf "%-5d%-5d%-5d\n" 1 10 100
1
10
100
$

The width modifier can be useful for lining up columns of text or numbers (note that signs for numbers
and leading 0, 0x, and 0X characters are counted as part of the argument's width). The width
specifies a minimum size for the field; if the width of an argument exceeds width, it is not truncated.
The .precision modifier is a positive number that specifies a minimum number of digits to be displayed for %d, %u, %o, %x, and %X. This results in zero padding on the left of the value:
$ printf "%.5d %.4X\n" 10 27
00010 001B
$

For strings, the .precision modifier specifies the maximum number of characters to be printed from
the string; if the string is longer than precision characters, it is truncated on the right:
$ printf "%.5s\n" abcdefg
abcde
$

A width can be combined with .precision to specify both a field width and zero padding (for numbers)
or truncation (for strings):
$ printf ":%#10.5x:%5.4x:%5.4d\n" 1 10 100
:
0x00001: 000a: 0100
$ printf ":%9.5s:\n" abcdefg
:
abcde:
$ printf ":%-9.5s:\n" abcdefg
:abcde
:
$

Finally, if a * is used in place of a number for width or precision, the argument preceding the value
to be printed must be a number and will be used as the width or precision, respectively. If a * is
used in place of both, two integer arguments must precede the value being printed and are used
for the width and precision:
$ printf
test
$ printf
test
$

"%s%.*s\n" 12 "test one" 10 2 "test two"

one
te
"%12s%10.2s\n" "test one" "test two"
one
te

As you can see, the two printfs in this example produce the same results. In the first printf,
12 is used as the width for the first string, 10 as the width for the second string, and 2 as the precision
for the second string. In the second printf, these numbers are specified as part of the conversion
specification.
Table 10.3 summarizes the various conversion specification modifiers.
Table 10.3. printf Conversion Specification Modifiers
Modifier

Meaning

flags

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172

Modifier

Meaning

Left justify value.

Precede integer with + or -.

(space)

Precede positive integer with space character.

Precede octal integer with 0, hexadecimal integer with 0x or 0X.

width

Minimum width of field; * means use next argument as width.

precision

Minimum number of digits to display for integers; maximum number of characters to display for strings; * means use
next argument as precision.

Here's a simple example that uses printf to align two columns of numbers from a file:
$ cat align
#
# Align two columns of numbers
# (works for numbers up to 12 digits long, including sign)
cat $* |
while read number1 number2
do
printf "%12d %12d\n" $number1 $number2
done
$ cat data
1234 7960
593 -595
395 304
3234 999
-394 -493
$ align data
1234
7960
593
-595
395
304
3234
999
-394
-493
$

In Chapters 12, 14, and 15 you'll see more uses for printf. But first try your hand at the following
exercises.

Exercises
1:
2:

What happens to mycp if one or more of the files to be copied doesn't exist? Can you make
any suggestions to better handle the situation?
What happens to mycp if one of the filenames contains a character that has a special meaning
to the shell such as ; or |?

Write a program called mymv that does with the mv command what mycp does with the cp
command. How many changes did you have to make to mycp to produce this new program?

Modify mycp to prompt for arguments if none are supplied. A typical execution of the modified
version should look like this:
$ mycp
Source file name? voucher
Destination file name? voucher.sv
$

Make sure that the program allows one or both of the files to be specified with filename substitution characters.

Reading and Printing Data

5:
6:
7:

173

Add a -n option to mycp that suppresses the normal check for the existence of the destination
files.
Modify mycp to use sed instead of the while loop to process the arguments typed on the
command line.
Modify the rem program used by rolo so that if multiple entries are found, the program will
prompt the user for the entry to be removed.
Here's a sample session:
$ rolo
...
Please select one of the above (1-3): 3
Enter name to be removed: Susan
More than one match; please select the one to remove:
Susan Goldberg
Remove (y/n)? n
Susan Topple
Remove (y/n)? y
$

8:
9:

Modify rolo so that the menu is redisplayed after each selection is made and processed. To
allow the user to get out of this, add another selection to the menu to exit from the program.
What happens to the rolo program if just an Enter is given as the name for the add, look up,
or remove options?

10: Modify lu to use printf to print the name and phone number so that they line up in columns
for names up to 40 characters in length (Hint: use cut f and the fact that the fields in the
phonebook are separated by tabs).

174

Chapter 11. Your Environment

IN THIS CHAPTER

Local Variables
Exported Variables
PS1 and PS2
HOME, James
Your PATH

Your Current Directory

More on Subshells
Your .profile File
The TERM Variable
The TZ Variable
Exercises

When you log on to the system, you're effectively given your own copy of the shell program. This
shell maintains what's known as your environmentan environment that is distinct from other users
on the system. This environment is maintained from the moment you log on until the moment you
log off. In this chapter you'll learn about this environment in detail, and you'll see how it relates to
writing and running programs.

Local Variables
Type the following program called vartest into your computer:
$ cat vartest
echo :$x:
$

vartest consists of a solitary echo command that displays the value of the variable x, surrounded
by colons. Now assign any value you want to the variable x from your terminal:
$ x=100

Here we chose 100. Question: What do you think will be displayed when vartest is now executed?
Answer:
$ vartest
::
$

vartest doesn't know about the value of x. Therefore, its value is null. The variable x that was
assigned the value 100 in the login shell is known as a local variable. The reason why it has this
name will become clear shortly.

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175

Here's another example. This program is called vartest2:

$ cat vartest2
x=50
echo :$x:
$ x=100
$ vartest2
:50:
$

Execute it

Now the question is: What's the value of x?

$ echo $x
100
$

So you see that vartest2 didn't change the value of x that you set equal to 100 in your login shell.

Subshells
The behavior exhibited by vartest and vartest2 is due to the fact that these two programs are
run as subshells by your login shell. A subshell is, for all intents and purposes, an entirely new shell
executed by your login shell to run the desired program. So when you ask your login shell to execute
vartest, it starts up a new shell to execute the program. Whenever a new shell runs, it runs in its
own environment, with its own set of local variables. A subshell has no knowledge of local variables
that were assigned values by the login shell (the parent shell). Furthermore, a subshell cannot
change the value of a variable in the parent shell, as evidenced by vartest2.
Let's review the process that goes on here. Before executing vartest2, your login shell has a
variable called x that has been assigned the value 100 (assume for now that this is the only variable
defined in the shell). This is depicted in Figure 11.1.

Figure 11.1. Login shell with x=100.

When you ask to have vartest2 executed, your login shell starts up a subshell to run it, giving it
an empty list of local variables to start with (see Figure 11.2).

Your Environment

176

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833
Figure 11.2. Login shell executes vartest2.

After the first command in vartest2 is executed (that assigns 50 to x), the local variable x that
exists in the subshell's environment will have the value 50 (see Figure 11.3). Note that this has no
relation whatsoever to the variable x that still maintains its value of 100 in the login shell.

Figure 11.3. vartest2 executes x=50.

Your Environment

177

When vartest2 finishes execution, the subshell goes away, together with any variables assigned

values.

Exported Variables
There is a way to make the value of a variable known to a subshell, and that's by exporting it with
the export command. The format of this command is simply
export variables

where variables is the list of variable names that you want exported. For any subshells that get
executed from that point on, the value of the exported variables will be passed down to the subshell.
Here's a program called vartest3 to help illustrate the difference between local and exported
variables:
$ cat vartest3
echo x = $x
echo y = $y
$

Assign values to the variables x and y in the login shell, and then run vartest3:
$
$
$
x
y
$

x=100
y=10
vartest3
=
=

x and y are both local variables, so their values aren't passed down to the subshell that runs
vartest3. Now let's export the variable y and try it again:
$
$
x
y
$

export y
vartest3
=
= 10

Make y known to subshells

This time, vartest3 knew about y because it is an exported variable. Conceptually, whenever a
subshell is executed, the list of exported variables gets copied down to the subshell, whereas the
list of local variables does not (see Figure 11.4).

Your Environment

178

Figure 11.4. Execution of vartest3.

Now it's time for another question: What do you think happens if a subshell changes the value of
an exported variable? Will the parent shell know about it after the subshell has finished? To answer
this question, here's a program called vartest4:
$ cat vartest4
x=50
y=5
$

We'll assume that you haven't changed the values of x and y, and that y is still exported.
$ vartest4
$ echo $x $y
100 10
$

So the subshell couldn't even change the value of the exported variable y; it merely changed the
copy of y that was passed to its environment when it was executed (see Figure 11.5). Just as with
local variables, when a subshell goes away, so do the values of the exported variables. There is no

way to change the value of a variable in a parent shell from within a subshell.

Figure 11.5. Execution of vartest4.

Your Environment

179

In the case of a subshell executing another subshell (for example, the rolo program executing the
lu program), the process is repeated: The exported variables from the subshell are copied to the
new subshell. These exported variables may have been exported from above, or newly exported
from within the subshell.

After a variable is exported, it remains exported to all subshells subsequently executed.

Consider a modified version of vartest4:
$ cat vartest4
x=50
y=5
z=1
export z
vartest5
$

and also consider vartest5:

$ cat vartest5
echo x = $x
echo y = $y
echo z = $z
$

When vartest4 gets executed, the exported variable y will be copied into the subshell's environment. vartest4 sets the value of x to 50, changes the value of y to 5, and sets the value of z to
1. Then it exports z. This makes the value of z accessible to any subshell subsequently run by
vartest4. vartest5 is such a subshell, and when it is executed, the shell copies into its environment the exported variables from vartest4: y and z. This should explain the following output:
$
x
y
z
$

vartest4
=
= 5
= 1

This entire operation is depicted in Figure 11.6.

Your Environment

180

Figure 11.6. Subshell execution.

To summarize the way local and exported variables work:

1.
2.

3.
4.

Any variable that is not exported is a local variable whose existence will not be known to
subshells.
Exported variables and their values are copied into a subshell's environment, where they may
be accessed and changed. However, such changes have no effect on the variables in the
parent shell.
Exported variables retain this characteristic not only for directly spawned subshells, but also
for subshells spawned by those subshells (and so on down the line).
A variable can be exported any time before or after it is assigned a value.

export -p
If you simply type export -p, you'll get a list of the variables and their values exported by your shell:
$ export p
export LOGNAME=steve
export PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:.
export TIMEOUT=600
export TZ=EST5EDT
export y=10
$

As you can see, there are actually more exported variables here than you were initially led to believe.
Note that y shows up on the list, together with other variables that were exported when you logged
on.
Note that the variables listed include those that have been inherited from a parent shell.

Your Environment

181

PS1 and PS2

The characters that the shell displays as your command prompt are stored in the variable PS1. You
can change this variable to be anything you want. As soon as you change it, it'll be used by the shell
from that point on.
$ echo :$PS1:
:$ :
$ PS1="==> "
==> pwd
/users/steve
==> PS1="I await your next command, master: "
I await your next command, master: date
Wed Sep 18 14:46:28 EDT 2002
I await your next command, master: PS1="$ "
$
Back to normal

Your secondary command prompt, normally >, is kept in the variable PS2, where you can change
it to your heart's content:
$ echo :$PS2:
:> :
$ PS2="=======> "
$ for x in 1 2 3
=======> do
=======> echo $x
=======> done
1
2
3
$

Like any other shell variables, after you log off the system, the values of those variables go with it.
So if you change PS1, the shell will use the new value for the remainder of your login session. Next
time you log in, however, you'll get the old value again. You can make the change yourself every
time you log in, or you can have the change made automatically by adding it to your .profile file
(discussed later in this chapter).

HOME, James
Your home directory is where you're placed whenever you log on to the system. A special shell
variable called HOME is also automatically set to this directory when you log on:
$ echo $HOME
/users/steve
$

This variable can be used by your programs to identify your home directory. It's also used by the
cd command whenever you type just cd with no arguments:
$ pwd
/usr/src/lib/libc/port/stdio
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

Where am I?

There's no place like home

You can change your HOME variable to anything you want, but be warned that doing so may affect
the operation of any programs that rely on it:

Your Environment
$ HOME=/users/steve/book
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/steve/book
$

182
Change it

See what happened

Your PATH
Return for a moment to the rolo program from Chapter 10, Reading and Printing Data:
$ rolo Liz
Liz Stachiw
$

212-555-2298

Let's see what directory this program was created in:

$ pwd
/users/steve/bin
$

Okay, now change directory to anywhere you want:

$ cd
$

Go home

And now try to look up Liz in the phone book:

$ rolo Liz
sh: rolo: not found
$

Unless you already know where this discussion is leading, you are likely to get the preceding results.
Whenever you type in the name of a program to be executed, the shell searches a list of directories
until it finds the requested program.1 When found, it initiates its execution. This list of directories is
contained in a special shell variable called PATH. This variable is automatically set for you when you
log on to the system. See what it's set to now:
$ echo $PATH
/bin:/usr/bin:.
$

Chances are that your PATH has a slightly different value. As noted, the PATH specifies the directories that the shell searches to execute a command. These directories are separated from one
another by colons (:). In the preceding example, three directories are listed: /bin, /usr/bin,
and . (which, you'll recall, stands for the current directory). So whenever you type in the name of a
program, say for example rolo, the shell searches the directories listed in PATH from left to right
until it finds an executable file called rolo. First it looks in /bin, then in /usr/bin, and finally in
the current directory for an executable file called rolo. As soon as it finds rolo, the shell executes
it; if the shell doesn't find rolo, the shell issues a not found message.
The path
/bin:.:/usr/bin

1Actually,

the shell is a bit more intelligent, because it keeps track of where it finds each command you execute. When you re-execute one of
these commands, the shell remembers where it was found and doesn't go searching for it again. This feature is known as hashing.

Your Environment

183

specifies to search /bin, followed by the current directory, followed by /usr/bin. To have the
current directory searched first, you put the period at the start of the path:
.:/bin:/usr/bin

For security reasons, it's generally not a good idea to have your current directory searched before
the system ones.2
The period for specifying the current directory is optional; for example, the path
:/bin:/usr/bin

is equivalent to the previous one; however, throughout this text we'll specify the current directory
with a period for clarity.
You can always override the PATH variable by specifying a path to the file to be executed. For
example, if you type
/bin/date

the shell goes directly to /bin to execute date. The PATH in this case is ignored, as it is if you type
in
../bin/lu

or
./rolo

This last case says to execute the program rolo in the current directory.
So now you understand why you couldn't execute rolo from your HOME directory: /users/steve/
bin wasn't included in your PATH, and so the shell couldn't find rolo. This is a simple matter to
rectify. You can simply add this directory to your PATH:
$ PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:.:/users/steve/bin
$

Now any program in /users/steve/bin can be executed by you from anywhere:

$ pwd
/users/steve
$ rolo Liz
grep: can't open phonebook
$

Where am I?

This time the shell finds rolo and executes it, but grep can't find the phonebook file. Look back
at the rolo program, and you'll see that the grep error message must be coming from lu. Take
another look at lu:
$ cat /users/steve/bin/lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book -- version 3
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]

2This is to avoid the so-called Trojan horse problem:Someone stores her own version of a command such as su (the command that changes

you to another user) in a directory she can write into and waits for another user to change to that directory and run su. If the PATH specifies
that the current directory be searched first, then the horsed version of su will be executed. This version will get the password that is typed
and then print out Sorry. The user will think he just typed the wrong password.

Your Environment

184

then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: lu name"
exit 1
fi
grep "$name" phonebook
$

grep is trying to open the phonebook file in the current directory, which is /users/steve (that's
where the program is being executed fromthe current directory has no relation to the directory in
which the program itself resides).
The PATH only specifies the directories to be searched for programs to be executed, and not for
any other types of files. So phonebook must be precisely located for lu. There are several ways
to fix this problema problem which, by the way, exists with the rem and add programs as well.
One approach is to have the lu program change directory to /users/steve/bin before it does
the grep. That way, grep finds phonebook because it exists in the current directory:
...
cd /users/steve/bin
grep "$1" phonebook

This approach is a good one to take when you're doing a lot of work with different files in a particular
directory: simply cd to the directory first and then you can directly reference all the files you need.
A second approach is to simply list a full path to phonebook in the grep command:
...
grep "$1" /users/steve/bin/phonebook

But suppose that you want to let others use your rolo program (and associated lu, add, and
rem programs). You can give them each their own copy, and then you'll have several copies of the
identical program on the systemprograms that you'll probably have to maintain. And what happens
if you make a small change to rolo? Are you going to update all their copies as well? A better
solution might be to keep just one copy of rolo but to give other users access to it.3
If you change all the references of phonebook to explicitly reference your phone book, everyone
else who uses your rolo program will be using your phone book, and not his own. One way to solve
the problem is to require that everyone have a phonebook file in his home directory; this way, if the
program references the file as $HOME/phonebookw, it will be relative to the home directory of the
person running the program.
Let's try this approach: Define a variable inside rolo called PHONEBOOK and set it to $HOME/phonebook. If you then export this variable, lu, rem, and add (which are executed as subshells by
rolo) can use the value of PHONEBOOK to reference the file. One advantage of this is if in the future
you change the location of the phonebook file, all you'll have to do is change this one variable in
rolo; the other three programs can remain untouched.
Here is the new rolo program, followed by modified lu, add, and rem programs.
$ cd /users/steve/bin
$ cat rolo
#
# rolo - rolodex program to look up, add, and
#
remove people from the phone book
#
3This

can be done by giving them execute permission on all the directories leading to rolo, as well as read and execute permissions on the
programs themselves. They can always copy your programs at that point, but you won't have to maintain them.

Your Environment

185

#
# Set PHONEBOOK to point to the phone book file
# and export it so other progs know about it
#
PHONEBOOK=$HOME/phonebook
export PHONEBOOK
if [ ! -f "$PHONEBOOK" ]
then
echo "No phone book file in $HOME!"
exit 1
fi
#
# If arguments are supplied, then do a lookup
#
if [ "$#" -ne 0 ]
then
lu "$@"
exit
fi
validchoice=""

# set it null

Your Environment

186

$ cat add
#
# Program to add someone to the phone book file
#
if [ "$#" -ne 2 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: add name number"
exit 1
fi
echo "$1
$2" >> $PHONEBOOK
sort -o $PHONEBOOK $PHONEBOOK
$ cat lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: lu name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

if [ $? -ne 0 ]
then
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
$ cat rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: rem name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
#
# Find number of matching entries
#
matches=$(grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK | wc l)

#
# If more than one match, issue message, else remove it
#
if [ "$matches" -gt 1 ]
then
echo "More than one match; please qualify further"
elif [ "$matches" -eq 1 ]
then
grep -v "$name" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/phonebook$$
mv /tmp/phonebook$$ $PHONEBOOK
else
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
$

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187

(In an effort to be more user-friendly, a test was added to the end of lu to see whether the grep
succeeds; if it doesn't, a message is displayed to the user.)
Now to test it:
$ cd
$ rolo Liz
No phonebook file in /users/steve!
$ mv /users/steve/bin/phonebook .
$ rolo Liz
Liz Stachiw
212-555-2298
$ rolo
Would you like to:

Return home
Quick lookup
Forgot to move it
Try again
Try menu selection

1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book
Please select one of the above (1-3): 2
Enter name to be added: Teri Zak
Enter number: 201-555-6000
$ rolo Teri
Teri Zak
201-555-6000
$

rolo, lu, and add seem to be working fine. rem should also be tested to make sure that it's okay
as well.
If you still want to run lu, rem, or add standalone, you can do it provided that you first define
PHONEBOOK and export it:
$
$
$
I
$

PHONEBOOK=$HOME/phonebook
export PHONEBOOK
lu Harmon
couldn't find Harmon in the phone book

If you do intend to run these programs standalone, you'd better put checks in the individual programs
to ensure that PHONEBOOK is set to some value.

Your Current Directory

Your current directory is also part of your environment. Take a look at this small shell program called
cdtest:
$ cat cdtest
cd /users/steve/bin
pwd
$

The program does a cd to /users/steve/bin and then executes a pwd to verify that the change
was made. Let's run it:
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ cdtest
/users/steve/bin
$

Get my bearings

Now for the $64,000 question: If you execute a pwd command now, will you be in /users/
steve or /users/steve/bin?

Your Environment

188

$ pwd
/users/steve
$

The cd executed in cdtest had no effect on your current directory. Because the current directory
is part of the environment, when a cd is executed from a subshell, the current directory of that
subshell is altered. There is no way to change the current directory of a parent shell from a subshell.
When cd is invoked, it sets the PWD shell variable to the full pathname of the new current directory,
so the command
echo $PWD

produces the same output as the pwd command:

$ pwd
/users/steve
$ echo $PWD
/users/steve
$ cd bin
$ echo $PWD
/users/steve/bin
$

cd also sets OLDPWD to the full pathname of the previous current directory.
Incidentally, cd is a shell built-in command.

CDPATH
The CDPATH variable works like the PATH variable: It specifies a list of directories to be searched
by the shell whenever you execute a cd command. This search is done only if the specified directory
is not given by a full pathname and if CDPATH is not null (obviously). So if you type in
cd /users/steve

the shell changes your directory directly to /users/steve; but if you type
cd memos

the shell looks at your CDPATH variable to find the memos directory. And if your CDPATH looks like
this:
$ echo $CDPATH
.:/users/steve:/users/steve/docs
$

the shell first looks in your current directory for a memos directory, and if not found then looks in /
users/steve for a memos directory, and if not found there tries /users/steve/docs in a last
ditch effort to find the directory. If the directory that it finds is not relative to your current one, the
cd command prints the full path to the directory to let you know where it's taking you:
$ cd /users/steve
$ cd memos
/users/steve/docs/memos
$ cd bin
/users/steve/bin
$

Like the PATH variable, use of the period for specifying the current directory is optional, so

Your Environment

189

:/users/steve:/users/steve/docs

is equivalent to
.:/users/steve:/users/steve/docs

Judicious use of the CDPATH variable can save you a lot of typing, especially if your directory hierarchy is fairly deep and you find yourself frequently moving around in it (or if you're frequently moving
around into other directory hierarchies as well).
Unlike the PATH, you'll probably want to put your current directory first in the CDPATH list. This gives
you the most natural use of CDPATH (because you're used to doing a cd x to switch to the subdirectory x). If the current directory isn't listed first, you may end up in an unexpected directory.

More on Subshells
It's important for you to understand the way subshells work and how they interact with your environment. You know now that a subshell can't change the value of a variable in a parent shell, nor
can it change its current directory. Suppose that you want to write a program to set values for some
variables that you like to use whenever you log on. For example, assume that you have the following
file called vars:
$ cat vars
BOOK=/users/steve/book
UUPUB=/usr/spool/uucppublic
DOCS=/users/steve/docs/memos
DB=/usr2/data
$

You know that if you execute vars, the values assigned to these variables will not be accessible
by you after this program has finished executing because vars will be run in a subshell:
$ vars
$ echo $BOOK
$

The . Command
Luckily, there is a shell built-in command called . (pronounced dot) whose general format is
. file

and whose purpose is to execute the contents of file in the current shell. That is, commands from
file are executed by the current shell just as if they were typed at that point. A subshell is not spawned
to execute the program. The shell uses your PATH variable to find file, just like it does when executing
other programs.
$ . vars
$ echo $BOOK
/users/steve/book
$

Execute vars in the current shell

Hoorah!

Because a subshell isn't spawned to execute the program, any variable that gets assigned a value
stays even after execution of the program is completed. It follows then that if you have a program
called db that has the following commands in it:

Your Environment

190

$ cat db
DATA=/usr2/data
RPTS=$DATA/rpts
BIN=$DATA/bin
cd $DATA
$

executing db with the dot command

$ . db
$

defines the three variables DATA, RPTS, and BIN in the current shell and then changes you to the
$DATA directory.
$ pwd
/usr2/data
$

This last example brings up an interesting point of discussion. If you're one of those Unix users who
have to support a few different directory hierarchies, you can create programs like db to execute
whenever you have to work on one of your directories. In that program, you can also include definitions for other variables; for example, you might want to change your prompt in PS1 to something
like DBto let you know that your database variables have been set up. You may also want to
change your PATH to include a directory that has programs related to the database and your
CDPATH variable so that directories in the database will be easily accessible with the cd command.
You can even change HOME so that a cd without any arguments returns you directly to your database
directory.
If you make these sorts of changes, you'll probably want to execute db in a subshell and not in the
current shell because doing the latter leaves all the modified variables around after you've finished
your work on the database. The trick to doing it right is to start up a new shell from inside the subshell,
with all the modified variables exported to it. Then, when you're finished working with the database,
you can log off the new shell by pressing Ctrl+d. Let's take a look at how this works. Here is a new
version of db:
$ cat db
#
# Set up and export variables related to the data base
#
HOME=/usr2/data
BIN=$HOME/bin
RPTS=$HOME/rpts
DATA=$HOME/rawdata
PATH=$PATH$BIN
CDPATH=:$HOME:$RPTS
PS1="DB: "
export HOME BIN RPTS DATA PATH CDPATH PS1
#
# Start up a new shell
#
/usr/bin/sh
$

Your Environment

191

The HOME directory is set to /usr2/data, and then the variables BIN, RPTS, and DATA are defined
relative to this HOME (a good idea in case you ever have to move the directory structure somewhere
else: all you'd have to change in the program is the variable HOME).
Next, the PATH is modified to include the database bin directory, and the CDPATH variable is set
to search the current directory, the HOME directory, and the RPTS directory (which presumably contains subdirectories).
After exporting these variables (which as you recall must be done to put the values of these variables
into the environment of subsequently spawned subshells), the standard shell, /usr/bin/sh, is
started. From that point on, this new shell processes commands typed in from the terminal. When
Ctrl+d is typed to this shell, control returns to db, which in turn returns control to your login shell.
$ db
DB: echo $HOME
/usr2/data
DB: cd rpts
/usr2/data/rpts
DB: ps
PID TTY TIME COMMAND
123 13 0:40 sh
761 13 0:01 sh
765 13 0:01 sh
769 13 0:03 ps
DB: Ctrl+d
$ echo $HOME
/users/steve
$

Run it
Try out CDPATH
It works
See what processes are running
Your login shell
Subshell running db
New shell run from db
Done for now
Back to normal

The execution of db is depicted in Figure 11.7 (where we've shown only the exported variables of
interest, not necessarily all that exist in the environment).

Your Environment

192

Figure 11.7. Executing db.

The exec Command

After you started up the new shell from db, you weren't interested in doing anything further after the
shell finished, as evidenced by the fact that no commands followed /usr/bin/sh in the program.
Instead of having db wait around for the new shell to finish, you can use the exec command to
replace the current program (db) with the new one (/usr/bin/sh). The general format of exec is
exec program

where program is the name of the program to be executed. Because the exec'ed program replaces
the current one, there's one less process hanging around; also, startup time of an exec'ed program
is quicker, due to the way the Unix system executes processes.
To use exec in the db program, you simply replace the last line with
exec /usr/bin/sh

As noted, after this gets executed, db will be replaced by /usr/bin/sh. This means that it's pointless to have any commands follow the exec because they'll never be executed.
exec can be used to close standard input and reopen it with any file that you want to read. To
change standard input to file, you use the exec command in the form
exec < file

Your Environment

193

Any commands that subsequently read data from standard input will read from file.
Redirection of standard output is done similarly. The command
exec > report

redirects all subsequent output written to standard output to the file report. Note here that exec
is not used to start up execution of a new program as previously described; here it is used to reassign
standard input or standard output.
If you use exec to reassign standard input and later want to reassign it someplace else, you can
simply execute another exec. To reassign standard input back to the terminal, you would write
exec < /dev/tty

The same discussion applies to reassignment of standard output.

The (...) and { ...; } Constructs

Sometimes you may want to group a set of commands together for some reason. For example, you
may want to send a sort followed by execution of your plotdata program into the background
for execution. You can group a set of commands together by enclosing them in a set of parentheses
or braces. The first form causes the commands to be executed by a subshell, the latter form by the
current shell.
Here are some examples to illustrate how they work:
$ x=50
$ (x=100)
$ echo $x
50
$ { x=100; }
$ echo $x
100
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ (cd bin; ls)
add
greetings
lu
number
phonebook
rem
rolo
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ { cd bin; }
$ pwd
/users/steve/bin
$

Execute this in a subshell

Didn't change
Execute this in the current shell
Where am I?
Change to bin and do an ls

No change
This should change me

If the commands enclosed in the braces are all to be typed on the same line, a space must follow
the left brace, and a semicolon must appear after the last command.
As the example
(cd bin; ls)

shows, the parentheses are useful for doing some commands without affecting your current environment. You can also use them for other purposes:
$ (sort 2002data -o 2002data; plotdata 2002data) &
[1]
3421
$

Your Environment

194

The parentheses group the sort and plotdata commands together so that they can both be sent
to the background for execution, with their order of execution preserved.
Input and output can be piped to and from these constructs, and I/O can be redirected. In the next
example, a
.ls 2

nroff command (for double-spaced output) is effectively tacked to the beginning of the file memo
before being sent to nroff.
$ { echo ".ls 2"; cat memo; } | nroff -Tlp | lp

In the command sequence

$ { prog1; prog2; prog3; } 2> errors

all messages written to standard error by the three programs are collected into the file errors.
As a final example, let's return to the mon program from Chapter 9, 'Round and 'Round She Goes.
As you'll recall, this program periodically checked for a user logging on to the system. One of the
comments we made back then is that it would be nice if the program could somehow automatically
send itself to the background for execution because that's how it's really meant to be run. Now you
know how to do it: You simply enclose the until loop and the commands that follow inside parentheses and send it into the background:
$ cat mon
#
# Wait until a specified user logs on -- version 4
#
# Set up default values
mailopt=FALSE
interval=60
# process command options
while getopts mt: option
do
case "$option"
in
m)
mailopt=TRUE;;
t)
interval=$OPTARG;;
\?)
echo "Usage: mon [-m] [-t n] user"
echo" -m means to be informed by mail"
echo" -t means check every n secs."
exit 1;;
esac
done
# Make sure a user name was specified
if [ "$OPTIND" -gt "$#" ]
then
echo "Missing user name!"
exit 2
fi
shiftcount=$(( OPTIND 1 ))
shift $shiftcount
user=$1
#
# Send everything that follows into the background
#

Your Environment

195

(
#
# Check for user logging on
#
until who | grep "^$user " > /dev/null
do
sleep $interval
done
#
# When we reach this point, the user has logged on
#
if [ "$mailopt" = FALSE]
then
echo "$user has logged on"
else
runner=$(who am i | cut -c1-8)
echo "$user has logged on" | mail $runner
fi
) &

The entire program could have been enclosed in parentheses, but we arbitrarily decided to do the
argument checking and parsing first before sending the remainder to the background.
$ mon fred
$
...
fred has logged on

Prompt comes back so you can continue working

Note that a process id number is not printed by the shell when a command is sent to the background
within a shell program.

Another Way to Pass Variables to a Subshell

If you want to send the value of a variable to a subshell, there's another way to do it besides setting
the variable and then exporting it. On the command line, you can precede the name of the command
with the assignment of as many variables as you want. For example,
DBHOME=/uxn2/data DBID=452 dbrun

places the variables DBHOME and DBID, and their indicated values, into the environment of
dbrun and then dbrun gets executed. These variables will not be known to the current shell; they're
created only for the execution of dbrun. In fact, execution of the preceding command behaves
identically to typing
(DBHOME=/uxn2/data; DBID=452; export DBHOME DBID; dbrun)

Here's a short example:

$ cat foo1
echo :$x:
foo2
$ cat foo2
echo :$x:
$ foo1
::
::
$ x=100 foo1
:100:

x not known to foo1 or foo2

Try it this way
x is known to foo1

Your Environment

196

:100:
$ echo :$x:
::
$

and to its subshells

Still not known to current shell

So variables defined this way otherwise behave as normal exported variables to the subshell.

Your .profile File

In Chapter 3, What Is the Shell?, you learned about the login sequence. This sequence is completed when your shell displays your command prompt and waits for you to type your first command.
Just before it does that, however, your login shell executes two special files on the system. The first
is /etc/profile. This file is set up by the system administrator and usually does things like
checking to see whether you have mail (Where do you think the You have mail. message
comes from?), setting your default file creation mask (your umask), assigning values to some
standard exported variables, and anything else that the administrator wants to have executed
whenever a user logs in.

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

The second file that gets automatically executed is .profile in your home directory. Your system
administrator may have given you a default .profile file when you got your account. See what's
in it now:
$ cat $HOME/.profile
PATH="/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/lbin:.:"
export PATH
$

Here you see a small .profile file that simply sets the PATH and exports it.

You can change your .profile file to include any commands that you want executed whenever
you log in. You can even put commands in your .profile file that override settings (usually environment variables) made in /etc/profile. Note that the commands in /etc/profile
and .profile are executed by your login shell (as if you typed in
$ . /etc/profile
$ . .profile
$

as soon as you logged in), which means that changes made to your environment remain after the
programs are executed.
Here's a sample .profile that sets your PATH to include your own bin, sets your CDPATH,
changes your primary and secondary command prompts, changes your erase character to a backspace (Ctrl+h) with the stty command, and prints a friendly message using the greetings program from Chapter 8, Decisions, Decisions:
$ cat $HOME/.profile
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/lbin:$HOME/bin:.:
CDPATH=.:$HOME:$HOME/misc:$HOME/documents
PS1="=> "
PS2="====> "
export PATH CDPATH PS1 PS2
stty echoe erase CTRL+h
echo
greetings
$

Your Environment

197

Here's what a login sequence would look like with this .profile:
login: steve
Password:
Good morning
=>

Output from greetings

New PS1

The TERM Variable

If you tend to use more than one type of terminal, the .profile is a good place to put some code
to prompt for the terminal type and then set the TERM variable accordingly. This variable is used by
screen editors such as vi and other screen-based programs.
A sample section of code from a .profile file to prompt for the terminal type might look like this:
echo "What terminal are you using (xterm is the default)? \c"
read TERM
if [ -z "$TERM" ]
then
TERM=xterm
fi
export TERM

Based on the terminal type entered, you may also want to do things such as set up the function keys
or the tabs on the terminal.
Even if you always use the same terminal type, you should set the TERM variable in your .profile file.

The TZ Variable
The TZ variable is used by the date command and some Standard C library functions to determine
time zone information. The simplest setting for TZ is a time zone name of three or more alphabetic
characters followed by a number that specifies the number of hours that must be added to the local
time to arrive at Coordinated Universal Time, also known as Greenwich Mean Time. This number
can be positive (local time zone is west of 0 longitude) or negative (local time zone is east of 0
longitude). For example, Eastern Standard Time can be specified as
TZ=EST5

The date command calculates the correct time based on this information and also uses the time
zone name in its output:
$ TZ=EST5 date
Wed Sep 18 15:24:09 EST 2002
$ TZ=xyz3 date
Wed Sep 18 17:24:28 xyz 2002
$

A second time zone name can follow the number; if this time zone is specified, daylight savings time
is assumed to apply (date automatically adjusts the time in this case when daylight saving is in
effect) and is assumed to be one hour earlier than standard time. If a number follows the daylight
saving time zone name, this value is used to compute the daylight savings time from the Coordinated
Universal Time in the same way as the number previously described.
So, the following TZ settings are quivalent:

Your Environment

198

TZ=EST5EDT
TZ=EST5EDT6

The TZ variable is usually set in either the /etc/profile file or your .profile file. If not set, an
implementation-specific default time zone is used, typically Coordinated Universal Time.

Exercises
1: Write a program called myrm that takes as arguments the names of files to be removed. If the
global variable MAXFILES is set, take it as the maximum number of files to remove without
question. If the variable is not set, use 10 as the maximum. If the number of files to be removed
exceeds this count, ask the user for confirmation before removing the files:
$ ls | wc -l
25
$ myrm *
Remove 25 files (y/n)? n
files not removed
$ MAXFILES=100 myrm *
$ ls
$

Remove them all

All files removed

If MAXFILES is set to zero, the check should be suppressed.

2: Here are two programs called prog1 and prog2:
$ cat prog1
e1=100
export e1
e2=200
e3=300 prog2
$ cat prog2
echo $e1 $e2 $e3 $e4
$

What output would you expect after typing the following:

$ e2=20; export e2
$ e4=40 prog1

3: Modify rolo from this chapter so that a person running the program can keep his or her phone
book file in any directory and not just in the home directory. This can be done by requiring that
the user set an exported variable called PHONEBOOK to the name of the phone book file before
executing rolo. Check to make sure that this variable is set to a valid file. If the variable is not
set, have the program assume that the phone book file is in the user's home directory as before.
Here are some examples:
$ PHONEBOOK=/users/steve/personal lu Gregory
Gregory
973-555-0370
$ PHONEBOOK=/users/pat/phonebook lu Toritos
El Toritos
973-555-2236
$

In the preceding example, we assume that the user steve has been granted read access to
pat's phone book file.

199

Chapter 12. More on Parameters

IN THIS CHAPTER

Parameter Substitution
The $0 Variable
The set Command
The IFS Variable

The readonly Command

The unset Command
Exercises
In this chapter, you'll learn some more about parameters. Technically, parameters include the arguments passed to a program (the positional parameters), the special shell variables such as $#
and $?, and ordinary variables, also known as keyword parameters.
Positional parameters cannot be assigned values directly; however, they can be reassigned values
with the set command. Keyword parameters are assigned values simply by writing
variable=value

The format is a bit more general than that shown; actually, you can assign several keyword parameters at once using the format
variable=value variable=value ...

as the following example illustrates:

$ x=100 y=200 z=50
$ echo $x $y $z
100 200 50
$

Parameter Substitution
In the simplest form, to have the value of a parameter substituted, you simply precede the parameter
with a dollar sign, as in $i or $9.

${parameter}
If there's a potential conflict caused by the characters that follow the parameter name, you can
enclose the name inside curly braces, as in
mv $file ${file}x

This command would add an x to the end of the filename specified by $file and could not be
written as

More on Parameters

200

mv $file $filex

because the shell would substitute the value of filex for the second argument.
As mentioned in Chapter 7, Passing Arguments, to access positional parameters 10 and above,
you must enclose the number inside the curly braces, as in ${11}.

${parameter:-value}
This construct says to substitute the value of parameter if it is not null, and to substitute value
otherwise. For example, in the command line
echo Using editor ${EDITOR:-/bin/vi}

the shell substitutes the value of EDITOR if it's not null, and the value /bin/vi otherwise. It has
the same effect as writing
if [ -n "$EDITOR" ]
then
echo Using editor $EDITOR
else
echo Using editor /bin/vi
fi

The command line

${EDITOR:-/bin/ed} /tmp/edfile

starts up the program stored in the variable EDITOR (presumably a text editor), or /bin/ed if
EDITOR is null.
Here's a simple test of this construct from the terminal:
$ EDITOR=/bin/ed
$ echo ${EDITOR:-/bin/vi}
/bin/ed
$ EDITOR=
$ echo ${EDITOR:-/bin/vi}
/bin/vi
$

Set it null

${parameter:=value}
This version is similar to the last, only if parameter is null; not only is value used, but it is also assigned
to parameter as well (note the = in the construct). You can't assign values to positional parameters
this way (that means that parameter can't be a number).
A typical use of this construct would be in testing to see whether an exported variable has been set
and, if not, setting it to a default value, as in
${PHONEBOOK:=$HOME/phonebook}

This says that if PHONEBOOK is set to some value, leave it alone; otherwise, set it to $HOME/phonebook.
Note that the preceding example could not stand alone as a command because after the substitution
was performed the shell would attempt to execute the result:
$ PHONEBOOK=
$ ${PHONEBOOK:=$HOME/phonebook}
sh: /users/steve/phonebook: cannot execute
$

More on Parameters

201

To use this construct as a standalone command, the null command is often employed. If you write
: $ {PHONEBOOK:=$HOME/phonebook}

the shell still does the substitution (it evaluates the rest of the command line), yet executes nothing
(the null command).
$ PHONEBOOK=
$ : ${PHONEBOOK:=$HOME/phonebook}
$ echo $PHONEBOOK
/users/steve/phonebook
$ : ${PHONEBOOK:=foobar}
$ echo $PHONEBOOK
/users/steve/phonebook
$

See if it got assigned

Shouldn't change it
It didn't

${parameter:?value}
If parameter is not null, the shell substitutes its value; otherwise, the shell writes value to standard
error and then exits (don't worryif it's done from your login shell, you won't be logged off). If
value is omitted, the shell writes the message
prog: parameter: parameter null or not set

Here's an example from the terminal:

$ PHONEBOOK=
$ : ${PHONEBOOK:?"No PHONEBOOK file!"}
No PHONEBOOK file!
$ : ${PHONEBOOK:?}
Don't give a value
sh: PHONEBOOK: parameter null or not set
$

With this construct, you can easily check to see whether a set of variables needed by a program
are all set and not null, as in
: ${TOOLS:?}

${EXPTOOLS:?}

${TOOLBIN:?}

${parameter:+value}
This one substitutes value if parameter is not null; otherwise, it substitutes nothing.
$ traceopt=T
$ echo options: ${traceopt:+"trace mode"}
options: trace mode
$ traceopt=
$ echo options: ${traceopt:+"trace mode"}
options:
$

The value part for any of the constructs in this section can be a command substitution; it's executed
by the shell only if its value is to be used. In
WORKDIR=${DBDIR:-$(pwd)}

WORKDIR is assigned the value of DBDIR if it's not null; otherwise, the pwd command is executed
and the result assigned to WORKDIR. pwd is executed only if DBDIR is null.

More on Parameters

202

Pattern Matching Constructs

The POSIX standard shell provides four parameter substitution constructs that perform pattern
matching. Note that some older shells do not support this feature.
In each case, the construct takes two arguments: a variable name (or parameter number) and a
pattern. The shell searches through the contents of the specified variable to match the supplied
pattern. If the pattern is matched, the shell substitutes the value of the variable on the command
line, with the matching portion of the pattern deleted. If the pattern is not matched, the entire contents
of the variable are substituted on the command line. In any case, the contents of the variable remain
unchanged.
The term pattern is used here because the shell allows you to use the same pattern matching
characters that it accepts in filename substitution and case values: * to match zero or more characters, ? to match any single character, [...] to match any single character from the specified
set, and [!...] to match any single character not in the specified set.
When you write the construct
${variable%pattern}

the shell looks inside variable to see whether it ends with the specified pattern. If it does, the contents
of variable are substituted on the command line with the shortest matching pattern removed from
the right.
If you use the construct
${variable%%pattern}

the shell once again looks inside variable to see whether it ends with pattern. This time, however,
it removes the longest matching pattern from the right. This is relevant only if the * is used in
pattern. Otherwise, the % and %% behave the same way.
The # is used in a similar way to force the pattern matching to occur on the left rather than the right.
So, the construct.
${variable#pattern}

tells the shell to substitute the value of variable on the command line, with pattern removed from
the left.
Finally, the shell construct
${variable##pattern}

works like the # form, only the longest occurrence of pattern is removed from the left.
Remember that in all four cases, no permanent changes are made to the variable itself; you are
affecting only what gets substituted on the command line. Also, remember that the pattern matches
are anchored. In the case of the % and %% constructs, the variables must end with the specified
pattern; in the case of the # and ## constructs, the variable must begin with it.
Here are some simple examples to show how these constructs work:
$ var=testcase
$ echo $var
testcase
$ echo ${var%e}
testcas
$ echo $var
testcase
$ echo ${var%s*e}

Remove e from right

Variable is unchanged
Remove smallest match from right

More on Parameters
testca
$ echo ${var%%s*e}
te
$ echo ${var#?e}
stcase
$ echo ${var#*s}
tcase
$ echo ${var##*s}
e
$ echo ${var#test}
case
$ echo ${var#teas}
testcase
$

203
Remove longest match
Remove smallest match from left
Remove smallest match from left
Remove longest match from left
Remove test from left
No match

There are many practical uses for these constructs, even though these examples don't seem to
show it. For example, the following tests to see whether the filename stored inside the variable
file ends in the two characters .o:
if [ ${file%.o} != $file ]
then
# file ends in .o
...
fi

As another example, here's a shell program that works just like the Unix system's basename command:
$ cat mybasename
echo ${1##*/}
$

The program displays its argument with all the characters up to the last / removed:
$ mybasename /usr/spool/uucppublic
uucppublic
$ mybasename $HOME
steve
$ mybasename memos
memos
$

${#variable}
This construct gives you the ability to count the number of characters stored inside a variable. For
example,
$ text='The shell'
$ echo ${#text}
9
$

Note that some older shells do not support this feature.

Each of the parameter substitution constructs described in this section is summarized in Table A.
3 in Appendix A, Shell Summary.

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204

The $0 Variable
Whenever you execute a shell program, the shell automatically stores the name of the program
inside the special variable $0. This can be used to advantage when you have two or more programs
that are linked under different names and you want to know which one was executed. It's also useful
for displaying error messages because it removes the dependency of the filename from the program.
If the name of the program is referenced by $0, subsequently renaming the program will not require
the program to be edited:
$ cat lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: $0 name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK
if [ $? -ne 0 ]
then
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
$ PHONEBOOK=$HOME/phonebook
$ export PHONEBOOK
$ lu Teri
Teri Zak
201-555-6000
$ lu Teri Zak
Incorrect number of arguments
Usage: lu name
$ mv lu lookup
Rename it
$ lookup Teri Zak
See what happens now
Incorrect number of arguments
Usage: lookup name
$

The set Command

The shell's set command is a dual-purpose command: it's used both to set various shell options
as well as to reassign the positional parameters $1, $2, and so forth.

The -x Option
This option turns on trace mode in the shell. It does to the current shell what the command
sh -x ctype a

did for the execution of the ctype program in Chapter 8, Decisions, Decisions. From the point
that the
set -x

command is executed, all subsequently executed commands will be printed to standard error by the
shell, after filename, variable, and command substitution and I/O redirection have been performed.
The traced commands are preceded by plus signs.

More on Parameters
$ x=*
$ set -x
$ echo $x
+ echo add greetings lu rem rolo
add greetings lu rem rolo
$ cmd=wc
+ cmd=wc
$ ls | $cmd -l
+ ls
+ wc -l
5
$

205
Set command trace option

You can turn off trace mode at any time simply by executing set with the +x option:
$ set +x
+ set +x
$ ls | wc l
5
$

Back to normal

You should note that the trace option is not passed down to subshells. But you can trace a subshell's
execution either by running the shell with the -x option followed by the name of the program to be
executed, as in
sh -x rolo

or you can insert a set -x command inside the file itself. In fact, you can insert any number of set
-x and set +x commands inside your program to turn trace mode on and off as desired.

set with No Arguments

If you don't give any arguments to set, you'll get an alphabetized list of all the variables that exist
in your environment, be they local or exported:
$ set
CDPATH=:/users/steve:/usr/spool
EDITOR=/bin/vi
HOME=/users/steve
IFS=

Show me all variables

LOGNAME=steve
MAIL=/usr/spool/mail/steve
MAILCHECK=600
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/users/steve/bin:.:
PHONEBOOK=/users/steve/phonebook
PS1=$
PS2=>
PWD=/users/steve/misc
SHELL=/usr/bin/sh
TERM=xterm
TMOUT=0
TZ=EST5EDT
cmd=wc
x=*
$

Using set to Reassign Positional Parameters

There is no way to directly assign a value to a positional parameter; for example,
1=100

More on Parameters

206

does not work. These parameters are initially set on execution of the shell program. The only way
they may be changed is with the shift or the set commands. If words are given as arguments to
set on the command line, those words will be assigned to the positional parameters $1, $2, and
so forth. The previous values stored in the positional parameters will be lost forever. So
set a b c

assigns a to $1, b to $2, and c to $3. $# also gets set to 3.

$ set one two three four
$ echo $1:$2:$3:$4
one:two:three:four
$ echo $#
4
$ echo $*
one two three four
$ for arg; do echo $arg; done
one
two
three
four
$

This should be 4
What does this reference now?

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

So after execution of the set, everything seems to work consistently: $#, $*, and the for loop
without a list.
set is often used in this fashion to parse data read from a file or the terminal. Here's a program
called words that counts the number of words typed on a line (using the shell's definition of a word):
$ cat words
#
# Count words on a line
#

read line
set $line
echo $#
$ words
Here's a line for you to count.
7
$

Run it

The program stores the line read in the shell variable line and then executes the command
set $line

This causes each word stored in line to be assigned to the positional parameters. The variable
$# is also set to the number of words assigned, which is the number of words on the line.

The -- Option
Try typing in a line to words that begins with a - and see what happens:
$ words
-1 + 5 = 4
words: -1: bad option(s)
$

After the line was read and assigned to line, the command
set $line

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207

was executed. After the shell did its substitution, the command line looked like this:
set -1 + 5 = 4

When set executed, it saw the - and thought that an option was being selected, thus explaining
the error message.
Another problem with words occurs if you give it a line consisting entirely of whitespace characters,
or if the line is null:
$ words
Just Enter is pressed
CDPATH=.:/users/steve:/usr/spool
EDITOR=/bin/vi
HOME=/users/steve
IFS=
LOGNAME=steve
MAIL=/usr/spool/mail/steve
MAILCHECK=600
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/users/steve/bin:.:
PHONEBOOK=/users/steve/phonebook
PS1=$
PS2=>
PWD=/users/steve/misc
SHELL=/usr/bin/sh
TERM=xterm
TMOUT=0
TZ=EST5EDT
cmd=wc
x=*
0
$

To protect against both of these problems occurring, you can use the -- option to set. This tells
set not to interpret any subsequent arguments on the command line as options. It also prevents
set from displaying all your variables if no other arguments follow, as was the case when you typed
a null line.
So the set command in words should be changed to read
set -- $line

With the addition of a while loop and some integer arithmetic, the words program can be easily
modified to count the total number of words on standard input, giving you your own version of wc
-w:
$ cat words
#
# Count all of the words on standard input
#
count=0
while read line
do
set -- $line
count=$(( count + $# ))
done
echo $count
$

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208

After each line is read, the set command is executed to take advantage of the fact that $# will be
assigned the number of words on the line. The -- option is supplied to set just in case any of the
lines read begins with a - or consists entirely of whitespace characters.
The value of $# is then added into the variable count, and the next line is read. When the loop is
exited, the value of count is displayed. This represents the total number of words read.
$ words < /etc/passwd
567
$ wc -w < /etc/passwd
567
$

Check against wc

(Our version is a lot slower than wc because the latter is written in C.)
Here's a quick way to count the number of files in your directory:1
$ set *
$ echo $#
8
$

This is much faster than

ls | wc -l

because the first method uses only shell built-in commands. In general, your shell programs run
much faster if you try to get as much done as you can using the shell's built-in commands.

Other Options to set

set accepts several other options, each of them enabled by preceding the option with a -, and
disabled by preceding it with a +. The -x option that we have described here is perhaps the most
commonly used. Others are summarized in Table A.9 in Appendix A.

The IFS Variable

There is a special shell variable called IFS, which stands for Internal Field Separator. The shell
uses the value of this variable when parsing input from the read command, output from command
substitution (the back-quoting mechanism), and when performing variable substitution. If it's typed
on the command line, the shell treats it like a normal whitespace character (that is, as a word delimiter).
See what it's set to now:
$ echo "$IFS"
$

Well, that wasn't very illuminating! To determine the actual characters stored in there, pipe the output
from echo into the od (octal dump) command with the -b (byte display) option:

1This

technique may not work on very large directories because you may exceed the limit on the length of the command line (the precise
length varies between Unix systems). Working with such directories may cause problems when using filename substitution in other
commands as well, such as echo * or for file in *.

More on Parameters

209

$ echo "$IFS" | od b
0000000 040 011 012 012
0000004
$

The first column of numbers shown is the relative offset from the start of the input. The following
numbers are the octal equivalents of the characters read by od. The first such number is 040, which
is the ASCII value of the space character. It's followed by 011, the tab character, and then by
012, the newline character. The next character is another newline; this was written by the echo.
These characters for IFS come as no surprise; they're the whitespace characters we've talked
about throughout the book.
You can change your IFS to any character or characters you want. This is useful when you want
to parse a line of data whose fields aren't delimited by the normal whitespace characters. For example, we noted that the shell normally strips any leading whitespace characters from the beginning
of any line that you read with the read command. You can change your IFS to just a newline
character before the read is executed, which has the effect of preserving the leading whitespace
(because the shell won't consider it a field delimiter):
$ read line

Try it the "old" way

Here's a line

$ echo "$line"
Here's a line
$ IFS="
> "
$ read line
Here's a line
$ echo "$line"
Here's a line
$

Set it to a just a newline

Try it again
Leading spaces preserved

To change the IFS to just a newline, an open quote was typed, followed immediately by the pressing
of the Enter key, followed by the closed quote on the next line. No additional characters can be
typed inside those quotes because they'll be stored inside IFS and then used by the shell.
Now let's change the IFS to something more visible, like a colon:
$ IFS=:
$ read x y z
123:345:678
$ echo $x
123
$ echo $z
678
$ list="one:two:three"
$ for x in $list; do echo $x; done
one
two
three
$ var=a:b:c
$ echo "$var"
a:b:c
$

Because the IFS was changed to a colon, when the line was read, the shell divided the line into
three words: 123, 345, and 678, which were stored into the three variables x, y, and z, respectively.
In the next to last example, the shell used the IFS when substituting the value of list in the for
loop. The last example shows that the shell doesn't use the IFS when performing variable assignment.
Changing the IFS is often done in conjunction with execution of the set command:

More on Parameters

210

$ line="Micro Logic Corp.:Box 174:Hackensack, NJ 07602"

$ IFS=:
$ set $line
$ echo $#
How many parameters were set?
3
$ for field; do echo $field; done
Micro Logic Corp.
Box 174
Hackensack, NJ 07602
$

This technique is a powerful one; it uses all built-in shell commands, which also makes it very fast.
(An alternative approach might have been to echo the value of $line into the tr command, where
all colons could have been translated into newlines, an approach that would have been much
slower.) This technique is used in a final version of the rolo program that's presented in Chapter
14, Rolo Revisited.
The following program, called number2, is a final version of the line numbering program presented
in Chapter 10, Reading and Printing Data. This program faithfully prints the input lines to standard
output, preceded by a line number. Notice the use of printf to right-align the line numbers.
$ cat number2
#
# Number lines from files given as argument or from
# standard input if none supplied (final version)
#
# Modify the IFS to preserve leading whitespace on input
IFS='
'
# Just a newline appears between the quotes
lineno=1
cat $* |
while read -r line
do
printf "%5d:%s\n" $lineno "$line"
lineno=$(( lineno + 1 ))
done

Here's a sample execution of number:

$ number2 words
1:#
2:# Count all of the words on standard input
3:#
4:
5:count=0
6:while read line
7:do
8: set -- $line
9: count=$(( count + $# ))
10:done
11:
12:echo $count
$

Because the IFS has an influence on the way things are interpreted by the shell, if you're going to
change it in your program, it's usually wise to save the old value first in another variable (such as
OIFS) and then restore it after you've finished the operations that depend on the changed IFS.

More on Parameters

211

The readonly Command

The readonly command is used to specify variables whose values cannot be subsequently
changed. For example,
readonly PATH HOME

makes the PATH and HOME variables read-only. Subsequently attempting to assign a value to these
variables causes the shell to issue an error message:
$ PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:.:
$ readonly PATH
$ PATH=$PATH:/users/steve/bin
sh: PATH: is read-only
$

Here you see that after the variable PATH was made read-only, the shell printed an error message
when an attempt was made to assign a value to it.
To get a list of your read-only variables, type readonly p without any arguments:2
$ readonly -p
readonly PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:.:
$

unset removes both exported and local shell variables.

You should be aware of the fact that the read-only variable attribute is not passed down to subshells.
Also, after a variable has been made read-only in a shell, there is no way to undo it.

The unset Command

Sometimes you may want to remove the definition of a variable from your environment. To do so,
you type unset followed by the names of the variables:
$ x=100
$ echo $x
100
$ unset x
$ echo $x

Remove x from the environment

You can't unset a read-only variable. Furthermore, the variables IFS, MAILCHECK, PATH, PS1,
and PS2 cannot be unset. Also, some older shells do not support the unset command.

Exercises
1: Given the following variable assignments:
$
$
$
$
$

EDITOR=/bin/vi
DB=
EDITFLAG=yes
PHONEBOOK=

2By

default, Bash produces output of the form declare r variable. To get POSIX-compliant output, you must run Bash with the posix
command-line option or run the set command with the o posix option.

More on Parameters

212

What will be the results of the following commands?

echo ${EDITOR}
echo ${EDITOR:-/bin/ed}
echo ${DB:-/users/pat/db}

echo ${DB:=/users/pat/db}
echo ${PHONEBOOK:?}
ed=${EDITFLAG:+${EDITOR:-/bin/ed}}

2: Rewrite the home program from Exercise 5 in Chapter 7 to use the set command and the IFS
to extract the home directory from /etc/passwd. What happens to the program if one of the
fields in the file is null, as in
steve:*:203:100::/users/steve:/usr/bin/ksh

Here the fifth field is null (::).

3: Using the fact that the shell construct ${#var} gives the number of characters stored in var, rewrite
wc in the shell. Be sure to use integer arithmetic! (Notes: Change your IFS variable to just a
newline character so that leading whitespace characters on input are preserved, and also use
the -r option to the shell's read command so that terminating backslash characters on the input
are ignored.)
4: Write a function called rightmatch that takes two arguments as shown:
rightmatch value pattern

where value is a sequence of one or more characters, and pattern is a shell pattern that is to be
removed from the right side of value. The shortest matching pattern should be removed from
value and the result written to standard output. Here is some sample output:
$ rightmatch test.c .c
test
$ rightmatch /usr/spool/uucppublic '/*'
/usr/spool
$ rightmatch /usr/spool/uucppublic o
/usr/spool/uucppublic
$

The last example shows that the rightmatch function should simply echo its first argument if
it does not end with the specified pattern.
5: Write a function called leftmatch that works similarly to the rightmatch function developed
in Exercise 4. Its two arguments should be as follows:
leftmatch pattern value

Here are some example uses:

$ leftmatch /usr/spool/ /usr/spool/uucppublic
uucppublic
$ leftmatch s. s.main.c
main.c
$

6: Write a function called substring that uses the leftmatch and rightmatch functions developed in Exercises 4 and 5 to remove a pattern from the left and right side of a value. It should
take three arguments as shown:
$ substring /usr/ /usr/spool/uucppublic /uucppublic
spool
$ substring s. s.main.c .c
main
$ substring s. s.main.c .o
Only left match

More on Parameters
main.c
$ substring x. s.main.c .o
s.main.c
$

213
No matches

7: Modify the substring, leftmatch, and rightmatch functions developed in the previous
exercises to take options that allow you to remove the largest possible matches of the specified
pattern from the left or right side of the specified value.

214

Chapter 13. Loose Ends

IN THIS CHAPTER
The eval Command

The wait Command

The trap Command
More on I/O
Functions
The type Command
Exercises

We've put commands and features into this chapter that for one reason or another did not logically
fit into earlier chapters. There's no particular rationale for their order of presentation.

The eval Command

This section describes another of the more unusual commands in the shell: eval. Its format is as
follows:
eval command-line

where command-line is a normal command line that you would type at the terminal. When you put
eval in front of it, however, the net effect is that the shell scans the command line twice before
executing it.1 For the simple case, this really has no effect:
$ eval echo hello
hello
$

But consider the following example without the use of eval:

$ pipe="|"
$ ls $pipe wc -l
|: No such file or directory
wc: No such file or directory
-l: No such file or directory
$

Those errors come from ls. The shell takes care of pipes and I/O redirection before variable substitution, so it never recognizes the pipe symbol inside pipe. The result is that the three arguments
|, wc, and -l are passed to ls as arguments.
1Actually,

what happens is that eval simply executes the command passed to it as arguments; so the shell processes the command line
when passing the arguments to eval, and then once again when eval executes the command. The net result is that the command line is
scanned twice by the shell.

Loose Ends

215

Putting eval in front of the command sequence gives the desired results:
$ eval ls $pipe wc l
16
$

The first time the shell scans the command line, it substitutes | as the value of pipe. Then eval
causes it to rescan the line, at which point the | is recognized by the shell as the pipe symbol.
The eval command is frequently used in shell programs that build up command lines inside one
or more variables. If the variables contain any characters that must be seen by the shell directly on
the command line (that is, not as the result of substitution), eval can be useful. Command terminator
(;, |, &), I/O redirection (<, >), and quote characters are among the characters that must appear
directly on the command line to have any special meaning to the shell.
For the next example, consider writing a program last whose sole purpose is to display the last
argument passed to it. You needed to get at the last argument in the mycp program in Chapter
10, Reading and Printing Data. There you did so by shifting all the arguments until the last one
was left. You can also use eval to get at it as shown:
$ cat last
eval echo \$$#
$ last one two three four
four
$ last *
zoo_report
$

Get the last file

The first time the shell scans

echo \$$#

the backslash tells it to ignore the $ that immediately follows. After that, it encounters the special
parameter $#, so it substitutes its value on the command line. The command now looks like this:
echo $4

(the backslash is removed by the shell after the first scan). When the shell rescans this line, it
substitutes the value of $4 and then executes echo.
This same technique could be used if you had a variable called arg that contained a digit, for
example, and you wanted to display the positional parameter referenced by arg. You could simply
write
eval echo \$$arg

The only problem is that just the first nine positional parameters can be accessed this way; to access
positional parameters 10 and greater, you must use the ${n} construct:
eval echo \${$arg}

Here's how the eval command can be used to effectively create pointers to variables:
$ x=100
$ ptrx=x
$ eval echo \$$ptrx
100
$ eval $ptrx=50
$ echo $x
50
$

Dereference ptrx
Store 50 in var that ptrx points to
See what happened

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216

The wait Command

If you submit a command line to the background for execution, that command line runs in a subshell
independent of your current shell (the job is said to run asynchronously). At times, you may want to
wait for the background process (also known as a child process because it's spawned from your
current shellthe parent) to finish execution before proceeding. For example, you may have sent
a large sort into the background and now want to wait for the sort to finish because you need to
use the sorted data.
The wait command is for such a purpose. Its general format is
wait process-id

where process-id is the process id number of the process you want to wait for. If omitted, the shell
waits for all child processes to complete execution. Execution of your current shell will be suspended
until the process or processes finish execution. You can try the wait command at your terminal:

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

$ sort big-data > sorted_data &

[1] 3423
$ date
Wed Oct 2 15:05:42 EDT 2002
$ wait 3423
$

The $! Variable

Send it to the background

Job number & process id from the shell
Do some other work
Now wait for the sort to finish
When sort finishes, prompt is returned

If you have only one process running in the background, then wait with no argument suffices.
However, if you're running more than one command in the background and you want to wait on a
particular one, you can take advantage of the fact that the shell stores the process id of the last
command executed in the background inside the special variable $!. So the command
wait $!

waits for the last process sent to the background to complete execution. As mentioned, if you send
several commands to the background, you can save the value of this variable for later use with wait:
prog1 &
pid1=$!
...
prog2 &
pid2=$!
...
wait $pid1
...
wait $pid2

# wait for prog1 to finish

# wait for prog2 to finish

The trap Command

When you press the Delete2 or Break key at your terminal during execution of a shell program,
normally that program is immediately terminated, and your command prompt returned. This may
not always be desirable. For instance, you may end up leaving a bunch of temporary files that won't
get cleaned up.

2Some

Unix systems use Ctrl+c rather than the Delete key for this purpose. You can determine which key sequence is used with the stty
command.

Loose Ends

217

The pressing of the Delete key at the terminal sends what's known as a signal to the executing
program. The program can specify the action that should be taken on receipt of the signal. This is
done with the trap command, whose general format is
trap commands signals

where commands is one or more commands that will be executed whenever any of the signals
specified by signals is received.
Numbers are assigned to the different types of signals, and the more commonly used ones are
summarized in Table 13.1. A more complete list is given under the trap command in Appendix
A, Shell Summary.
Table 13.1. Commonly Used Signal Numbers
Signal

Generated for

Exit from the shell

Hangup

Interrupt (for example, Delete, Ctrl+c key)

Software termination signal (sent by kill by default)

As an example of the trap command, the following shows how you can remove some files and
then exit if someone tries to abort the program from the terminal:
trap "rm $WORKDIR/work1$$ $WORKDIR/dataout$$; exit" 2

From the point in the shell program that this trap is executed, the two files work1$$ and dataout
$$ will be automatically removed if signal number 2 is received by the program. So if the user
interrupts execution of the program after this trap is executed, you can be assured that these two
files will be cleaned up. The exit that follows the rm is necessary because without it execution
would continue in the program at the point that it left off when the signal was received.
Signal number 1 is generated for hangup: Either someone intentionally hangs up the line or the line
gets accidentally disconnected. You can modify the preceding trap to also remove the two specified
files in this case by adding signal number 1 to the list of signals:
trap "rm $WORKDIR/work1$$ $WORKDIR/dataout$$; exit"

1 2

Now these files will be removed if the line gets hung up or if the Delete key gets pressed.
The commands specified to trap must be enclosed in quotes if they contain more than one command. Also note that the shell scans the command line at the time that the trap command gets
executed and also again when one of the listed signals is received. So in the preceding example,
the value of WORKDIR and $$ will be substituted at the time that the trap command is executed. If
you wanted this substitution to occur at the time that either signal 1 or 2 was received (for example,
WORKDIR may not have been defined yet), you can put the commands inside single quotes:
trap 'rm $WORKDIR/work1$$ $WORKDIR/dataout$$; exit'

1 2

The trap command can be used to make your programs more user friendly. In the next chapter,
when we revisit the rolo program, the signal generated by the Delete key is caught by the program
and brings the user back to the main menu. In this way, this key can be used to abort the current
operation without exiting from the program.

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218

trap with No Arguments

Executing trap with no arguments results in the display of any traps that you have changed.
$ trap 'echo logged off at $(date) >>$HOME/logoffs' 0
$ trap
List changed traps
trap 'echo logged off at $(date) >>$HOME/logoffs' EXIT
$ Ctrl+d
Log off
login: steve
Log back in
Password:
$ cat $HOME/logoffs
See what happened
logged off at Wed Oct 2 15:11:58 EDT 2002
$

A trap was set to be executed whenever signal 0 was received by the shell. This signal is generated
whenever the shell is exited. Because this was set in the login shell, the trap will be taken when you
log off. The purpose of this trap is to write the time you logged off into the file $HOME/logoffs.
The command is enclosed in single quotes to prevent the shell from executing date when the trap
is defined.
The trap command is then executed with no arguments, which results in the display of the changed
action to be taken for signal 0 (EXIT). Next, steve logs off and then back on again to see whether
the trap works. Displaying the contents of $HOME/logoffs verifies that the echo command was
executed when steve logged off.

Ignoring Signals
If the command listed for trap is null, the specified signal will be ignored when received. For example, the command
trap "" 2

specifies that the interrupt signal is to be ignored. You might want to ignore certain signals when
performing some operation that you don't want interrupted.
Note that the first argument must be specified for a signal to be ignored and is not equivalent to
writing the following, which has a separate meaning of its own:
trap 2

If you ignore a signal, all subshells also ignore that signal. However, if you specify an action to be
taken on receipt of a signal, all subshells will still take the default action on receipt of that signal. For
the signals we've described, this means that the subshells will be terminated.
Suppose that you execute the command
trap "" 2

and then execute a subshell, which in turn executes other shell programs as subshells. If an interrupt
signal is then generated, it will have no effect on the shells or subshells that are executing because
they will all ignore the signal.
If instead of executing the previous trap command you execute
trap : 2

and then execute your subshells, then on receiving the interrupt signal the current shell will do
nothing (it will execute the null command), but all active subshells will be terminated (they will take
the default actiontermination).

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219

Resetting Traps
After you've changed the default action to be taken on receipt of a signal, you can change it back
again with trap if you simply omit the first argument; so
trap 1 2

resets the action to be taken on receipt of signals 1 or 2 back to the default.

More on I/O
You know about the standard constructs <, >, and >> for input redirection, output redirection, and
output redirection with append, respectively. You also know that you can redirect standard error
from any command simply by writing
command 2> file

Sometimes you may want to explicitly write to standard error in your program. You can redirect the
standard output for a command to standard error by writing
command >&

The notation >& specifies output redirection to a file associated with the file descriptor that follows.
File descriptor 0 is standard input, descriptor 1 is standard output, and descriptor 2 is standard error.
Note that no space is permitted between the > and the &.
So to write an error message to standard error, you write
echo "Invalid number of arguments" >&

Frequently, you may want to collect the standard output and the standard error output from a program into the same file. If you know the name of the file, this is straightforward enough:
command >foo 2>>foo

Here, both the standard output and the standard error output from command will be written to foo.
You can also write
command >foo 2>&1

to achieve the same effect; standard output is redirected to foo, and standard error is redirected to
standard output (which has already been redirected to foo). Note that because the shell evaluates
redirection from left to right on the command line, the last example cannot be written
command 2>&1 > foo

because this would first redirect standard error to standard output (your terminal by default) and
then standard output to foo.
You recall that you can also dynamically redirect standard input or output in a program using the
exec command:
exec < datafile

redirects standard input from the file datafile. Subsequent commands executed that read from
standard input will read from datafile instead. The command
exec > /tmp/output

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220

does the same thing with standard output: All commands that subsequently write to standard output
will write to /tmp/output (unless explicitly redirected elsewhere). Naturally, standard error can be
reassigned this way as well:
exec 2> /tmp/errors

Here, all output to standard error will go to /tmp/errors.

<&- and >&The characters >&- have the effect of closing standard output. If preceded by a file descriptor, the
associated file is closed instead. So writing (the impractical)
ls >&-

causes the output from ls to go nowhere because standard output is closed by the shell before
ls is executed.
The same thing applies for input using <&-.
$ wc <&0
$

Inline Input Redirection

If the << characters follow a command in the format
command <<word

the shell uses the lines that follow as the standard input for command, until a line that contains just
word is found. Here's a small example at the terminal:
$
>
>
>
>

wc -l <<ENDOFDATA
here's a line
and another
and yet another
ENDOFDATA
3

Use lines up to ENDOFDATA as standard input

Here the shell fed every line typed into the standard input of wc until it encountered the line containing
just ENDOFDATA.
Inline input redirection is a powerful feature when used inside shell programs. It lets you specify the
standard input to a command directly in the program, thus obviating the need to write it into a separate file first, or to use echo to get it into the standard input of the command.
$ cat mailmsg
mail $* <<END-OF-DATA
Attention:
Our monthly computer users group meeting
will take place on Friday, October 4, 2002 at
8am in Room 1A-308. Please try to attend.
END-OF-DATA
$

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221

To execute this program for all members of the group that are contained in the file users_list,
you could write
mailmsg $(cat users_list)

The shell performs parameter substitution for the redirected input data, executes back-quoted commands, and recognizes the backslash character. However, any other special characters, such as
*, |, and ", are ignored. If you have dollar signs, back quotes, or backslashes in these lines that
you don't want interpreted by the shell, you can precede them with a backslash character. Alternatively, if you want the shell to leave the input lines completely untouched, you can precede the word
that follows the << with a backslash.
$ cat <<FOOBAR
> $HOME
> *****
>
\$foobar
> `date`
> FOOBAR
Terminates the input
/users/steve
*****
$foobar
Wed Oct 2 15:23:15 EDT 2002
$

Here the shell supplies all the lines up to FOOBAR as the input to cat. It substitutes the value for
HOME but not for foobar because it's preceded by a backslash. The date command is also executed because back quotes are interpreted.
$ cat <<\FOOBAR
> \\\\
> `date`
> $HOME
> FOOBAR
\\\\
`date`
$HOME
$

The backslash before FOOBAR tells the shell to leave the following lines alone. So it ignores the
dollar signs, backslashes, and back quotes.
Use care when selecting the word that follows the <<. Generally, just make sure that it's weird
enough so that the chances of it accidentally appearing in the following lines are remote.
If the first character that follows the << is a dash (-), leading tab characters in the input will be
removed by the shell. This is useful for visually indenting the redirected text.
$ cat <<-END
>
Indented lines
>
So there you have it
> END
Indented lines
So there you have it
$

Shell Archives
One of the best uses of the inline input redirection feature is for creating shell archive files. With this
technique, one or more related shell programs can be put into a single file and then shipped to
someone else using the standard Unix mail commands. When the archive is received, it can be
easily unpacked by simply running the shell on it.

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222

For example, here's an archived version of the lu, add, and rem programs used by rolo:
$ cat rolosubs
#
# Archived programs used by rolo.
#
echo Extracting lu
cat >lu <<\THE-END-OF-DATA
#
# Look someone up in the phone book
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: lu name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK
if [ $? -ne 0 ]
then
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
THE-END-OF-DATA
echo Extracting add
cat >add <<\THE-END-OF-DATA
#
# Program to add someone to the phonebook file
#
if [ "$#" -ne 2 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: add name number"
exit 1
fi
echo "$1
$2" >> $PHONEBOOK
sort -o $PHONEBOOK $PHONEBOOK
THE-END-OF-DATA
echo Extracting rem
cat >rem <<\THE-END-OF-DATA
#
# Remove someone from the phone book
#
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]
then
echo "Incorrect number of arguments"
echo "Usage: rem name"
exit 1
fi
name=$1
#
# Find number of matching entries
#
matches=$(grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK | wc l)
#
# If more than one match, issue message, else remove it
#

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223

if [ "$matches" -gt 1 ]
then
echo "More than one match; please qualify further"
elif [ "$matches" -eq 1 ]
then
grep -v "$name" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/phonebook
mv /tmp/phonebook $PHONEBOOK
else
echo "I couldn't find $name in the phone book"
fi
THE-END-OF-DATA
$

To be complete, this archive should probably include rolo as well, but we didn't here to conserve
space.
Now you have one file, rolosubs, that contains the source for the three programs lu, add, and
rem, which can be sent to someone else using mail:
$ mail [email protected] < rolosubs
Mail the archive
$ mail [email protected]
Mail tony a message
Tony,
I mailed you a shell archive containing the programs
lu, add, and rem. rolo itself will be sent along shortly.
Pat
Ctrl+d
$

When tony receives the file in his mail, he can extract the three programs simply by running the
shell on the file (after having first removed some header lines that mail sticks at the beginning of
the file):
$ sh rolosubs
Extracting lu
Extracting add
Extracting rem
$ ls lu add rem
add
lu
rem
$

The shar program used to create the rolosubs archive file is simple:
$ cat shar
#
# Program to create a shell archive
# from a set of files
#
echo "#"
echo "# To restore, type sh archive"
echo "#"
for file
do
echo
echo "echo Extracting $file"
echo "cat >$file <<\THE-END-OF-DATA
cat $file
echo "THE-END-OF-DATA"
done

Refer to the contents of the rolosubs file when studying the operation of this shar program.
Remember, shar actually creates a shell program.

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224

More sophisticated archiving programs allow entire directories to be archived and also check to
make sure that no data is lost in the transmission (see Exercises 2 and 3 at the end of this chapter).
The Unix sum command can be used to generate a checksum for a program. This checksum can
be generated on the sending end for each file in the archive, and then commands included in the
shell archive can verify the sum on the receiving end. If they don't match, an error message can be
displayed.

Functions
The POSIX standard shell supports the concept of functions; note that older shells may not support
this feature.
To define a function, you use the general format:
name () { command; ... command; }

where name is the name of the function, the parentheses denote to the shell that a function is being
defined, and the commands enclosed between the curly braces define the body of the function.
These commands will be executed whenever the function is executed. Note that at least one whitespace character must separate the { from the first command, and that a semicolon must separate
the last command from the closing brace if they occur on the same line.
The following defines a function called nu that displays the number of logged-in users:
nu () { who | wc -l; }

You execute a function the same way you execute an ordinary command: simply by typing its name
to the shell:
$ nu
22
$

Arguments listed after the function on the command line are assigned to the positional parameters
$1, $2, ..., just as with any other command. Here's a function called nrrun that runs tbl,
nroff, and lp on the file given as its argument:
$ nrrun () { tbl $1 | nroff -mm -Tlp | lp; }
$ nrrun memo1
Run it on memo1
request id is laser1-33 (standard input)
$

Functions exist only in the shell in which they're defined; that is, they can't be passed down to
subshells. Further, because the function is executed in the current shell, changes made to the current directory or to variables remain after the function has completed execution:
$ db () {
>
PATH=$PATH:/uxn2/data
>
PS1=DB:
>
cd /uxn2/data
>
}
$ db
DB:

Execute it

As you see, a function definition can continue over as many lines as necessary. The shell displays
your secondary command prompt until you close the definition with the }.

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225

You can put definitions for commonly used functions inside your .profile so that they'll be available whenever you log in. Alternatively, you can group the definitions in a file, say myfuncs, and
then execute the file in the current shell by typing
. myfuncs

This has the effect of causing any functions defined inside myfuncs to be read in and defined to
the current shell.
The following function, called mycd, takes advantage of the fact that functions are run in the current
environment. It mimics the operation of the Korn shell's cd command, which has the capability to
substitute portions of the current directory's path with something else (see the discussion of cd in
Chapter 15, Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features, for more details).
$ cat myfuncs
See what's inside
#
# new cd function:
#
mycd dir Switches dir
#
mycd old new Substitute new for old in current directory's path
#
mycd ()
{
if [ $# -le 1 ]
then
# normal case -- 0 or 1 argument
cd $1
elif [ $# -eq 2 ]
then
# special case -- substitute $2 for $1
cd $(echo $PWD | sed "s|$1|$2|")
else
# cd can't have more than two arguments
echo mycd: bad argument count
exit 1
fi
}
$ . myfuncs
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ mycd /users/pat
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ mycd pat tony
$ pwd
/users/tony
$

Read in definition
Change directory
Did it work?
Substitute tony for pat

After a function has been defined, its execution will be faster than an equivalent shell program file.
That's because the shell won't have to search the disk for the program, open the file, and read its
contents into memory.
Another advantage of functions is the capability to group all your related shell programs in a single
file if desired. For example, the add, lu, and rem programs from Chapter 11, Your Environment,
can be defined as functions inside rolo. The template for such an approach is shown:
$ cat rolo
#
# rolo program written in function form
#
#
# Function to add someone to the phonebook file
#

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226

add () {
# put commands from add program here
}
#
# Function to look someone up in the phone book
#
lu () {
# put commands from lu program here
}
#
# Function to remove someone from the phone book
#
rem () {
# put commands from rem program here
}

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

#
# rolo - rolodex program to look up, add, and
#
remove people from the phone book
#
# put commands from rolo here
$

None of the commands inside the original add, lu, rem, or rolo programs would have to be
changed. These first three programs are turned into functions by including them inside rolo, sandwiched between the function header and the closing curly brace. Note that defining them as functions
this way now makes them inaccessible as standalone commands.

Removing a Function Definition

To remove the definition of a function from the shell, you use the unset command with the f
option. This is the same command you use to remove the definition of a variable to the shell.
$ unset f nu
$ nu
sh: nu: not found
$

The return Command

If you execute an exit command from inside a function, its effect is not only to terminate execution
of the function but also of the shell program that called the function. If you instead want to just
terminate execution of the function, you can use the return command, whose format is
return n

The value n is used as the return status of the function. If omitted, the status returned is that of the
last command executed. This is also what gets returned if you don't execute a return at all in your
function. The return status is in all other ways equivalent to the exit status: You can access its value
through the shell variable $?, and you can also test it in if, while, and until commands.

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227

The type Command

When you type in the name of a command to execute, it's frequently useful to know where that
command is coming from. In other words, is the command actually defined as a function? Is it a
shell program? Is it a shell built-in? Is it a standard Unix command? This is where the type command
comes in handy. The type command takes one or more command names as its argument and tells
you what it knows about it. Here are some examples:
$ nu () { who | wc -l; }
$ type pwd
pwd is a shell builtin
$ type troff
troff is /usr/bin/troff
$ type cat
cat is /bin/cat
$ type nu
nu is a function
$

Exercises
1: Using eval, write a program called recho that prints its arguments in reverse order. So
recho one two three

should produce
three two one

Assume that more than nine arguments can be passed to the program.
2: Modify the shar program presented in this chapter to handle directories. shar should recognize
input files from different directories and should make sure that the directories are created if necessary when the archive is unpacked. Also allow shar to be used to archive an entire directory.
$ ls rolo
lu
add
rem
rolo
$ shar rolo/lu rolo/add rolo/rem > rolosubs.shar
$ shar rolo > rolo.shar

In the first case, shar was used to archive three files from the rolo directory. In the last case,
shar was used to archive the entire rolo directory.
3: Modify shar to include in the archive the character count for each file and commands to compare
the count of each extracted file against the count of the original file. If a discrepancy occurs, an
error should be noted, as in
add: expected 345 characters, extracted 343.

228

Chapter 14. Rolo Revisited

IN THIS CHAPTER

Design Considerations
rolo
add
lu
display
rem
change
listall
Sample Output
Exercises
This chapter presents a final version of the rolo program. This version is enhanced with additional
options and also allows for more general types of entries (other than just names and numbers). The
sections in this chapter discuss the individual programs in rolo, starting with rolo itself. At the end
of this chapter, sample output is shown.

Design Considerations
A more practical type of rolodex program would permit more than just the names and numbers to
be stored in the phone book. You'd probably want to keep addresses (maybe even electronic mail
addresses) there as well. The new rolo program allows entries in the phone book to consist of
multiple lines. For example, a typical entry might be
Steve's Ice Cream
444 6th Avenue
New York City 10003
212-555-3021

To increase the flexibility of the program, we're allowing an individual entry to contain as many lines
as desired. So another entry in the phone book might read
YMCA
(201) 555-2344

To logically separate one entry from the next inside the phone book file, each entry is packed into
a single line. This is done by replacing the terminating newline characters in an entry with a special
character. We arbitrarily chose the caret ^. The only restriction here is that this character not be
used as part of the entry itself.
Using this technique, the first entry shown would be stored in the phone book file as
Steve's Ice Cream^444 6th Avenue^New York City 10003^212-555-3021^

Rolo Revisited

229

and the second entry shown as

YMCA^(201) 555-2344^

You'll shortly see how convenient it becomes to process the entries when they're stored in this
format. Now we'll describe each program written for the rolodex program.

rolo
#
# rolo - rolodex program to look up, add,
#
remove and change entries from the phone book
#
#
# Set PHONEBOOK to point to the phone book file
# and export it so other progs know about it
# if it's set on entry, then leave it alone
#
: ${PHONEBOOK:=$HOME/phonebook}
export PHONEBOOK
if [ ! -e "$PHONEBOOK" ]
then
echo "$PHONEBOOK does not exist!"
echo "Should I create it for you (y/n)? \c"
read answer
if [ "$answer" != y ]
then
exit 1
fi
> $PHONEBOOK || exit 1

# exit if the creation fails

fi
#
# If arguments are supplied, then do a lookup
#
if [ "$#" -ne 0 ]
then
lu "$@"
exit
fi
#
# Set trap on interrupt (DELETE key) to continue the loop
#
trap "continue" 2
#
# Loop until user selects 'exit'
#
while true
do
#
# Display menu
#
echo '
Would you like to:
1. Look someone up
2. Add someone to the phone book
3. Remove someone from the phone book

Rolo Revisited

230
4. Change an entry in the phone book
5. List all names and numbers in the phone book
6. Exit this program

Please select one of the above (1-6): \c'

#
# Read and process selection
#
read choice
echo
case "$choice"
in
1) echo "Enter name to look up: \c"
read name

2)
3)

5)
6)
*)
esac

if [ -z "$name" ]
then
echo "Lookup ignored"
else
lu "$name"
fi;;
add;;
echo "Enter name to remove: \c"
read name
if [ -z "$name" ]
then
echo "Removal ignored"
else
rem "$name"
fi;;
echo "Enter name to change: \c"
read name
if [ -z "$name" ]
then
echo "Change ignored"
else
change "$name"
fi;;
listall;;
exit 0;;
echo "Bad choice\a";;

done

Instead of requiring that the user have a phone book file in his or her home directory, the program
checks on startup to see whether the variable PHONEBOOK has been set. If it has, it's assumed that
it contains the name of the phone book file. If it hasn't, it's set to $HOME/phonebook as the default.
In either case, the program then checks to see whether the file exists, and if it doesn't, instead of
immediately exiting, asks the user whether he would like to have an initial file created. This was
added so that first-time users of rolo can have an empty phone book file created for them by the
program.
This version of rolo also has a couple of new items added to the menu. Because individual entries
can be rather long, an editing option has been added to allow you to edit a particular entry. Formerly,
the only way to change an entry was to first remove it and then add a new one, a strategy that was
perfectly acceptable when the entries were small.
Another option allows for listing of the entire phone book. With this option, just the first and last lines
of each entry are displayed. This assumes that the user follows some convention such as putting
the name on the first line and the number on the last.
The entire menu selection process was placed inside a while loop so that rolo will continue to
display menus until the exit option is picked from the menu.

Rolo Revisited

231

A trap command is executed before the loop is entered. This trap specifies that a continue
command is to be executed if signal number 2 is received. So if the user presses the Delete key in
the middle of an operation (such as listing the entire phone book), the program won't exit but will
abort the current operation and simply continue with the loop. This will result in the redisplay of the
menu.
Because entries can now span as many lines as desired, the action performed when add is selected
has been changed. Instead of asking for the name and number, rolo executes the add program
to get the entry from the user.
For the lookup, change, and remove options, a check is made to ensure that the user doesn't simply
press the Enter key when asked to type in the name. This avoids the RE error that grep issues
if it's given a null first argument.
Now let's look at the individual programs that rolo executes. Each of the original programs has
been changed to accommodate the new entry format and also to be more user friendly.

add
#
# Program to add someone to the phonebook file
#
echo "Type in your new entry"
echo "When you're done, type just a single Enter on the line."
first=
entry=
while true
do
echo ">> \c"
read line
if [ -n "$line" ]
then
entry="$entry$line^"
if [ -z "$first" ]
then
first=$line
fi
else
break
fi
done
echo "$entry" >> $PHONEBOOK
sort -o $PHONEBOOK $PHONEBOOK
echo
echo "$first has been added to the phone book"

This program adds an entry to the phone book. It continually prompts the user to enter lines until a
line with just an Enter is typed (that is, a null line). Each line that is entered is concatenated to the
variable entry, with the special ^ character used to logically separate one line from the next.
When the while loop is exited, the new entry is added to the end of the phone book, and the file
is sorted.

Rolo Revisited

232

lu
#
# Look someone up in the phone book
#
name=$1
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/matches$$
if [ ! -s /tmp/matches$$ ]
then
echo "I can't find $name in the phone book"
else
#
# Display each of the matching entries
#
while read line
do
display "$line"
done < /tmp/matches$$
fi
rm /tmp/matches$$

This is the program to look up an entry in the phone book. The matching entries are written to the
file /tmp/matches$$. If the size of this file is zero, no match was found. Otherwise, the program
enters a loop to read each line from the file (remember an entry is stored as a single line in the file)
and then display it at the terminal. A program called display is used for this purpose. This program
is also used by the rem and change programs to display entries at the terminal.

display
#
# Display entry from the phonebook
#
echo
echo "--------------------------------------"
entry=$1
IFS="^"
set $entry
for line in "$1" "$2" "$3" "$4" "$5" "$6"
do
printf "| %-34.34s |\n" $line
done
echo "|
o
o
|"
echo "--------------------------------------"
echo

As noted, this program displays an entry passed as its argument. To make the output more aesthetically pleasing, the program actually draws a rolodex card. So typical output from display
would look like this:
-------------------------------------| Steve's Ice Cream
|
| 444 6th Avenue
|
| New York City 10003
|
| 212-555-3021
|

Rolo Revisited

233

|
|
|
|
|
o
o
|
--------------------------------------

After skipping a line and then displaying the top of the card, display changes IFS to ^ and then
executes the set command to assign each line to a different positional parameter. For example,
if entry is equal to
Steve's Ice Cream^444 6th Avenue^New York City 10003^212-555-3021^

executing the set command assigns Steve's Ice Cream to $1, 444 6th Avenue to $2, New
York City 10003 to $3, and 212-555-3021 to $4.
After executing the set, the program enters a for loop that will be executed exactly six times, no
matter how many lines are contained in the entry (this ensures uniformity of our rolodex cardsthe
program can be easily modified to draw larger-sized cards if needed). If the set command was
executed on Steve's Ice Cream as shown previously, $5 and $6 would be null, thus resulting
in two blank lines to fill out the bottom of the card.
The printf command displays a line exactly 38 characters wide: the leading | followed by a space
followed by the first 34 characters of $line followed by a space and a |.

rem
#
# Remove someone from the phone book
#
name=$1
#
# Get matching entries and save in temp file
#
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/matches$$
if [ ! -s /tmp/matches$$ ]
then
echo "I can't find $name in the phone book"
exit 1
fi
#
# Display matching entries one at a time and confirm removal
#
while read line
do
display "$line"
echo "Remove this entry (y/n)? \c"
read answer < /dev/tty
if [ "$answer" = y ]
then
break
fi
done < /tmp/matches$$
rm /tmp/matches$$
if [ "$answer" = y ]
then
if grep -v "^$line$" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/phonebook$$

Rolo Revisited

234

then
mv /tmp/phonebook$$ $PHONEBOOK
echo "Selected entry has been removed"
else
echo "Entry not removed"
fi
fi

The rem program collects all matching entries into a temporary file. If the size of the file is zero, no
match was found and an appropriate message is issued. Otherwise, for each matching entry, the
program displays the entry and asks the user whether that entry is to be removed. This provides
reassurance to the user that the entry the user intends to remove is the same one that the program
intends to remove, even in the single match case.
After a y has been typed to the program, a break command is executed to exit from the loop.
Outside the loop, the program tests the value of answer to determine how the loop was exited. If
its value is not equal to y, then the user doesn't want to remove an entry after all (for whatever
reason). Otherwise, the program proceeds with the removal by greping out all lines but the desired
one (and here the pattern specified to grep is made to match only entire lines by anchoring it to the
start and end of the line).

change
#
# Change an entry in the phone book
#
name=$1
#
# Get matching entries and save in temp file
#
grep "$name" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/matches$$
if [ ! -s /tmp/matches$$ ]
then
echo "I can't find $name in the phone book"
exit 1
fi
#
# Display matching entries one at a time and confirm change
#
while read line
do
display "$line"
echo "Change this entry (y/n)? \c"
read answer < /dev/tty
if [ "$answer" = y ]
then
break
fi
done < /tmp/matches$$
rm /tmp/matches$$
if [ "$answer" != y ]
then
exit
fi
#
# Start up editor on the confirmed entry

Rolo Revisited

235

#
echo "$line\c" | tr '^' '\012' > /tmp/ed$$
echo "Enter changes with ${EDITOR:=/bin/ed}"
trap "" 2
# don't abort if DELETE hit while editing
$EDITOR /tmp/ed$$
#
# Remove old entry now and insert new one
#
grep -v "^$line$" $PHONEBOOK > /tmp/phonebook$$
{ tr '\012' '^' < /tmp/ed$$; echo; } >> /tmp/phonebook$$
# last echo was to put back trailing newline translated by tr
sort /tmp/phonebook$$ -o $PHONEBOOK
rm /tmp/ed$$ /tmp/phonebook$$

The change program allows the user to edit an entry in the phone book. The initial code is virtually
identical to rem: it finds the matching entries and then prompts the user to select the one to be
changed.
The selected entry is then written into the temporary file /tmp/ed$$, with the ^ characters translated to newlines. This unfolds the entry into separate lines for convenient editing. The program
then displays the message
echo "Enter changes with ${EDITOR:=/bin/ed}"

which serves a dual purpose: It tells the user what editor will be used to make the change while at
the same time setting the variable EDITOR to /bin/ed if it's not already set. This technique allows
the user to use his or her preferred editor by simply assigning its name to the variable EDITOR and
exporting it before executing rolo:
$ EDITOR=vi; export EDITOR; rolo

The signal generated by the Delete key (2) is ignored so that if the user presses this key while in
the editor, the change program won't abort. The editor is then started to allow the user to edit the
entry. After the user makes his changes, writes the file, and quits the editor, control is given back
to change. The old entry is then removed from the phone book with grep, and the modified entry
is converted into the special internal format with tr and tacked onto the end. An extra newline
character must be added here to make sure that a real newline is stored in the file after the entry.
This is done with an echo with no arguments.
The phone book file is then sorted, and the temporary files removed.

listall
#
# list all of the entries in the phone book
#
IFS='^'
# to be used in set command below
echo "-----------------------------------------------------"
while read line
do
#
# Get the first and last fields, presumably names and numbers
#
set $line

Rolo Revisited

236

#
# display 1st and last fields (in reverse order!)
#
eval printf "\"%-40.40s %s\\n\"" "\"$1\"" "\"\${$#}\""
done < $PHONEBOOK
echo "-----------------------------------------------------"

The listall program lists all entries in the phone book, printing just the first and last lines of each
entry. The internal field separator characters (IFS) is set to a ^, to be used later inside the loop.
Each line from the phone book file is then read and assigned to the variable line. The set command is used to assign each field to the positional parameters.
The trick now is to get the value of the first and last positional parameters because that's what we
want to display. The first one is easy because it can be directly referenced as $1. To get the last
one, you use eval as you saw in Chapter 13, Loose Ends. The command
eval echo \${$#}

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

has the effect of displaying the value of the last positional parameter. The command
eval printf "\"%-40.40s %-s\\n\"" "\"$1\"" "\"\${$#}\""

gets evaluated to

printf "%-40.40s %-s\n" "Steve's Ice Cream" "${4}"

using the entry shown previously as the example, and then the shell rescans the line to substitute
the value of ${4} before executing printf.

Sample Output

Now it's time to see how rolo works. We'll start with an empty phone book and add a few entries
to it. Then we'll list all the entries, look up a particular one, and change one (using the default editor
edremember that the variable EDITOR can always be set to a different editor and then exported).
To conserve space, we'll show only the full menu that rolo displays the first time.
$ PHONEBOOK=/users/steve/misc/book
$ export PHONEBOOK
$ rolo
Start it up
/users/steve/misc/book does not exist!
Should I create it for you (y/n)? y
Would you like to:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.

Look someone up
Add someone to the phone book
Remove someone from the phone book
Change an entry in the phone book
List all names and numbers in the phone book
Exit this program

Please select one of the above (1-6): 2

Type in your new entry
When you're done, type just a single Enter on the line.
>> Steve's Ice Cream
>> 444 6th Avenue
>> New York City 10003
>> 212-555-3021
>>
Steve's Ice Cream has been added to the phone book

Rolo Revisited

237

Would you like to:

...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 2
Type in your new entry
When you're done, type just a single Enter on the line.
>> YMCA
>> 973-555-2344
>>
YMCA has been added to the phone book
Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 2
Type in your new entry
When you're done, type just a single Enter on the line.
>> Maureen Connelly
>> Hayden Book Companu
>> 10 Mulholland Drive
>> Hasbrouck Heights, N.J. 07604
>> 201-555-6000
>>
Maureen Connelly has been added to the phone book
Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 2
Type in your new entry
When you're done, type just a single Enter on the line.
>> Teri Zak
>> Hayden Book Company
>> (see Maureen Connelly for address)
>> 201-555-6060
>>
Teri Zak has been added to the phone book
Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 5
----------------------------------------------------------Maureen Connelly
201-555-6000
Steve's Ice Cream
212-555-3021
Teri Zak
201-555-6060
YMCA
973-555-2344
----------------------------------------------------------Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 1
Enter name to look up: Maureen
------------------------------------| Maureen Connelly
|
| Hayden Book Companu
|
| 10 Mulholland Drive
|
| Hasbrouck Heights, NJ 07604
|
| 201-555-6000
|
|
o
o
|
------------------------------------------------------------------------| Teri Zak
|

Rolo Revisited

238

| Hayden Book Company

|
| (see Maureen Connelly for address)|
| 201-555-6060
|
|
|
|
o
o
|
------------------------------------Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 4
Enter name to change: Maureen
------------------------------------| Maureen Connelly
|
| Hayden Book Companu
|
| 10 Mulholland Drive
|
| Hasbrouck Heights, NJ 07604
|
| 201-555-6000
|
|
o
o
|
------------------------------------Change this person (y/n)? y
Enter changes with /bin/ed
101
1,$p
Maureen Connelly
Hayden Book Companu
10 Mulholland Drive
Hasbrouck Heights, NJ 07604
201-555-6000
2s/anu/any
Change the misspelling
Hayden Book Company
w
101
q
Would you like to:
...
Please select one of the above (1-6): 6
$

The only function not tested here is removal of an entry.

Hopefully this example has given you some insight on how to develop larger shell programs, and
how to use the many different programming tools provided by the system. Other than the shell builtins, rolo relies on tr, grep, an editor, sort, and the standard file system commands such as
mv and rm to get the job done. The simplicity and elegance that enable you to easily tie all these
tools together account for the deserved popularity of the Unix system.
See Appendix B for more information on downloading the rolo programs.
Chapter 15, Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features, introduces you to interactive features of
the shell and two shells that have some nice features not found in the POSIX standard shell.

Exercises
1: Modify rolo so that upper- and lowercase letters are not distinguished when doing a lookup in
the phone book.

Rolo Revisited

239

2: Add a -m command-line option to rolo to send mail to the person who follows on the command
line. Have rolo look up the person in the phone book and then look for the string mail:mailaddr in the matching entry, where mailaddr is the person's mail address. Then start up an editor
(as in change mode) to allow the user to enter the mail message. When the editing is complete,
mail the message to the user. If no mail address is found in the phone book, prompt for it.
Also add a mail option to the menu so that it can be selected interactively. Prompt for the name
of the person to send mail to.
3: After adding the -m option, add a -f option to specify that the mail message is to be taken from
the file that follows on the command line. So
rolo -m tony -f memo

should look up tony and mail him the contents of the file memo.
4: Can you think of other ways to use rolo? For example, can it be used as a small general-purpose
database program (for example, for storing recipes or employee data)?
5: Modify rolo to use the following convention instead of the exported PHONEBOOK variable: the
file .rolo in each rolo user's home directory contains the pathname to that user's phone book
file, for example:
$ cat $HOME/.rolo
/users/steve/misc/phonebook
$

Then add an option to rolo to allow you to look up someone in another user's phone book
(provided that you have read access to it). This option should be added to the command line (as
a -u option) as well as to the menu. For example,
$ rolo -u pat Pizza

would look up Pizza in pat's phone book, no matter who is running rolo. The program can
find pat's phone book by looking at .rolo in pat's home directory.
6: What happens with rolo if the user adds an entry containing a ^ or [ character?
7: Add a s (send) option to rolo to mail a rolodex entry to a specified user. So
$ rolo s tom pizza

should send the rolodex card entry for pizza to the user tom.

240

Chapter 15. Interactive and Nonstandard Shell

Features

IN THIS CHAPTER
Getting the Right Shell
The ENV File
Command-Line Editing
Command History
The vi Line Edit Mode
The emacs Line Edit Mode

Other Ways to Access Your History

Functions
Integer Arithmetic
The alias Command
Arrays

Job Control
The Restricted Shell rsh
Miscellaneous Features
Compatibility Summary
Exercises

In this chapter you'll learn about shell features that are either useful to interactive users or not part
of the POSIX shell standard. These features are available in Bash and the Korn shell, the two most
commonly available POSIX-compliant shells.
The Korn shell was developed by David Korn of AT&T Bell Laboratories. It was designed to be
upward compatible with the System V Bourne shell and the POSIX standard shell. It is available
in the standard Unix distributions from Sun, HP, and IBM, and is the default shell on MIPS workstations.
Bash (short for Bourne-Again Shell) was developed by Brian Fox for the Free Software Foundation.
It was also designed to be upward compatible with the System V Bourne shell and the POSIX
standard shell, and also contains many extensions from the Korn and C shells. Bash is the standard
shell on Linux systems.
Except for a few minor differences, Bash and the Korn shell provide all the POSIX standard shell's
features, as well as many new ones. To give you an idea of the compatibility of these shells with
the POSIX standard, all shell programs in the previous chapters work under both Bash and the Korn
shell.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

241

We'll note any nonstandard features that we discuss in this chapter, and Table 15.4 at the end of
this chapter lists the features supported by the different shells.

Getting the Right Shell

Most shells follow a convention that allows you to select a specific program to run a file. If the first
two characters on the first line of a file are #!, the remainder of the line specifies an interpreter for
the file. So
#!/usr/bin/ksh

specifies the Korn shell and

#!/usr/bin/bash

specifies Bash. If you use constructs specific to one shell, you can use this feature to force that shell
to run your programs, avoiding compatibility problems.
Note that you can put any program you want here, so a Perl program beginning with
#!/usr/bin/perl

forces the shell to execute /usr/bin/perl on it.

You have to use this feature with caution, however, because many programs, such as Perl, don't
reside in a standard place on every Unix system. Also, this is not a feature specified by the POSIX
standard, even though it's found in every modern shell we've seen and is even implemented at the
operating system level on many Unix versions.

The ENV File

When you start the shell, one of the first things it does is look in your environment for a variable
called ENV. If it finds it, the file specified by ENV will be executed, much like the profile is executed
when logging in. The ENV file usually contains commands to set up the shell's environment.
Throughout this chapter, we'll mention various things that you may want to put into this file.
If you do decide to have an ENV file, you should set and export the ENV variable inside
your .profile file:
$ cat .profile
...
ENV=$HOME/.alias
export ENV
...
$

For Bash users, the ENV file is read only when Bash is invoked with the name sh or with the -posix command-line option, or after set o posix is executed (all of which force POSIX standard
compliance). By default, when a noninteractive Bash shell is started (for example, when you run a
shell program), it reads commands from the file specified by the BASH_ENV environment variable,
and when an interactive Bash shell is started (for example, by typing bash at the command prompt),
it doesn't.
You should also set and export inside your .profile file a variable called SHELL.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

242

$ cat .profile
...
SHELL=/usr/bin/ksh
export SHELL
...
$

This variable is used by certain applications (such as vi) to determine what shell to start up when
you execute a shell escape. In such cases, you want to make sure that each time you start up a
new shell, you get the shell you want and not an older Bourne shell.

Command-Line Editing
Line edit mode is a feature of the shell that allows you to edit a command line using built-in commands that mimic those found in two popular screen editors. The POSIX standard shell provides
the capability to mimic vi; however, both Bash and the Korn shell also support an emacs line edit
mode. We list the complete set of vi commands in Table A.4 in Appendix A, Shell Summary.
If you've used either of these screen editors, you'll find that the built-in line editors in the shell are
faithful reproductions of their full-screen counterparts. If you've never used a screen editor, don't be
intimidated. This capability is one of the most useful features in the shell. In fact, after learning how
to use one of the shell's built-in editors, you'll be able to learn vi or emacs with little effort.
To turn on a line edit mode, you use the set command with the -o mode option, where mode is
either vi or emacs:
$ set -o vi

Turn on vi mode

Note that you can put this in your .profile or ENV file to automatically start up the shell with one
of the edit modes turned on.

Command History
As we said before, the shell keeps a history of previously entered commands. Each time you press
the Enter key to execute a command, that command gets added to the end of this history list. This
command list is actually stored inside a file, which means that you can access previously entered
commands across login sessions. By default, the history list is kept in a file in your home directory
under the name .sh_history (.bash_history for Bash, unless it is started with the --posix
option). You can change this filename to anything you want by setting the variable HISTFILE to
the name of your history file. This variable can be set and exported in your .profile file.
Naturally, there is a limit to the number of commands the shell records. The default value of this
limit varies by implementation, but the POSIX standard requires it to be at least 128; the default
value for the Korn shell is 128; the default value for Bash is 500. Each time you log in, the shell
automatically truncates your history file to this length.
You can control the size of your history file through the HISTFILE variable. You may find that the
default size isn't adequate for your needs, in which case you may want to set the HISTFILE variable
to a larger value, such as 500 or 1000. The value you assign to HISTSIZE can be set and exported
in your .profile file:
$ cat .profile
...
HISTSIZE=500
export HISTSIZE
...
$

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

243

Be reasonable about the values that you assign to HISTSIZE. The larger the value, the more disk
space you will need to store the history file, and the longer it will take the shell to search through
the entire history file.

The vi Line Edit Mode

After turning on the vi line editor, you will be placed in input mode. You probably won't even notice
anything different about input mode because you can type in and execute commands almost the
same as before you started the vi line editor:
$ set -o vi
$ echo hello
hello
$ pwd
/users/pat
$

To make use of the line editor, you must enter command mode by pressing the ESCAPE or Esc
key, usually in the upper-left corner of the keyboard. When you enter command mode, the cursor
moves to the left one space, to the last character typed in. The current character is whatever character the cursor is on; we'll say more about the current character in a moment. When in command
mode, you can enter vi commands. Note that vi commands are not followed by an Enter.
One problem often encountered when typing in long commands is that you may notice an error in
a command line after you finish typing it in. Invariably, the error is at the beginning of the line. In
command mode, you can move the cursor around without disturbing the command line. After you've
moved the cursor to the place where the error is, you can change the letter or letters to whatever
you want.
In the following examples, the underline (_) represents the cursor. A command line will be shown,
followed by one or more keystrokes, followed by what the line looks like after applying the keystrokes:

before keystrokes after

First, let's look at moving the cursor around. The H key moves the cursor to the left and the L key
moves it to the right. Try this out by entering command mode and pressing the H and L keys a few
times. The cursor should move around on the line. If you try to move the cursor past the left or right
side of the line, the shell beeps at you.
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little

larb
larb
larb
larb

Esc
h
h
l

$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little

larb
larb
larb
larb

After the cursor is on the character you want to change, you can use the x command to delete the
current character (X it out).
$ mary had a little larb

$ mary had a little lab

Note that the b moved to the left when the r was deleted and is now the current character.
To add characters to the command line, you can use the i and a commands. The i command
inserts characters before the current character, and the a command adds characters after the current character. Both of these commands put you back into input mode; you must press Esc again
to go back to command mode.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

$
$
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little
little
little

lab
lamb
lammb
lammb
lamb
lamb_

im
m
Esc
x
a
da

$
$
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary
mary
mary

244
had
had
had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little
little
little

lamb
lammb
lammb
lamb
lamb_
lambda_

If you think that moving the cursor around by repeatedly pressing h and l is slow, you're right. The
h and l commands may be preceded by a number that specifies the number of spaces to move the
cursor.
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little

lambda_
lambda
lambda
lambda

Esc
10h
13h
5x

$
$
$
$

mary had a little lambda

mary had a little lambda
mary had a little lambda
had a little lambda

As you can see, the x command can also be preceded by a number to tell it how many characters
to delete.
You can easily move to the end of the line by typing the $ command:
$ had a little lambda

$ had a little lambda

To move to the beginning of the line, you use the 0 (that's a zero) command:
$ had a little lambda

$ had a little lambda

Two other commands useful in moving the cursor are the w and b commands. The w command
moves the cursor forward to the beginning of the next word, where a word is a string of letters,
numbers, and underscores delimited by blanks or punctuation. The b command moves the cursor
backward to the beginning of the previous word. These commands may also be preceded by a
number to specify the number of words to move forward or backward.
$ had a little lambda
$ had a little lambda
$ had a little lambda

w
2w
3b

$ had a little lambda

$ had a little lambda
$ had a little lambda

At any time you can press Enter and the current line will be executed as a command.
$ had a little lambda
ksh: had: not found
$ _

Hit Enter

After a command is executed, you are placed back in input mode.

Accessing Commands from Your History

So far, you've learned how to edit the current line. You can use the vi commands k and j to retrieve
commands from your history. The k command replaces the current line on your terminal with the
previously entered command, putting the cursor at the beginning of the line. Let's assume that these
commands have just been entered:
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ cd /tmp
$ echo this is a test
this is a test
$ _

Now go into command mode and use k to access them:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

$ _

Esc k

245
$ echo this is a test

Every time k is used, the current line is replaced by the previous line from the command history.
$ echo this is a test
$ cd /tmp

k
k

$ cd /tmp
$ pwd

To execute the command being displayed, just press the Enter key.
$ pwd
/tmp
$ _

Hit Enter

The j command is the reverse of the k command and is used to display the next command in the
history.
The / command is used to search through the command history for a command containing a string.
If the / is entered, followed by a string, the shell searches backward through its history to find the
most recently executed command that contains that string anywhere on the command line. The
command will then be displayed. If no line in the history contains the string, the shell beeps the
terminal. When the / is entered, the current line is replaced by a /.
/tmp
$ _

Esc /test

/test_

The search is begun when the Enter key is pressed.

/test_

Enter

$ echo this is a test

To execute the command that results from the search, Enter must be pressed again.
$ echo this is a test
this is a test
$ _

Hit Enter again

If the command that's displayed isn't the one you're interested in, you can continue the search
through the command history by simply typing / and pressing Enter. The shell uses the string that
you entered the last time you executed the search command.
When you've found the command in the history (either by k, j, or /), you can edit the command
using the other vi commands we've already discussed. Note that you don't actually change the
command in the history: That command cannot be changed after it is entered. Instead, you are
editing a copy of the command in the history, which will itself be entered in the history when you
press Enter.
Table 15.1 summarizes the basic vi line edit commands.
Table 15.1. Basic vi Line Edit Commands
Command

Meaning

Move left one character.

Move right one character.

Move left one word.

Move right one word.

Move to start of line.

Move to end of line.

Delete character at cursor.

Delete word at cursor.

Change character at cursor to c.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

246

Command

Meaning

Enter input mode and enter text after the current character.

Enter input mode and insert text before the current character.

Get previous command from history.

Get next command from history.

/string

Search history for the most recent command containing string; if string is null, the previous string will be used.

The Line Edit Mode

After turning on the emacs line editor, you probably won't even notice anything different because
you can type in and execute commands the same way as before:
$ set -o emacs
$ echo hello
hello
$ pwd
/users/pat
$

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

To use the line editor, you enter emacs commands. emacs commands are either control characters
that is, characters typed in by holding down the Ctrl key and pressing another characteror they
are characters preceded by the ESCAPE or Esc key. You may enter emacs commands anytime
you want; there are no separate modes like the vi line editor. Note that emacs commands are not
followed by an Enter. We cover only a few of them here; for a complete list of commands, refer to
the documentation for Bash or the Korn shell.
First, let's look at moving the cursor around. The Ctrl+b command moves the cursor to the left, and
the Ctrl+f command moves it to the right. Try this out by pressing Ctrl+b and Ctrl+f a few times. The
cursor should move around on the line. If you try to move the cursor past the left or right side of the
line, the shell simply ignores you.
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little

larb_
larb
larb
larb

Ctrl+b
Ctrl+b
Ctrl+b
Ctrl+f

$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had

a
a
a
a

little
little
little
little

larb
larb
larb
larb

After the cursor is on the character you want to change, you can use the Ctrl+d command to delete
the current character.
$ mary had a little larb

Ctrl+d

$ mary had a little lab

Note that the b moved to the left when the r was deleted and is now the current character.
To add characters to the command line, you simply type them in. The characters are inserted
before the current character.
$ mary had a little lab
$ mary had a little lamb
$ mary had a little lammb

m
m
Ctrl+h

$ mary had a little lamb

$ mary had a little lammb
$ mary had a little lamb

Note that the current erase character (usually either # or Ctrl+h) will always delete the character to
the left of the cursor.
The Ctrl+a and Ctrl+e commands may be used to move the cursor to the beginning and end of the
command line, respectively.
$ mary had a little lamb
$ mary had a little lamb

Ctrl+a
Ctrl+e

$ mary had a little lamb

$ mary had a little lamb_

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

247

Note that the Ctrl+e command places the cursor one space to the right of the last character on the
line. (When you're not in emacs mode, the cursor is always at the end of the line, one space to the
right of the last character typed in.) When you're at the end of the line, anything you type will be
appended to the line.
$ mary had a little lamb_

$ mary had a little lambda_

Two other commands useful in moving the cursor are the Esc f and Esc b commands. The Esc
f command moves the cursor forward to the end of the current word, where a word is a string of
letters, numbers, and underscores delimited by blanks or punctuation. The Esc b command moves
the cursor backward to the beginning of the previous word.
$
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had
had

a little
a little
a little
a little
a_little

lambda_
lambda
lambda
lambda
lambda

Esc
Esc
Esc
Esc
Esc

b
b
b
f
f

$
$
$
$
$

mary
mary
mary
mary
mary

had
had
had
had
had

a little lambda
a little lambda
a little lambda
a_little lambda
a little_lambda

At any time you can press the Enter key and the current line will be executed as a command.
$ mary had a little_lambda
ksh: mary: not found
$ _

Hit Enter; enter command

Accessing Commands from Your History

So far, you've learned how to edit the current line. As we said before, the shell keeps a history of
recently entered commands. To access these commands, you can use the emacs commands Ctrl
+p and Ctrl+n. The Ctrl+p command replaces the current line on your terminal with the previously
entered command, putting the cursor at the end of the line. Let's assume that these commands have
just been entered:
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ cd /tmp
$ echo this is a test
this is a test
$ _

Now use Ctrl+p to access them:

$ _

Ctrl+p

$ echo this is a test_

Every time Ctrl+p is used, the current line is replaced by the previous line from the command history.
$ echo this is a test_
$ cd /tmp_

Ctrl+p
Ctrl+p

$ cd /tmp_
$ pwd_

To execute the command being displayed, just press Enter.

$ pwd_
/tmp
$ _

Hit Enter

The Ctrl+n command is the reverse of the Ctrl+p command and is used to display the next command
in the history.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

248

The Ctrl+r command is used to search through the command history for a command containing a
string. The Ctrl+r is entered followed by the string to search for, followed by the Enter key. The shell
then searches the command history for the most recently executed command that contains that
string on the command line. If found, the command line is displayed; otherwise, the shell beeps
the terminal. When the Ctrl+r is typed, the shell replaces the current line with ^R:
$ _

Ctrl+r test

$ ^Rtest_

The search is initiated when Enter is pressed.

$ ^Rtest_

Enter

$ echo this is a test_

To execute the command that is displayed as a result of the search, Enter must be pressed again.
$ echo this is a test_
this is a test
$ _

Hit Enter again

To continue the search through the command history, you simply type Ctrl+r followed by an Enter.
Bash handles Ctrl+r a little differently. When you type Ctrl+r, Bash replaces the current line with
(reverse-i-search)`':
$ _

Ctrl+r

(reverse-i-search)`': _

As you type text, the line is updated inside the `' with the text you type, and the rest of the line is
updated with the matching command:
(reverse-i-search)`': _ c (reverse-i-search)`c': echo this is a test
(reverse-i-search)`c': echo this is a test
d
(reverse-i-search)`cd': cd /tmp

Note how Bash highlights the matching part of the command by placing the cursor on it. As with the
Korn shell, the command is executed by pressing Enter.
When you've found the command in the history (either by Ctrl+p, Ctrl+n, or Ctrl+r), you can edit the
command using the other emacs commands we've already discussed. Note that you don't actually
change the command in the history: That command cannot be changed after it is entered. Instead,
you are editing a copy of the command in the history, which will itself be entered in the history when
you press Enter.
Table 15.2 summarizes the basic line edit commands.
Table 15.2. Basic emacs Line Edit Commands
Command

Meaning

Ctrl+b

Move left one character

Ctrl+f

Move right one character

Esc+f

Move forward one word

Esc+b

Move back one word

Ctrl+a

Move to start of line

Ctrl+e

Move to end of line

Ctrl+d

Delete current character

Esc+d

Delete current word

erase char

(User-defined erase character, usually # or Ctrl+h), delete previous character

Ctrl+p

Get previous command from history

Ctrl+n

Get next command from history

Ctrl+r string

Search history for the most recent command line containing string

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

249

Other Ways to Access Your History

There are several other ways to access your command history that are worth noting.

The history Command

The operation of the history command differs between the Korn shell and Bash because it is not
part of the POSIX standard.
The Korn shell history command writes your last 16 commands to standard output:
$ history
507
cd shell
508
cd ch15
509
vi int
510
ps
511
echo $HISTSIZE
512
cat $ENV
513
cp int int.sv
514
history
515
exit
516
cd shell
517
cd ch16
518
vi all
519
run -n5 all
520
ps
521
lpr all.out
522
history

The numbers to the left are simply relative command numbers (command number 1 would be the
first, or oldest, command in your history).
Without any arguments, the Bash history command lists your entire history (as specified by the
HISTSIZE variable) to standard output. If you just want to see the last few commands, you must
specify the number of commands to display as an argument:
$ history 10
513
cp int int.sv
514
history
515
exit
516
cd shell
517
cd ch16
518
vi all
519
run -n5 all
520
ps
521
lpr all.out
522
history 10
$

The fc Command
The fc command allows you to start up an editor on one or more commands from your history or
to simply write a list of history commands to your terminal. In the latter form, which is indicated by
giving the -l option to fc, it is like typing in history, only more flexible (you can specify a range
of commands to be listed or can get fewer or more than the last 16 commands listed). For example,
the command
fc -l 510 515

writes commands 510 through 515 to standard output, whereas the command
fc -n -l -20

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

250

writes the last 20 commands to standard output, not preceded by line numbers (-n). Suppose that
you've just executed a long command line and then decide that it would be nice to turn that command
line into a shell program called runx. You can use fc to get the command from your history and I/
O redirection to write that command to a file:
fc -n -l -1 > runx

(That's the letter l followed by the number -1.) fc is described in full detail in Appendix A.

The r Command
A simple Korn shell command allows you to re-execute previous commands using even a fewer
number of keystrokes than described. If you simply type in the r command, the Korn shell re-executes your last command:
$ date
Thu Oct 24 14:24:48 EST 2002
$ r
date
Thu Oct 24 14:25:13 EST 2002
$

Re-execute previous command

When you type in the r command, the Korn shell redisplays the previous command and then immediately executes it.
If you give the r command the name of a command as an argument, the Korn shell re-executes the
most recent command line from your history that begins with the specified argument:
$ cat docs/planA
...
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ r cat
cat docs/planA
$

Rerun last cat command

Once again, the Korn shell redisplays the command line from its history before automatically reexecuting it.
The final form of the r command allows you to substitute the first occurrence of one string with the
next. To re-execute the last cat command on the file planB instead of planA, you could type:
$ r cat planA=planB
cat docs/planB
...
$

or even more simply, you could have typed:

$ r cat A=B
cat docs/planB
...
$

Bash has the ! built-in command; !! re-executes the previous command, and !string re-executes
the most recent command line from your history that begins with string:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

251

$ !!
cat docs/planB
...
$ !d
date
Thu Oct 24 14:39:40 EST 2002
$

Note that no spaces can exist between ! and string.

The fc command can be used with the s option to do the same thing with any POSIX-compliant
shell (the r command is actually an alias to the fc command in the Korn shellmore on that later
in this chapter):
$ fc s cat
cat docs/planB
...
$ fc s B=C
cat docs/planC
...
$

Functions
Bash and the Korn shell both have function features not available in the POSIX standard shell.

Local Variables
Bash and Korn shell functions can have local variables, making recursive functions possible. They
are defined with the typeset command, as in
typeset i j

If a variable of the same name as a local function variable exists, it is saved when the typeset is
executed and restored when the function exits. Note that the typeset command is not part of the
POSIX standard shell.
After using the shell for a while, you may develop a set of functions that you like to use during your
interactive work sessions. A good place to define such functions is inside your ENV file so that they
will be defined whenever you start up a new shell.

Automatically Loaded Functions

The Korn shell allows you to set up a special variable called FPATH that is similar to your PATH
variable. If you try to execute a function that is not yet defined, the Korn shell searches the colondelimited list of directories in your FPATH variable for a file that matches the function name. If it finds
such a file, it executes it in the current shell. Presumably, somewhere inside the file will be a definition
for the specified function.

Integer Arithmetic
Both Bash and the Korn shell support evaluating arithmetic expressions without arithmetic expansion. The syntax is similar to $((...)) but without the dollar sign. Because expansion is not performed, the construct can be used without variable assignment or the colon operator:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

252

$ x=10
$ ((x = x * 12))
$ echo $x
120
$

The real value of this construct is that it allows arithmetic expressions to be used rather than test in
if, while, and until commands. The comparison operators set the exit status to a nonzero value
if the result of the comparison is false and to a zero value if the result is true. So writing
(( i == 100 ))

has the effect of testing i to see whether it is equal to 100 and setting the exit status appropriately.
This knowledge makes integer arithmetic ideal for inclusion in if commands:
if (( i == 100 ))
then
...
fi

The (( i == 100 )) returns an exit status of zero (true) if i equals 100 and one (false) otherwise,
and has the same effect as writing
if [ "$i" -eq 100 ]
then
...
fi

One advantage of using ((...)) rather than test is the capability to perform arithmetic as part of
the test:
if (( i / 10 != 0 ))
then
...
fi

Here the comparison returns a true if i divided by 10 is not equal to zero.

while loops can also benefit from integer arithmetic. For example,
x=0
while ((x++ < 100))
do
commands
done

executes commands 100 times. (Note that some older versions of the Korn shell and Bash do not
support the ++ and -- operators.)

Integer Types
The Korn shell and Bash both support an integer data type. You can declare variables to be integers
by using the typeset command with the i option
typeset -i variables

where variables are any valid shell variable names. Initial values can be assigned to the variables
at the time they are declared.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

253

Arithmetic performed on integer variables with the ((...)) construct is slightly faster than on noninteger ones because the shell internally stores the value of an integer variable as a binary number
and not as a character string.
An integer variable cannot be assigned anything but an integer value or an integer expression. If
you attempt to assign a noninteger to it, the message bad number is printed by the Korn shell:
$ typeset -i i
$ i=hello
ksh: i: bad number

Bash simply ignores any strings that don't contain numeric values and generates an error for anything that contains both numbers and other characters:
$ typeset -i i
$ i=hello
$ echo $i
0
$ i=1hello
bash: 1hello: value too great for base (error token is "1hello")
$ i=10+15
$ echo $i
25
$

The preceding example shows that integer-valued expressions can be assigned to an integer variable, without even having to use the ((...)) construct. This holds true for both Bash and the Korn
shell.

Numbers in Different Bases

The Korn shell and Bash allow you to perform arithmetic in different bases. To write a number in a
different base with these shells, you use the notation
base#number

For example, to express the value 100 in base 8 (octal) you write
8#100

You can write constants in different bases anywhere an integer value is permitted. To assign octal
100 to the integer variable i, you can write
typeset -i i=8#100

Note that with the Korn shell the base of the first value assigned to an integer variable fixes the base
of all subsequent substitutions of that variable. In other words, if the first value you assign to the
integer variable i is an octal number, each time you subsequently substitute the value of i on the
command line, the Korn shell substitutes the value as an octal number using the notation 8#value.
$ typeset i i=8#100
$ echo $i
8#100
$ i=50
$ echo $i
8#62
$ (( i = 16#a5 + 16#120 ))
$ echo $i
8#705
$

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

254

Because the first value assigned to i in this example is an octal number (8#100), all further substitutions of i will be in octal. When the base 10 value of 50 is next assigned to i and then i is
subsequently displayed, we get the value 8#62, which is the octal equivalent of 50 in base 10.
In the preceding example, the ((...)) construct is used to add together the two hexadecimal values
a5 and 120. The result is then displayed, once again in octal.
Bash uses both the base#number syntax for arbitrary bases and the C language syntax for octal
and hexadecimal numbersoctal numbers are preceded by 0 (zero), and hexadecimal numbers
are preceded by 0x:
$ typeset -i i=0100
$ echo $i
64
$ i=0x80
$ echo $i
128
$ i=2#1101001
$ echo $i
105
$ (( i = 16#a5 + 16#120 ))
$ echo $i
453
$

Unlike the Korn shell, Bash doesn't keep track of the variable's base; integer variables are displayed
as decimal numbers. You can always use printf to print integers in octal or hexadecimal format.
As you can see, with Bash and the Korn shell it's easy to work with different bases. This makes it
possible to easily write functions to perform base conversion and arithmetic, for example.

The alias Command

An alias is a shorthand notation provided by the shell to allow customization of commands. The shell
keeps a list of aliases that is searched when a command is entered. If the first word of a command
line is an alias, it is replaced by the text of the alias. An alias is defined by using the alias command.
The format is
alias name=string

where name is the name of the alias, and string is any string of characters. For example,
alias ll='ls l'

assigns ls -l to the alias ll. Now when the alias ll is typed in, the shell replaces it with ls l. You can type arguments after the alias name on the command line, as in
ll *.c

which looks like this after alias substitution has been performed:
ls -l *.c

The shell performs its normal command-line processing both when the alias is set and when it is
used, so quoting can be tricky. For example, recall that the shell keeps track of your current working
directory inside a variable called PWD:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

255

$ cd /users/steve/letters
$ echo $PWD
/users/steve/letters
$

You can create an alias called dir that gives you the base directory of your current working directory
by using the PWD variable and one of the parameter substitution constructs described in an earlier
section of this chapter:
alias dir="echo ${PWD##*/}"

Let's see how this alias works:

$ alias dir="echo ${PWD##*/}"
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ dir
steve
$ cd letters
$ dir
steve
$ cd /usr/spool
$ dir
steve
$

Define alias
Where are we?
Execute alias
Change directory
Execute the alias again
One more try

It seems that no matter what the current directory is, the dir alias prints out steve. That's because
we weren't careful about our quotes when we defined the dir alias. Recalling that the shell performs
parameter substitution inside double quotes, the shell evaluated
${PWD##*/}

at the time the alias was defined. This means, that for all intents and purposes, the dir alias was
defined as though we typed in the following:
$ alias dir="echo steve"

The solution is to use single rather than double quotes when defining the dir alias to defer the
parameter substitution until the time the alias is executed:
$ alias dir='echo ${PWD##*/}'
$ pwd
/users/steve
$ dir
steve
$ cd letters
$ dir
letters
$ cd /usr/spool
$ dir
spool
$

Define alias
Where are we?
Execute alias
Change directory
Execute alias again
One more try

Now the alias works just fine.

If an alias ends with a space, the word following the alias is also checked for alias substitution. For
example:
alias nohup="/bin/nohup "
nohup ll

causes the shell to perform alias checking on the string ll after replacing nohup with /bin/nohup.
Quoting a command prevents alias substitution. For example:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

256

$ 'll'
ksh: ll: command not found
$

The format
alias name

causes the value of the alias name to be listed, and the alias command without arguments causes
all aliases to be listed.
The following aliases are automatically defined when the Korn shell starts up:
autoload='typeset fu'
functions='typeset f'
history='fc l'
integer='typeset i'
local=typeset
nohup='nohup '
r='fc -e '
suspend='kill -STOP $$'

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

Note from the preceding example that r is actually an alias for the fc command with the -e option,
and history is an alias for fc -l. Bash doesn't automatically define any aliases by default.

Removing Aliases

The unalias command is used to remove aliases from the alias list. The format is
unalias name

which removes the alias name and

unalias a

which removes all aliases.

This concludes this section on aliases. If you develop a set of alias definitions that you like to use
during your login sessions, you may want to define them inside your ENV file so that they will always
be available for you to use.

Arrays
The Korn shell and Bash provide a limited array capability (arrays are not a part of the POSIX
standard shell). Bash arrays may contain an unlimited number of elements (subject to memory
limitations); Korn shell arrays are limited to 4096 elements. Array indexing in both shells starts at
zero. An array element is accessed with a subscript, which is an integer-valued expression enclosed
inside a pair of brackets. You don't declare the maximum size of a shell array; you simply assign
values to elements as you need them. The values that you can assign are the same as for ordinary
variables.
$ arr[O]=hello
$ arr[1]="some text"
$ arr[2]=/users/steve/memos
$

To retrieve an element from an array, you write the array name followed by the element number,
enclosed inside a pair of brackets as before. The entire construct must be enclosed inside a pair of
curly braces, which is then preceded by a dollar sign.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

257

$ echo ${array[0]}
hello
$ echo ${array[1]}
some text
$ echo ${array[2]}
/users/steve/memos
$ echo $array
hello
$

As you can see from the preceding example, if no subscript is specified, element zero is used.
If you forget the curly braces when performing the substitution, here's what happens:
$ echo $array[1]
hello[1]
$

In the preceding example, the value of array is substituted (hellothe value inside array[0])
and then echoed along with [1]. (Note that because the shell does filename substitution after
variable substitution, the shell would attempt to match the pattern hello[1] against the files in
your current directory.)
The construct [*] can be used as a subscript to substitute all the elements of the array on the
command line, with each element delimited by a single space character.
$ echo ${array[*]}
hello some text /users/steve/memos
$

The construct ${#array[*]} can be used to substitute the number of elements in the array array.
$ echo ${#array[*]}
3
$

Note that the number reported here is the actual number of values stored inside the array, not the
largest subscript used to store an element inside the array.
$ array[10]=foo
$ echo ${array[*]}
Display all elements
hello some text /users/steve/memos foo
$ echo ${#array[*]}
Number of elements
4
$

You can declare an array of integers to the shell simply by giving the array name to typeset -i:
typeset -i data

Integer calculations can be performed on array elements using the ((...)) construct:
$ typeset -i array
$ array[0]=100
$ array[1]=50
$ (( array[2] = array[0] + array[1] ))
$ echo ${array[2]}
150
$ i=1
$ echo ${array[i]}
50
$ array[3]=array[0]+array[2]
$ echo ${array[3]}
250
$

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

258

Note that not only can you omit the dollar signs and the curly braces when referencing array elements inside double parentheses, you also can omit them outside when the array is declared to be
of integer type. Also note that dollar signs are not needed before variables used in subscript expressions.
The following program, called reverse, reads in up to 4096 lines from standard input and then
writes them back out to standard output in reverse order:
$ cat reverse
# read lines to array buf
typeset -i line=0
while (( line < 4096 )) && read buf[line]
do
(( line = line + 1 ))
done
# now print the lines in reverse order
while (( line > 0 )) do
(( line = line - 1 ))
echo "${buf[line]}"
done
$ reverse
line one
line two
line three
Ctrl+d
line three
line two
line one
$

The first while loop executes as long as 4096 or fewer lines have been read and there is more
data to be read from standard input (recall the && described at the end of Chapter 8, Decisions,
Decisions).
The following function, cdh, changes the current directory like cd but uses an array to keep a history
of previous directories. It allows the user to list the directory history and change back to any directory
in it:
$ cat cdh
CDHIST[0]=$PWD

# initialize CDHIST[0]

cdh ()
{
typeset i cdlen i
if [ $# -eq 0 ]
then
set -- $HOME
fi
cdlen=${#CDHIST[*]}

# default to HOME with no arguments

# number of elements in CDHIST

case "$@" in
-l)
#
i=0
while ((i < cdlen))
do
printf "%3d %s\n"
((i = i + 1))
done
return ;;
-[0-9]|-[0-9][0-9])
#
i=${1#-}
#

print directory list

$i ${CDHIST[i]}

cd to dir in list
remove leading '-'

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

259

cd ${CDHIST[i]} ;;
*)

# cd to new dir
cd $@ ;;

esac
CDHIST[cdlen]=$PWD
}
$

The CDHIST array stores each directory visited by cdh, and the first element, CDHIST[0], is initialized with the current directory when the cdh file is run:
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ . cdh
$ cdh /tmp
$ cdh l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
$

Define cdh function

When the cdh file was run, CDHIST[0] was assigned /users/pat, and the cdh function was
defined; when cdh /tmp was executed, cdlen was assigned the number of elements in
CDHIST (one), and CDHIST[1] was assigned /tmp. The cdh l caused printf to display each
element of CDHIST (on this invocation, cdlen was set to 2, because elements 0 and 1 of
CDHIST contained data).
Note that the if statement at the beginning of the function sets $1 to $HOME if no arguments are
passed. Let's try that out:
$ cdh
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ cdh l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
2 /users/pat
$

Well, it worked, but now /users/pat shows up twice in the list. One of the exercises at the end of
this chapter asks you to remedy this.
Okay, the most useful feature of cdh is the n option, which causes it to change the current directory
to the one specified in the list:
$ cdh /usr/spool/uucppublic
$ cdh l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
2 /users/pat
3 /usr/spool/uucppublic
$ cdh 1
$ pwd
/tmp
$ cdh 3
$ pwd
/usr/spool/uucppublic
$

We can make cdh replace our cd command by using the fact that alias lookup is performed before
built-in commands are executed. So if we create a cd alias to cdh, we can have an enhanced cd.
In that case, we have to quote every use of cd in the cdh function to prevent recursion:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

$ cat cdh
CDHIST[0]=$PWD
alias cd=cdh

260

# initialize CDHIST[0]

cdh ()
{
typeset i cdlen i
if [ $# -eq 0 ]
then
set -- $HOME
fi

# default to HOME with no arguments

cdlen=${#CDHIST[*]}

# number of elements in CDHIST

case "$@" in
-l)
#
i=0
while ((i < cdlen))
do
printf "%3d %s\n"
((i = i + 1))
done
return ;;
-[0-9]|-[0-9][0-9])
#
i=${1#-}
#
'cd' ${CDHIST[i]} ;;
*)
#
'cd' $@ ;;
esac
CDHIST[cdlen]=$PWD
}
$ . cdh
$ cd /tmp
$ cd l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
$ cd /usr/spool
$ cd l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
2 /usr/spool
$

print directory list

$i ${CDHIST[i]}

cd to dir in list
remove leading '-'
cd to new dir

Define cdh function and cd alias

Table 15.3 summarizes the various array constructs in the Korn shell and Bash.
Table 15.3. Array Constructs
Construct

Meaning

${array[i]}

Substitute value of element i

$array

Substitute value of first element (array[0])

${array[*]}

Substitute value of all elements

${#array[*]}

Substitute number of elements

array[i]=val

Store val into array[i]

Job Control
The shell provides facilities for controlling jobs. A job is any command sequence. For example:
who | wc

When a command is started in the background (that is, with &), the shell prints out the job number
inside brackets ([]) as well as the process number:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

261

$ who | wc &
[1]
832
$

When a job finishes, the shell prints the message

[n] +

sequence

where n is the job number of the finished job, and sequence is the text of the command sequence
used to create the job.
The jobs command may be used to print the status of jobs that haven't yet finished.
$ jobs
[3] + Running
[2] Running
[1]
Running

make ksh &

monitor &
pic chapt2 | troff > aps.out &

The + and - after the job number mark the current and previous jobs, respectively. The current job
is the last job sent to the background, and the previous job is the next-to-the-last job sent to the
background. Several built-in commands may be given a job number or the current or previous job
as arguments.
The shell's built-in kill command can be used to terminate a job running in the background. The
argument to it can be a process number or a percent sign (%) followed by a job number, a + (current
job), a (previous job), or another % (also current job).
$ pic chapt1 | troff > aps.out &
[1]
886
$ jobs
[1] + Running
pic chapt1 | troff > aps.out &
$ kill %1
[1]
Done
pic chapt1 | troff > aps.out &
$

The preceding kill could have used %+ or %% to refer to the same job.
The first few characters of the command sequence can also be used to refer to a job; for example,
kill %pic would have worked in the preceding example.

Stopped Jobs and the fg and bg Commands

If you are running a job in the foreground (without an &) and you want to suspend it, you can press
the Ctrl+z key. The job stops executing, and the shell prints the message
[n] + Stopped (SIGTSTP)

sequence

The stopped job is made the current job. To have it continue executing, you must use the fg or
bg command. The fg command with no arguments causes the current job to resume execution in
the foreground, and bg causes the current job to resume execution in the background. You can also
use a job number, the first few characters of the pipeline, a +, a -, or a % preceded by a to specify
any job to the fg and bg commands. These commands print out the command sequence to remind
you what is being brought to the foreground or sent to the background.
$ troff memo | photo
Ctrl+z
[1] + Stopped (SIGTSTP)
troff memo | photo
$ bg
[1]
troff memo | photo &
$

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

262

The preceding sequence is one of the most often used with job control: sending a job mistakenly
started in the foreground to the background.
If a job running in the background tries to read from the terminal, it is stopped, and the message
[n] - Stopped (SIGTTIN)

sequence

is printed. It can then be brought to the foreground with the fg command. After entering input to the
job, it can be stopped (with the Ctrl+z) and returned to the background until it again requests input
from the terminal.
Output from a background job normally goes directly to the terminal. The command
stty tostop

causes any background job that attempts to write to the terminal to be stopped and the message
[n] - Stopped (SIGTTOU)

sequence

to be printed. (Note that Bash generates slightly different messages than the ones shown here.)
The following shows how job control might be used:
$ stty tostop
$ rundb
??? find green red
Ctrl+z
[1] + Stopped
rundb
$ bg
[1]
rundb &
...
$ jobs
[1] + Stopped(tty output)
$ fg
rundb
1973 Ford
Mustang
1975 Chevy
Monte Carlo
1976 Ford
Granada
1980 Buick
Century
1983 Chevy
Cavalier
??? find blue
Ctrl+z
[1] + Stopped
rundb
$ bg
[1]
rundb &
...

Start up data base program

Find green and red objects
This may take a while
So put it in the background
Do some other stuff
rundb &
Bring back to foreground
red
green
green
green
red
Find blue objects
Stop it again
Back to the background
Keep working until it's ready

The Restricted Shell rsh

Although the restricted shell is not part of the POSIX standard, it is supported by every Bourne shell
variant we know of.
The restricted shell is almost the same as the regular shell, but it's designed to restrict a user's
capabilities by disallowing certain actions that the standard shell allows. This allows an administrator
to let users who should not have complete access to the system use the shell. It is usually found
in /usr/lib/rsh and is started as the login shell for a user who should not have full capabilities
on a systemfor example, a game user or data-entry clerk. The list of actions disallowed is very
short:
Cannot change directory (cd)
Cannot change PATH, ENV, or SHELL variables
Cannot specify a path to a command

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

263

Cannot redirect output (> and >>)

Cannot exec programs
These restrictions are enforced after the .profile is executed when logging in, and the user is
logged off if he presses Break or Delete while the .profile is being interpreted.
These simple restrictions allow the writer of a restricted user's .profile to have control over what
commands that user can use. The following example shows a simple setup for a restricted environment:
$ cat .profile
User restrict's .profile
PATH=/usr/rbin:/users/restrict/bin
export PATH
SHELL=/usr/lib/rsh
Some commands use SHELL variable
export SHELL
cd /users/restrict/restdir
Don't leave user in HOME directory
$ ls -l .profile
Restricted user shouldn't own his .profile
-rw-r--r-1 pat group1 179 Sep 14 17:50 .profile
$ ls /usr/rbin
Directory of restricted commands
cat
Harmless commands
echo
ls
mail
Let them send us mail
red
Restricted editor
write
$ ls /users/restrict/bin
restrict's command directory
adventure
Lots of games
backgammon
chess
hearts
poker
rogue
$

Here we have a restricted environment for a user. When this user logs in, his PATH is changed to
search just the directories /usr/rbin and /users/restrict/bin. He can run only commands
found in these two directories. Any other command will get a command: not found response. The
user is effectively bottled up in the directory /users/restrict/restdir and cannot cd out of
it. The .profile is owned by a user other than the restricted one, and the permissions are such
that only the owner can change the file. (Don't let a restricted user alter his or her .profile because
the .profile is executed before any restrictions are applied.)
One quick note about the commands in /usr/rbin: They were simply copied from the /bin
and /usr/bin directories. You can put almost any command from /bin and /usr/bin in /usr/
rbin; just use common sense in choosing the commands you allow restricted users to use. For
example, don't give them access to the shell, a compiler, or chmod because these may be used to
bypass the restricted shell. The mail and write commands are safe even though they have shell
escapes because the shell looks at the SHELL variable and runs restricted if the first character of
its name is r. The restricted editor red is the same as ed, except it doesn't allow shell escapes,
and it only allows editing of files in the current directory.
Note that most restricted shells are not really very secure. They should not be used to contain hostile
users. Even though some restricted shells are more secure than others, if you give a restricted user
certain commands (such as env), he will be able to break out into a nonrestricted shell.
If you can't find the restricted shell on your system, you can copy or link your Bash, Korn shell, or
even old Bourne shell to any filename that begins with r and make that file the login shell of the
restricted user. When the shell starts up, it checks the first letter of the command name that was
used to invoke it; if that letter is r, it will be a restricted shell.

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

264

Miscellaneous Features
Other Features of the cd Command
The - argument to cd always means the previous directory.
$ pwd
/usr/src/cmd
$ cd /usr/spool/uucp
$ pwd
/usr/spool/uucp
$ cd /usr/src/cmd
$ cd /usr/spool/uucp
$

cd to previous directory
cd prints out name of new directory

As you can see, cd - can be used to toggle between two directories with no effort at all.
The Korn shell's cd command has the capability to substitute portions of the current directory's path
with something else. (Bash and the POSIX standard shell do not support this feature.) The format is
cd old new

cd attempts to replace the first occurrence of the string old in the current directory's path with the
string new.
$ pwd
/usr/spool/uucppublic/pat
$ cd pat steve
/usr/spool/uucppublic/steve
$ pwd
/usr/spool/uucppublic/steve
$

Change pat to steve and cd

cd prints out name of new directory
Confirm location

Tilde Substitution
If a word on a command line begins with the tilde (~) character, the shell scans the rest of the word
and performs the following substitutions: If the tilde is the only character in the word or if the character
following the tilde is a slash (/),the value of the HOME variable is substituted:
$ echo ~
/users/pat
$ grep Korn ~/shell/chapter9/ksh
The Korn shell is a new shell developed
by David Korn at AT&T
for the Bourne shell would also run under the Korn
the one on System V, the Korn shell provides you with
idea of the compatibility of the Korn shell with Bourne's,
the Bourne and Korn shells.
The main features added to the Korn shell are:
$

If the rest of the word up to a slash is a user's login name in /etc/passwd, the tilde and the user's
login name are substituted with the HOME directory of that user.
$ echo ~steve
/users/steve
$ echo ~pat
/users/pat
$ grep Korn -pat/shell/chapter9/ksh
The Korn shell is a new shell developed
by David Korn at AT&T

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

265

for the Bourne shell would also run under the Korn
the one on System V, the Korn shell provides you with
idea of the compatibility of the Korn shell with Bourne's,
the Bourne and Korn shells.
The main features added to the Korn shell are:
$

In the Korn shell and Bash, if the ~ is followed by a + or a -, the value of the variable PWD or
OLDPWD is substituted, respectively. PWD and OLDPWD are set by cd and are the full pathnames of
the current and previous directories, respectively. ~+ and ~- are not supported by the POSIX
standard shell.
$ pwd
/usr/spool/uucppublic/steve
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/pat
$ echo ~+
/users/pat
$ echo ~/usr/spool/uucppublic/steve
$

In addition to the preceding substitutions, the shell also checks for a tilde after a colon (:) and performs tilde substitution on that as well (for PATH interpretation).

Order of Search
It's worthwhile listing the order of searching the shell uses when you type a command name:
1.

The shell first checks to see whether the command is a reserved word (such as for and do).

If it's not a reserved word and is not quoted, the shell next checks its alias list, and if it finds a
match, performs the substitution. If the alias definition ends in a space, it attempts alias substitution on the next word. The final result is then checked against the reserved word list, and
if it's not a reserved word, the shell proceeds to step 3.
Next, the shell checks the command against its function list and executes it if found.

The shell checks to see whether the command is a built-in command (such as cd and pwd).

Finally, the shell searches the PATH to locate the command.

If the command still isn't found, a command not found error message is issued.

Compatibility Summary
Table 15.4 summarizes the compatibility of the POSIX standard shell, the Korn shell, and Bash with
the features described in this chapter. In this table, an X denotes a supported feature, UP, an
optional feature in the POSIX shell (these are also known as User Portability features in the POSIX
shell specification), and POS, a feature supported only by Bash when it is invoked with the name
sh or with the --posix command-line option, or after set o posix is executed.
Table 15.4. POSIX Shell, Korn Shell, and Bash Compatibility
POSIX Shell

Korn Shell

Bash

ENV file

POS

vi line edit mode

emacs line edit mode

fc command
r command

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

266
POSIX Shell

Korn Shell

Bash
X
X

!string
Functions

local variables

autoload via FPATH

Integer expressions with ((...))

Integer data type

integers in different bases

0xhexnumber, 0octalnumber
Aliases

Arrays
Job control
cd cd old new
~username, ~/
~+, ~-

Exercises

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833
X

1: Using only shell built-in commands, write a function that prints all filenames in a specified directory hierarchy. Its output should be similar to the output of the find command:
$ myfind /users/pat
/users/pat
/users/pat/bin
/users/pat/bin/ksh
/users/pat/bin/lf
/users/pat/bin/pic
/users/pat/chapt1
/users/pat/chapt1/intro
/users/pat/rje
/users/pat/rje/file1

(Hint: Bash and Korn shell functions can be recursive.)

2: Write a shell function called octal that converts octal numbers given as command-line arguments to decimal numbers and prints them out, one per line:
$ octal 10 11 12
8
9
10
$

(Hint for Korn shell users: If you assign a decimal number to a variable when it's declaredfor
example, typeset i d=10#0assignments to this variable from other bases are converted
to decimal first.)
3: Modify the cdh function to filter out multiple occurrences of the same directory; for example:

Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features

267

$ cdh l
0 /users/pat
$ cdh
$ cdh
$ cdh l
0 /users/pat
$

4: Modify the cdh function to set the prompt (PS1) to show the current directory; for example:
/users/pat: cdh /tmp
/tmp: cdh
/users/pat:

5: Modify the cdh function to allow the user to specify a partial name of a directory in the history
file preceded by a dash:
/etc: cdh l
0 /users/pat
1 /tmp
2 /users/steve
3 /usr/spool/uucppublic
4 /usr/local/bin
5 /etc
/etc: cdh pub
/usr/spool/uucppublic: cdh bin
/usr/local/bin:

6: (Bash users only) Add the Korn shell's cd old new feature to the cdh function.

268

Appendix A. Shell Summary

IN THIS APPENDIX

Startup
Commands
Comments
Parameters and Variables
Command Re-entry

Quoting
Filename Substitution
I/O Redirection
Exported Variables and Subshell Execution
Functions

Job Control
Command Summary
This appendix summarizes the main features of the standard POSIX shell as per IEEE Std
1003.1-2001.

Startup
The shell can be given the same options on the command line as can be specified with the set
command. In addition, the following options can be specified:
-c commands

commands are executed.

-i

The shell is interactive. Signals 2, 3, and 15 are ignored.

-s

Commands are read from standard input.

Commands
The general format of a command typed to the shell is

command arguments
where command is the name of the program to be executed, and arguments are its arguments. The
command name and the arguments are delimited by whitespace characters, normally the space,
tab, and newline characters (changing the variable IFS affects this).
Multiple commands can be typed on the same line if they're separated by semicolons (;).
Every command that gets executed returns a number known as the exit status; zero is used to
indicate success, and nonzero indicates a failure.

Shell Summary

269

The pipe symbol | can be used to connect the standard output from one command to the standard
input of another, as in
who | wc -l

The exit status is that of the last command in the pipeline. Placing a ! at the beginning of the pipeline
causes the exit status of the pipeline to be the logical negation of the last command in the pipeline.
If the command sequence is terminated by an ampersand character (&),it is run asynchronously in
the background. The shell displays the process id number and job id of the command at the terminal.
Typing of a command can continue to the next line if the last character on the line is a backslash
character (\).
The characters && cause the command that follows to be executed only if the preceding command
returns a zero exit status. The characters || cause the command that follows to be executed only
if the preceding command returns a nonzero exit status. As an example, in
who | grep "fred" > /dev/null && echo "fred's logged on"

the echo is executed only if the grep returns a zero exit status.

Comments
If a word begins with the character #, the shell treats the remainder of the line as a comment and
simply ignores it.

Parameters and Variables

There are three different types of parameters: shell variables, special parameters, and positional
parameters.

Shell Variables
A shell variable name must start with an alphabetic or underscore (_) character, and can be followed
by any number of alphanumeric or underscore characters. Shell variables can be assigned values
on the command line by writing:

variable=value variable=value ...

Filename substitution is not performed on value.

Positional Parameters
Whenever a shell program is executed, the name of the program is assigned to the variable $0 and
the arguments typed on the command line to the variables $1, $2, and ..., respectively. Positional
parameters can also be assigned values with the set command. Parameters 1 through 9 can be
explicitly referenced. Parameters greater than nine must be enclosed inside braces, as in ${10}.

Special Parameters
Table A.1 summarizes the special shell parameters.

Shell Summary

270

Table A.1. Special Parameter Variables

Parameter

Meaning

The number of arguments passed to the program; or the number of parameters set by executing the set statement

Collectively references all the positional parameters as $1, $2, ...

Same as $*, except when double-quoted ($@) collectively references all the positional parameters as $1,
$2, ...

The name of the program being executed

The process id number of the program being executed

The process id number of the last program sent to the background for execution

The exit status of the last command not executed in the background

The current option flags in effect (see the set statement)

In addition to these parameters, the shell has some other variables that it uses. Table A.2 summarizes the more important of these variables.
Table A.2. Other Variables Used by the Shell
Variable

Meaning

CDPATH

The directories to be searched whenever cd is executed without a full path as argument.

ENV

The name of a file that the shell executes in the current environment when started interactively.

FCEDIT

The editor used by fc. If not set, ed is used.

HISTFILE

If set, it specifies a file to be used to store the command history. If not set or if the file isn't writable,
$HOME/.sh_history is used.

HISTSIZE

If set, specifies the number of previously entered commands accessible for editing. The default value is at least 128.

HOME

The user's home directory; the directory that cd changes to when no argument is supplied.

IFS

The Internal Field Separator characters; used by the shell to delimit words when parsing the command line, for the
read and set commands, when substituting the output from a back-quoted command, and when performing
parameter substitution. Normally, it contains the three characters space, horizontal tab, and newline.

LINENO

Set by the shell to the line number in the script it is executing. This value is set before the line gets executed and
starts at 1.

MAIL

The name of a file that the shell periodically checks for the arrival of mail. If new mail arrives, the shell displays a
You have mail message. See also MAILCHECK and MAILPATH.

MAILCHECK

The number of seconds specifying how often the shell is to check for the arrival of mail in the file in MAIL or in
the files listed in MAILPATH. The default is 600. A value of 0 causes the shell to check before displaying each
command prompt.

MAILPATH

A list of files to be checked for the arrival of mail. Each file is delimited by a colon and can be followed by a percent
sign (%) and a message to be displayed when mail arrives in the indicated file. (You have mail is often the
default.)

PATH

A colon-delimited list of directories to be searched when the shell needs to find a command to be executed. The
current directory is specified as :: or :.: (if it heads or ends the list, : suffices).

PPID

The process id number of the program that invoked this shell (that is, the parent process).

PS1

The primary command prompt, normally $ .

PS2

The secondary command prompt, normally > .

PS4

Prompt used during execution trace (-x option to shell or set -x). Default is + .

PWD

Pathname of the current working directory.

Parameter Substitution
In the simplest case, the value of a parameter can be accessed by preceding the parameter with a
dollar sign ($). Table A.3 summarizes the different types of parameter substitution that can be performed. Parameter substitution is performed by the shell before filename substitution and before
the command line is divided into arguments.

Shell Summary

271

The presence of the colon after parameter in Table A.3 indicates that parameter is to be tested to
see whether it's set and not null. Without the colon, a test is made to check whether parameter is
set only.
Table A.3. Parameter Substitution
Parameter

Meaning

$parameter or ${parameter}

Substitute the value of parameter.

${parameter:-value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set and non-null; otherwise, substitute value.

${parameter-value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set; otherwise, substitute value.

${parameter:=value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set and non-null; otherwise, substitute value and also assign
it to parameter.

${parameter=value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set; otherwise, substitute value and also assign it to parameter.

${parameter:?value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set and non-null; otherwise, write value to standard error
and exit. If value is omitted, write parameter: parameter null or not set instead.

${parameter?value}

Substitute the value of parameter if it's set; otherwise, write value to standard error and exit. If
value is omitted, write parameter: parameter null or not set instead.

${parameter:+value}

Substitute value if parameter is set and non-null; otherwise, substitute null.

${parameter+value}

Substitute value if parameter is set; otherwise, substitute null.

${#parameter}

Substitute the length of parameter. If parameter is * or @, the result is not specified.

${parameter#pattern}

Substitute the value of parameter with pattern removed from the left side. The smallest portion of
the contents of parameter matching pattern is removed. Shell filename substitution characters
(*, ?, [...], !, and @) may be used in pattern.

${parameter##pattern}

Same as #pattern except the largest matching pattern is removed.

${parameter%pattern}

Same as #pattern except pattern is removed from the right side.

${parameter%%pattern}

Same as ##pattern except the largest matching pattern is removed from the right side.

Command Re-entry
The shell keeps a list, or history, of recently entered commands. The number of commands available
is determined by the HISTSIZE variable (default at least 128), and the file in which the history is
kept is determined by the HISTFILE variable (default $HOME/.sh_history). Because the command history is stored in a file, these commands are available after you log off and back on.
There are three ways you can access the command history.

The fc Command
The built-in command fc allows you to run an editor on one or more commands in the command
history. When the edited command(s) is written and you leave the editor, the edited version of the
command(s) is executed. The editor is determined by the FCEDIT variable (default ed). The -e
option may be used with fc to specify the editor rather than FCEDIT.
The s option causes commands to be executed without first invoking an editor. A simple editing
capability is built in to the fc -s command; an argument of the form

old=new
may be used to change the first occurrence of the string old to the string new in the command(s) to
be re-executed.

Shell Summary

272

vi Line Edit Mode

The shell has a built-in implementation of the vi screen editor, scaled down to work on single lines.
When vi mode is turned on, you are by default placed in a state similar to vi's input mode. Commands can be typed just the same as when vi mode is off. At any time, however, you can press
the Esc key to be placed in edit mode. At this point, most vi commands will be interpreted by the
shell. The current command line can be edited, as can any of the lines in the command history.
Pressing Enter at any point in either command or input mode causes the command being edited to
be executed.
Table A.4 lists all the editing commands in vi mode. Note: [count] is any integer and may be omitted.
Table A.4. vi Editing Commands
Input Mode Commands
Command

Meaning

erase

(Erase character, usually Ctrl+h or #); delete previous character.

Ctrl+w

Delete the previous blank-separated word.

kill

(Line kill character, normally Ctrl+u or @); delete the entire current line.

eof

(End-of-file character, normally Ctrl+d); terminate the shell if the current line is empty.

Ctrl+v

Quote next character; editing characters and the erase and kill characters may be entered in a command
line or in a search string if preceded by a Ctrl+v.

Enter

Execute the current line.

Esc

Enter edit mode.

Edit Mode Commands

Command

Meaning

[count]k

Get previous command from history.

[count]-

Get previous command from history.

[count]j

Get next command from history.

[count]+

Get next command from history.

[count]G

Get the command number count from history; the default is the oldest stored command.

/string

Search history for the most recent command containing string; if string is null, the previous string will
be used (string is terminated by an Enter or a Ctrl+j); if string begins with ^, search for line beginning
with string.

?string

Same as / except that the search will be for the least recent command.

Repeat the last / or ? command.

Repeat the last / or ? command but reverse the direction of the search.

[count]l or [count]space

Move cursor right one character.

[count]w

Move cursor right one alphanumeric word.

[count]W

Move cursor right to next blank-separated word.

[count]e

Move cursor to end of word.

[count]E

Move cursor to end of current blank-separated word.

[count]h

Move cursor left one character.

[count]b

Move cursor left one word.

[count]B

Move cursor left to previous blank-separated word.

Move cursor to start of line.

Move cursor to first nonblank character.

Move cursor to end of line.

[count]|

Move cursor to column count; 1 is default.

[count]fc

Move cursor right to character c.

Shell Summary

273

[count]Fc

Move cursor left to character c.

[count]tc

Same as fc followed by h.

[count]Tc

Same as Fc followed by l.

Repeat the last f, F, t, or T command.

Reverse of ;.

Enter input mode and enter text after the current character.

Append text to the end of the line; same as $a.

[count]c motion

Delete current character through character specified by motion and enter input mode; if motion is c, the
entire line is deleted.

Delete current character through end of line and enter input mode.

Same as cc.

[count]d motion

Delete current character through the character specified by motion; if motion is d, the entire line is
deleted.

Delete current character through the end of line; same as d$.

Enter input mode and insert text before the current character.

Enter input mode and insert text before the first word on the line.

[count]P

Place the previous text modification before the cursor.

[count]p

Place the previous text modification after the cursor.

[count]y motion

Copy current character through character specified by motion into buffer used by p and P; if motion is
y, the entire line is copied.

Copy current character through the end of line; same as y$.

Enter input mode and overwrite characters on the line.

[count]rc

Replace the current character with c.

[count]x

Delete current character.

[count]X

Delete preceding character.

[count].

Repeat the previous text modification command.

Invert the case of the current character and advance the cursor.

[count]_

Append the count word from the previous command and enter input mode; the last word is the default.

Attempt filename generation on the current word; if a match is found, replace the current word with the
match and enter input mode.

List files that begin with current word.

Complete pathname of current word; if current word is a directory, append a /; if current word is a file,
append a space.

Undo the last text modification command.

Restore the current line to its original state.

@letter

Soft function keyif an alias of the name _letter is defined, its value will be executed.

[count]v

Execute vi editor on line count; if count is omitted, the current line is used.

Ctrl+l

Linefeed and print current line.

Reprint the current line.

Ctrl+j

Execute the current line.

Ctrl+m

Execute the current line.

Enter

Execute the current line.

Insert a # at the beginning of the line and enter the line into the command history (same as I#Enter).

Quoting
Four different types of quoting mechanisms are recognized. These are summarized in Table A.5.

Shell Summary

274

Table A.5. Summary of Quotes

Quote

Description

'...'

Removes special meaning of all enclosed characters

"..."

Removes special meaning of all enclosed characters except $, `, and \

Removes special meaning of character c that follows; inside double quotes removes special meaning of $, `,
", newline, and \that follows, but is otherwise not interpreted; used for line continuation if appears as last
character on line (newline is removed)

`command` or$
(command)

Executes command and inserts standard output at that point

Tilde Substitution
Each word and shell variable on a command line is checked to see whether it begins with an unquoted ~. If it does, the rest of the word or variable up to a / is considered a login name and is
looked up in a system file, typically /etc/passwd. If that user exists, his home directory replaces
the ~ and his login name. If that user doesn't exist, the text is unchanged. A ~ by itself or followed
by a / is replaced by the HOME variable.

Arithmetic Expressions
General Format: $((expression))
The shell evaluates the integer arithmetic expression. expression can contain constants, shell variables (which don't have to be preceded by dollar signs), and operators. The operators, in order of
decreasing precedence, are
-

unary minus

bitwise NOT

logical negation

* / %

multiplication, division, remainder

+ -

addition, subtraction

<< >>

left shift, right shift

<= >= < >

comparison

== !=

equal, not equal

bitwise AND

bitwise exclusive OR

bitwise OR

logical AND

logical OR

expr1 ? expr2 : expr3

conditional operator

=, *=, /=, %=

assignment

+=, <<=, >>=, &=,

^=, |=

Parentheses may be used to override operator precedence.

The exit status is zero (true) if the last expression is nonzero and one (false) if the last expression
is zero.
The C operators sizeof, ++, and -- may be available in your shell implementation but are not
required by the standard.

Examples

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y=$((22 * 33))
z=$((y * y / (y - 1)))

Filename Substitution
After parameter substitution (and command substitution) is performed on the command line, the
shell looks for the special characters *, ?, and [. If they're not quoted, the shell searches the current
directory, or another directory if preceded by a /, and substitutes the names of all files that match
(these names are first alphabetized by the shell). If no match is found, the characters remain untouched.
Note that filenames beginning with a . must be explicitly matched (so echo * won't display your
hidden files; echo .* will).
The filename substitution characters are summarized in Table A.6.
Table A.6. Filename Substitution Characters
Character(s)

Meaning

Matches any single character.

Matches zero or more characters.

[chars]

Matches any single character in chars; the format C1-C2 can be used to match any character in the range Cl through
C2, inclusive (for example, [A-Z] matches any uppercase letter).

[!chars]

Matches any single character not in chars; a range of characters may be specified previously.

I/O Redirection
When scanning the command line, the shell looks for the special redirection characters < and >. If
found, they are processed and removed (with any associated arguments) from the command line.
Table A.7 summarizes the different types of I/O redirection that the shell supports.
Table A.7. I/0 Redirection
Construct

Meaning

< file

Redirect standard input from file.

> file

Redirect standard output to file; file is created if it doesn't exist and zeroed if it does.

>| file

Redirect standard output to file; file is created if it doesn't exist and zeroed if it does; the noclobber (-C) option to
set is ignored.

>> file

Like >, only output is appended to file if it already exists.

<< word

Redirect standard input from lines that follow up until a line containing just word; parameter substitution occurs on
the lines, and back-quoted commands are executed and the backslash character interpreted; if any character in word is
quoted, none of this processing occurs and the lines are passed through unaltered; if word is preceded by a -, leading
tabs on the lines are removed.

<& digit

Standard input is redirected from the file associated with file descriptor digit.

>& digit

Standard output is redirected to the file associated with file descriptor digit.

<&-

Standard input is closed.

>&-

Standard output is closed.

<> file

Open file for both reading and writing.

Note that filename substitution is not performed on file. Any of the constructs listed in the first column
of the table may be preceded by a file descriptor number to have the same effect on the file associated with that file descriptor.

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The file descriptor 0 is associated with standard input, 1 with standard output, and 2 with standard
error.

Exported Variables and Subshell Execution

Commands other than the shell's built-in commands are normally executed in a new shell, called
a subshell. Subshells cannot change the values of variables in the parent shell, and they can only
access variables from the parent shell that were exported to themeither implicitly or explicitly
by the parent. If the subshell changes the value of one of these variables and wants to have its own
subshells know about it, it must explicitly export the variable before executing the subshell.
When the subshell finishes execution, any variables that it may have set are inaccessible by the
parent.

The (...) Construct

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

If one or more commands are placed inside parentheses, those commands will be executed in a
subshell.

The { ...; } Construct

If one or more commands are placed inside curly braces, those commands will be executed by the
current shell.
With this construct and the (...) construct, I/O can be redirected and piped into and out of the set
of enclosed commands, and the set can be sent to the background for execution by placing an & at
the end. For example,
(prog1; prog2; prog3) 2>errors &

submits the three listed programs to the background for execution, with standard error from all three
programs redirected to the file errors.

More on Shell Variables

A shell variable can be placed into the environment of a command by preceding the command name
with the assignment to the parameter on the command line, as in
PHONEBOOK=$HOME/misc/phone rolo

Here the variable PHONEBOOK will be assigned the indicated value and then placed in rolo's environment. The environment of the current shell remains unchanged, as if
(PHONEBOOK=$HOME/misc/phone; export PHONE BOOK; rolo)

had been executed instead.

Functions
Functions take the following form:

name () compound-command
where compound-command is a set of commands enclosed in (...), {...} or can be a for, case,
until, or while command. Most often, the function definition takes this form:

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name () { command; command; ...command; }

where name is the name of the function defined to the current shell (functions can't be exported).
The function definition can span as many lines as necessary. A return command can be executed
to cause execution of the function to be terminated without also terminating the shell (see the return
command description).
For example,
nf () { ls | wc -l; }

defines a function called nf to count the number of files in your current directory.

Job Control
Shell Jobs
Every command sequence run in the background is assigned a job number, starting at one. The
lowest available number not in use is assigned. A job may be referred to by a job_id, which is a %
followed by the job number, %+, %-, %%, % followed by the first few letters of the pipeline, or %?
string. The following built-in commands may be given a job_id as an argument: kill, fg, bg, and
wait. The special conventions %+ and %- refer to the current and previous jobs, respectively; %%
also refers to the current job. The current job is the most recent job placed in the background or the
job running in the foreground. The previous job is the previous current job. The convention %string
refers to the job whose name begins with string; %?string refers to the job whose name contains
string. The jobs command may be used to list the status of all currently running jobs.
If the monitor option of the set command is turned on, the shell prints a message when each job
finishes. If you still have jobs when you try to exit the shell, a message is printed to alert you of this.
If you immediately try to exit again, the shell exits. The monitor option is enabled by default for
interactive shells.

Stopping Jobs
If the shell is running on a system with job control, and the monitor option of the set command is
turned on, jobs that are running in the foreground may be placed in the background and vice versa.
Normally, Ctrl+z stops the current job. The bg command puts a stopped job in the background. The
fg command brings a background or stopped job to the foreground.
Whenever a job in the background attempts to read from the terminal, it is stopped until it is brought
to the foreground. Output from background jobs normally comes to the terminal. If stty tostop
is executed, output from background jobs is disabled, and a job writing to the terminal is stopped
until it is brought to the foreground. When the shell exits, all stopped jobs are killed.

Command Summary
This section summarizes the shell's built-in commands. Actually, some of these commands (such
as echo and test) may not be built in to the shell but must be provided as a utility by a POSIXcompliant system. They are built in to Bash and the Korn shell and are so often used in shell scripts
that we decided to list them here anyway.
The following commands are organized alphabetically for easy reference.

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The : Command
General Format: :
This is essentially a null command. It is frequently used to satisfy the requirement that a command
appear.

Example
if who | grep jack > /dev/null
then
:
else
echo "jack's not logged in"
fi

The : command returns an exit status of zero.

The . Command
General Format: . file
The dot command causes the indicated file to be read and executed by the shell, just as if the lines
from the file were typed at that point. Note that file does not have to be executable, only readable.
Also, the shell uses the PATH variable to find file.

Example
. progdefs

Execute commands in progdefs

The preceding command causes the shell to search the current PATH for the file progdefs. When
it finds it, it reads and executes the commands from the file.
Note that because file is not executed by a subshell, variables set and/or changed within file remain
in effect after execution of the commands in file is complete.

The alias Command

General Format: alias name=string [name=string ...]
The alias command assigns string to the alias name. Whenever name is used as a command,
the shell substitutes string, performing command-line substitution after string is in place.

Examples
alias ll='ls l'
alias dir='basename $(pwd)'

If an alias ends with a blank, the word following the alias is also checked to see whether it's an alias.
The format
alias name

causes the alias for name to be printed out.

alias with no arguments lists all aliases.
alias returns an exit status of zero unless a name is given (as in alias name) for which no alias
has been defined.

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The bg Command
General Format: bg job_id
If job control is enabled, the job identified by job_id is put into the background. If no argument is
given, the most recently suspended job is put into the background.

Example
bg %2

The break Command

General Format: break
Execution of this command causes execution of the innermost for, while, or until loop to be
immediately terminated. Execution continues with the commands that immediately follow the loop.
If the format
break n

is used, where n is an integer greater than or equal to 1, execution of the n innermost loops is
automatically terminated.

The case Command

General Format:
case value in
patl) command
command
...
command;;
pat2) command
command
...
command;;
...
patn) command
command
...
command;;
esac

The word value is successively compared against patl, pat2, ..., patn until a match is found. The
commands that appear immediately after the matching pattern are then executed until a double
semicolon (;;) is encountered. At that point, execution of the case is terminated.
If no pattern matches value, none of the commands inside the case are executed. The pattern *
matches anything and is often used as the last pattern in a case as the catchall case.
The shell metacharacters * (match zero or more characters), ? (match any single character), and
[...] (match any single character enclosed between the brackets) can be used in patterns. The
character | can be used to specify a logical ORing of two patterns, as in

patl | pat2
which means to match either patl or pat2.

Examples

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case $1 in
-l) lopt=TRUE;;
-w) wopt=TRUE;;
-c) copt=TRUE;;
*) echo "Unknown option";;
esac
case $choice in
[1-9]) valid=TRUE;;
*) echo "Please choose a number from 1-9";;
esac

The cd Command
General Format: cd directory
Execution of this command causes the shell to make directory the current directory. If directory is
omitted, the shell makes the directory specified in the HOME variable the current directory.
If the shell variable CDPATH is null, directory must be a full directory path (for example, /users/
steve/documents) or relative to the current directory (for example, documents, ../pat).
If CDPATH is non-null and directory is not a full path, the shell searches the colon-delimited directory
list in CDPATH for a directory containing directory.

Examples
$ cd documents/memos

Change to documents/memos directory

$ cd

Change to HOME directory

An argument of - causes the shell to make the previous directory the current directory. The pathname of the new current directory is printed out.

Examples
$ pwd
/usr/lib/uucp
$ cd /
$ cd /usr/lib/uucp
$

The cd command sets the shell variable PWD to the new current directory, and OLDPWD to the previous directory.

The continue command

General Format: continue
Execution of this command from within a for, while, or until loop causes any commands that
follow the continue to be skipped. Execution of the loop then continues as normal.
If the format
continue n

is used, the commands within the n innermost loops are skipped. Execution of the loops then continue as normal.

The echo Command

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281

General Format: echo args

This command causes args to be written to standard output. Each word from args is delimited by a
blank space. A newline character is written at the end. If args is omitted, the effect is to simply skip
a line.
Certain backslashed characters have a special meaning to echo as shown in Table A.8.
Table A.8. echo Escape Characters
Character

Prints

Alert

Backspace

The line without a terminating newline

Formfeed

Newline

Carriage return

Tab character

Vertical tab character

Backslash character

\0nnn

The character whose ASCII value is nnn, where nnn is a one- to three-digit octal number that starts with a zero

Remember to quote these characters so that the echo command interprets them and not the shell.

Examples
$ echo *
bin docs mail mise src
$ echo

List all files in the current directory

$ echo 'X\tY'
X
Y
$ echo "\n\nSales Report"

Print X and Y, separated by a tab

Sales Report
$ echo "Wake up!!\a"
Wake up!!
$

Skip a line

Skip two lines before displaying Sales Report

Print message and beep terminal

The eval Command

General Format: eval args
Execution of this command causes the shell to evaluate args and then execute the results. This is
useful for causing the shell to effectively double-scan a command line.

Example
$ x='abc def'
$ y='$x'
$ echo $y
$x
$ eval echo $y
abc def
$

Assign $x to y

The exec Command

General Format: exec command args

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282

When the shell executes the exec command, it initiates execution of the specified command with
the indicated arguments. Unlike other commands executed as a new process, command replaces
the current process (that is, no new process is created). After command starts execution, there is
no return to the program that initiated the exec.
If just I/O redirection is specified, the input and/or output for the shell is accordingly redirected.

Examples
exec /bin/sh

Replace current process with sh

exec < datafile

Reassign standard input to datafile

The exit Command

General Format: exit n
Execution of exit causes the current shell program to be immediately terminated. The exit status
of the program is the value of the integer n, if supplied. If n is not supplied, the exit status is that of
the last command executed prior to the exit.
An exit status of zero is used by convention to indicate success, and nonzero to indicate failure
(such as an error condition). This convention is used by the shell in evaluation of conditions for if,
while, and until commands, and with the && and || constructs.

Examples
who | grep $user > /dev/null
exit
exit 1
if finduser
then
...
fi

Exit with status of last grep

Exit with status of 1
If finduser returns an exit status of zero then...

Note that executing exit from a login shell has the effect of logging you off.

The export Command

General Format: export variables
The export command tells the shell that the indicated variables are to be marked as exported; that
is, their values are to be passed down to subshells.

Examples
export PATH PS1
export dbhome x1 y1 date

Variables may be set when exported using the form

export variable=value...

So lines such as
PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin; export PATH
CDPATH=.:$HOME:/usr/spool/uucppublic; export CDPATH

can be rewritten as

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283

export PATH=$PATH:$HOME/bin CDPATH=.:$HOME:/usr/spool/uucppublic

The output of export with a p argument is a list of the exported variables and their values in the
form
export variable=value

or
export variable

if variable has been exported but not yet set.

The false Command

General Format: false
The false command simply returns a nonzero exit status.

The fc Command
General Format: fc -e editor -lnr first last
fc s old=new first
The fc command is used to edit commands in the command history. A range of commands is
specified from first to last, where first and last can be either command numbers or strings; a negative
number is taken as an offset from the current command number; a string specifies the most recently
entered command beginning with that string. The commands are read into the editor and executed
upon exit from the editor. If no editor is specified, the value of the shell variable FCEDIT is used; if
FCEDIT is not set, ed is used.
The -l option lists the commands from first to last (that is, an editor is not invoked). If the -n option
is also selected, these commands are not preceded by command numbers.
The -r option to fc reverses the order of the commands.
If last is not specified, it defaults to first. If first is also not specified, it defaults to the previous command for editing and to -16 for listing.
The s option causes the selected command to be executed without editing it first. The format
fc -s old=new first

causes the command first to be re-executed after the string old in the command is replaced with
new. If first isn't specified, the previous command is used, and if old=new isn't specified, the command is not changed.

Examples
fc -l

List the last 16 commands

fc -e vi sed

Read the last sed command into vi

fc 100 110

Read commands 100 to 110 into $FCEDIT

fc -s

Re-execute the previous command

fc -s abc=def 104

Re-execute command 104, replacing abc with def

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The fg Command
General Format: fg job_id
If job control is enabled, the job specified by job_id is brought to the foreground. If no argument is
given, the most recently suspended job, or the job last sent to the background is brought to the
foreground.

Example
fg %2

The for Command

General Format:
for var in wordl word2 ... wordn
do
command
command
...
done

Execution of this command causes the commands enclosed between the do and done to be executed as many times as there are words listed after the in.
The first time through the loop, the first wordwordlis assigned to the variable var and the commands between the do and done executed. The second time through the loop, the second word
listedword2is assigned to var and the commands in the loop executed again. This process
continues until the last variable in the listwordnis assigned to var and the commands between
the do and done executed. At that point, execution of the for loop is terminated. Execution then
continues with the command that immediately follows the done.
The special format
for var
do
...
done

indicates that the positional parameters $1, $2, ... are to be used in the list and is equivalent to
for var in "$@"
do
...
done

Example
# nroff all of the files in the current directory
for file in *
do
nroff -Tlp $file | lp
done

The getopts Command

General Format: getopts options var
This command processes command-line arguments. options is a list of valid single letter options. If
any letter in options is followed by a :, that option takes a following argument on the command line,
which must be separated from the option by at least one whitespace character.

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Each time getopts is called, it processes the next command-line argument. If a valid option is
found, getopts stores the matching option letter inside the specified variable var and returns a
zero exit status.
If an invalid option is specified (that is, one not listed in options), getopts stores a ? inside var and
returns with a zero exit status. It also writes an error message to standard error.
If an option takes a following argument, getopts stores the matching option letter inside var and
stores the following command-line argument inside the special variable OPTARG. If no arguments
are left on the command line, getopts stores a ? inside var and writes an error message to standard
error.
If no more options remain on the command line (that is, if the next command-line argument does
not begin with a -), getopts returns a nonzero exit status.
The special variable OPTIND is also used by getopts. It is initially set to 1 and is adjusted each
time getopts returns to indicate the number of the next command-line argument to be processed.
The argument -- can be placed on the command line to specify the end of the command-line
arguments.
getopts supports stacked arguments, as in
repx -iau

which is equivalent to
repx -i -a -u

Options that take following arguments may not be stacked.

If the format
getopts options var args

is used, getopts parses the arguments specified by args rather than the command-line arguments.

Example
usage="Usage: foo [-r] [-O outfile] infile"
while getopts ro: opt
do
case "$opt"
in
r) rflag=1;;
O) oflag=1
ofile=$OPTARG;;
\?) echo "$usage"
exit 1;;
esac
done
if [ $OPTIND
then
echo
echo
exit
fi

-gt $# ]
"Needs input file!"
"$usage"
2

shift $((OPTIND 1))

ifile=$1
...

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The hash Command

General Format: hash commands
This command tells the shell to look for the specified commands and to remember what directories
they are located in. If commands is not specified, a list of the hashed commands is displayed.
If the format
hash -r

is used, the shell removes all commands from its hash list. Next time any command is executed,
the shell uses its normal search methods to find the command.

Examples
hash rolo whoq
hash
hash -r

The if Command
General Format:
if commandt
then
command
command
...
fi

Add rolo and whoq to hash list

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833
Print hash list

Remove hash list

commandt is executed and its exit status tested. If it is zero, the commands that follow up to the
fi are executed. Otherwise, the commands that follow up to the fi are skipped.
Example
if grep $sys sysnames > /dev/null
then
echo "$sys is a valid system name"
fi

If the grep returns an exit status of zero (which it will if it finds $sys in the file sysnames), the
echo command is executed; otherwise it is skipped.
The built-in command test is often used as the command following the if.

Example
if [ $# -eq 0 ]
then
echo "Usage: $0 [-l] file ..."
exit 1
fi

An else clause can be added to the if to be executed if the command returns a nonzero exit status.
In this case, the general format of the if becomes
if commandt
then
command
command
...
else

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command
command
...
fi

If commandt returns an exit status of zero, the commands that follow up to the else are executed,
and the commands between the else and the fi are skipped. Otherwise, commandt returns a
nonzero exit status and the commands between the then and the else are skipped, and the commands between the else and the fi are executed.

Example
if [ -z "$line" ]
then
echo "I couldn't find $name"
else
echo "$line"
fi

In the preceding example, if line has zero length, the echo command that displays the message
I couldn't find $name is executed; otherwise, the echo command that displays the value of
line is executed.
A final format of the if command is useful when more than a two-way decision has to be made. Its
general format is
if commandl
then
command
command
...
elif command2
then
command
command
...
elif commandn
then
command
command
...
else
command
command
...
fi

commandl, command2, ..., commandn are evaluated in order until one of the commands returns an
exit status of zero, at which point the commands that immediately follow the then (up to another
elif, else, or fi) are executed. If none of the commands returns an exit status of zero, the commands listed after the else (if present) are executed.
Example
if [ "$choice" = a ]
then
add $*
elif [ "$choice" = d ]
then
delete $*
elif [ "$choice" = l ]
then
list

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288

else
echo "Bad choice!"
error=TRUE
fi

The jobs Command

General Format: jobs
The list of active jobs is printed. If the -l option is specified, detailed information about each job,
including its process id, is listed as well. If the -p option is specified, only process ids are listed.
If an optional job_id is supplied to the jobs command, just information about that job is listed.

Example
$ sleep 100 &
[1] 1104
$ jobs
[1] + Running
$

sleep 100 &

The kill Command

General Format: kill -signal job
The kill command sends the signal signal to the specified process, where job is a process id
number or job_id, and signal is a number or one of the signal names specified in <signal.h> (see
the description of trap later in the chapter). kill l lists these names. A signal number supplied
with the l option lists the corresponding signal name. A process id used with the l option lists
the name of the signal that terminated the specified process (if it was terminated by a signal).
The s option can also be used when a signal name is supplied, in which case the dash before the
name is not used (see the following example).
If signal isn't specified, TERM is used.

Examples
kill
kill
kill
kill

-9 1234
-HUP %2
s TERM %2
%1

Note that more than one process id can be supplied to the kill command on the command line.

The newgrp Command

General Format: newgrp group
This command changes your real group id (GID) to group. If no argument is specified, it changes
you back to your default group.

Examples
newgrp shbook

Change to group shbook

newgrp

Change back to default group

If a password is associated with the new group, and you are not listed as a member of the group,
you will be prompted to enter it.

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289

newgrp l changes you back to your login group.

The pwd Command

General Format: pwd
This command tells the shell to print your working directory, which is written to standard output.

Examples
$ pwd
/users/steve/documents/memos
$ cd
$ pwd
/users/steve
$

The read Command

General Format: read vars
This command causes the shell to read a line from standard input and assign successive whitespace-delimited words from the line to the variables vars. If fewer variables are listed than there are
words on the line, the excess words are stored in the last variable.
Specifying just one variable has the effect of reading and assigning an entire line to the variable.
The exit status of read is zero unless an end-of-file condition is encountered.

Examples
$ read hours mins
10 19
$ echo "$hours:$mins"
10:19
$ read num rest
39 East 12th Street, New York City 10003
$ echo "$num\n$rest"
39
East 12th Street, New York City 10003
$ read line
Here
is an entire
line \r
$ echo "$line"
Here
is an entire
line r
$

Note in the final example that any leading whitespace characters get eaten by the shell when read.
You can change IFS if this poses a problem.
Also note that backslash characters get interpreted by the shell when you read the line, and any
that make it through (double backslashes will get through as a single backslash) get interpreted by
echo if you display the value of the variable.
A r option to read says to not treat a \character at the end of a line as line continuation.

The readonly Command

General Format: readonly vars

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290

This command tells the shell that the listed variables cannot be assigned values. These variables
may be optionally assigned values on the readonly command line. If you subsequently try to
assign a value to a readonly variable, the shell issues an error message.
readonly variables are useful for ensuring that you don't accidentally overwrite the value of a
variable. They're also good for ensuring that other people using a shell program can't change the
values of particular variables (for example, their HOME directory or their PATH). The readonly attribute is not passed down to subshells.
readonly with a p option prints a list of your readonly variables.

Example
$ readonly DB=/users/steve/database
$ DB=foo
sh: DB: is read-only
$ echo $DB
/users/steve/database
$

Assign value to DB and make it readonly

Try to assign it a value
Error message from the shell
But can still access its value

The return Command

General Format: return n
This command causes the shell to stop execution of the current function and immediately return to
the caller with an exit status of n. If n is omitted, the exit status returned is that of the command
executed immediately prior to the return.

The set Command

General Format: set options args
This command is used to turn on or off options as specified by options. It is also used to set positional
parameters, as specified by args.
Each single letter option in options is enabled if the option is preceded by a minus sign (-), or disabled
if preceded by a plus sign (+). Options can be grouped, as in
set -fx

which enables the f and x options.

Table A.9 summarizes the options that can be selected.
Table A.9. set Options
Meaning

Option

Don't treat subsequent args preceded by a - as options. If there are no arguments, the positional parameters are unset.

-a

Automatically export all variables that are subsequently defined or modified.

-b

If supported by the implementation, cause the shell to notify you when background jobs finish.

-C

Don't allow output redirection to overwrite existing files. >| can still be used to force individual files to be overwritten
even if this option is selected.

-e

Exit if any command that gets executed fails or has a nonzero exit status.

-f

Disable filename generation.

-h

Add commands inside functions to the hash list as they are defined, and not as they are executed.

-m

Turn on the job monitor.

-n

Read commands without executing them (useful for checking for balanced do...dones, and if...fis).

Write current option mode settings in command format.

Shell Summary

291

Meaning

Option

-o m

Turn on option mode m (see Table A.10).

-u

Issue an error if a variable is referenced without having been assigned a value or if a positional parameter is referenced
without having been set.

-v

Print each shell command line as it is read.

-x

Print each command and its arguments as it is executed, preceded by a +.

Shell modes are turned on or off by using the -o and +o options, respectively, followed by an option
name. These options are summarized in Table A.10.
Table A.10. Shell Modes
Mode

Meaning

allexport

Same as -a.

errexit

Same as -e.

ignoreeof

The exit command must be used to leave the shell.

monitor

Same as -m.

noclobber

Same as -C.

noexec

Same as -n.

noglob

Same as -f.

nolog

Don't put function definitions in the history.

nounset

Same as -u.

verbose

Same as -v.

The inline editor is set to vi.

xtrace

Same as -x.

The command set -o without any following options has the effect of listing all shell modes and
their settings.
The shell variable $- contains the current options setting.
Each word listed in args is set to the positional parameters $1, $2, ..., respectively. If the first word
might start with a minus sign, it's safer to specify the -- option to set to avoid interpretation of that
value.
If args is supplied, the variable $# will be set to the number of parameters assigned after execution
of the command.

Examples
set -vx

Print all command lines as they are read,

and each command and its arguments as
it is executed

set "$name" "$address" "$phone"

Set $1 to $name, $2 to $address, and $3 to

$phone

set -- -1

Set $1 to -1

set -o vi

Turn on vi mode

set +o verbose -o noglob

Turn verbose mode off, noglob on

The shift Command

General Format: shift

Shell Summary

292

This command causes the positional parameters $1, $2, ..., $n to be shifted left one place. That
is, $2 is assigned to $1, $3 to $2, ..., and $n to $n-1. $# is adjusted accordingly.
If the format
shift n

is used instead, the shift is to the left n places.

Examples
$
$
4
a
$
$
3
b
$
$
1
d
$

set a b c d
echo "$#\n$*"
b c d
shift
echo "$#\n$*"
c d
shift 2
echo "$#\n$*"

The test Command

General Format:
test condition

or
[ condition ]

The shell evaluates condition and if the result of the evaluation is TRUE, returns a zero exit status.
If the result of the evaluation is FALSE, a nonzero exit status is returned. If the format [ condition ] is used, a space must appear immediately after the [ and before the ].

condition is composed of one or more operators as shown in Table A.11. The -a operator has higher
precedence than the -o operator. In any case, parentheses can be used to group subexpressions.
Just remember that the parentheses are significant to the shell and so must be quoted. Operators
and operands (including parentheses) must be delimited by one or more spaces so that test sees
them as separate arguments.
test is often used to test conditions in an if, while, or until command.

Examples
# see if perms is executable
if test -x /etc/perms
then
...
fi
# see if it's a directory or a normal file that's readable
if [ -d $file -o $ -f $file -a -r $file $ ]
then
...
fi

Shell Summary

293

Table A.11. test Operators

Operator

Returns TRUE (zero exit status) if

File Operators
-b file

file is a block special file

-c file

file is a character special file

-d file

file is a directory

-e file

file exists

-f file

file is an ordinary file

-g file

file has its set group id (SGID) bit set

-h file

file is a symbolic link

-k file

file has its sticky bit set

-L file

file is a symbolic link

-p file

file is a named pipe

-r file

file is readable by the process

-S file

file is a socket

-s file

file has nonzero length

-t fd

fd is open file descriptor associated with a terminal (1 is default)

-u file

file has its set user id (SUID) bit set

-w file

file is writable by the process

-x file

file is executable

String Operators
string

string is not null

-n string

string is not null (and string must be seen by test)

-z string

string is null (and string must be seen by test)

string1 = string2

string1 is identical to string2

string1 != string2

string1 is not identical to string2

Integer Comparison Operators

int1 -eq int2

int1 is equal to int2

int1 -ge int2

int1 is greater than or equal to int2

int1 -gt int2

int1 is greater than int2

int1 -le int2

int1 is less than or equal to int2

int1 -lt int2

int1 is less than int2

int1 -ne int2

int1 is not equal to int2

Boolean Operators
! expr

expr is FALSE; otherwise, returns TRUE

expr1 -a expr2

expr1 is TRUE, and expr2 is TRUE

expr1 -o expr2

expr1 is TRUE, or expr2 is TRUE

The times Command

General Format: times
Execution of this command causes the shell to write to standard output the total amount of time that
has been used by the shell and by all its child processes. For each, two numbers are listed: first the
accumulated user time and then the accumulated system time.
Note that times does not report the time used by built-in commands.

Example

Shell Summary
$ times
1m5s 2m9s
8m22.23s 6m22.01s
$

294
Print time used by processes
1 min., 5 secs. user time, 2 mins., 9 secs. system time
Time used by child processes

The trap Command

General Format: trap commands signals
This command tells the shell to execute commands whenever it receives one of the signals listed
in signals. The listed signals can be specified by name or number.
trap with no arguments prints a list of the current trap assignments.
If the first argument is the null string, as in
trap "" signals

the signals in signals are ignored when received by the shell.

If the format
trap

signals

is used, processing of each signal listed in signals is reset to the default action.
Examples
trap "echo hangup >> $ERRFILE; exit" 2

Log message and exit on hangup

trap "rm $TMPFILE; exit" 1 2 15

remove $TMPFILE on signals l, 2, or 15

trap "" 2

Ignore interrupts

trap 2

Reset default processing of interrupts

Table A.12 lists values that can be specified in the signal list.
Table A.12. Signal Numbers and Names for trap
Signal #

Signal Name

Generated for

EXIT

Exit from the shell

HUP

Hangup

INT

Interrupt (for example, Delete key, Ctrl+c)

QUIT

Quit

ABRT

Abort

KILL

Kill

ALRM

Alarm timeout

TERM

Software termination signal (sent by kill by default)

The shell scans commands when the trap command is encountered and again when one of the
listed signals is received. This means, for example, that when the shell encounters the command
trap "echo $count lines processed >> $LOGFILE; exit" HUP INT TERM

it substitutes the value of count at that point, and not when one of the signals is received. You can
get the value of count substituted when one of the signals is received if you instead enclose the
commands in single quotes:
trap 'echo $count lines processed >> $LOGFILE; exit' HUP INT TERM

Shell Summary

295

The true Command

General Format: true
This command returns a zero exit status.

The type Command

General Format: type commands
This command prints information about the indicated commands.

Examples
$ type troff echo
troff is /usr/bin/troff
echo is a shell builtin
$

The umask Command

General Format: umask mask
umask sets the default file creation mask to mask. Files that are subsequently created are ANDed
with this mask to determine the mode of the file.
umask with no arguments prints the current mask. The S option says to produce symbolic output.

Examples
$ umask
0002
$ umask 022
$

Print current mask

No write to others
No write to group either

The unalias Command

General Format: unalias names
The alias's names are removed from the alias list. The a option says to remove all aliases.

The unset Command

General Format: unset names
This causes the shell to erase definitions of the variables or functions listed in names. Read-only
variables cannot be unset. The v option to unset specifies that a variable name follows, whereas
the f option specifies a function name. If neither option is used, it is assumed that variable name(s)
follow.

Example
unset dblist files

Remove definitions of variables dblist and files

The until Command

General Format:

Shell Summary

296

until commandt
do
command
command
...
done

commandt is executed and its exit status tested. If it is nonzero, the commands enclosed between
the do and done are executed. Then commandt is executed again and its status tested. If it is
nonzero, the commands between the do and done are once again executed. Execution of commandt and subsequent execution of the commands between the do and done continues until commandt returns a zero exit status, at which point the loop is terminated. Execution then continues
with the command that follows the done.
Note that because commandt gets evaluated immediately on entry into the loop, the commands
between the do and done may never be executed if it returns a zero exit status the first time.

Example

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

# sleep for 60 seconds until jack logs on

until who | grep jack > /dev/null
do
sleep 60
done
echo jack has logged on

The preceding loop continues until the grep returns a zero exit status (that is, finds jack in who's
output). At that point, the loop is terminated, and the echo command that follows is executed.

The wait Command

General Format: wait job

This command causes the shell to suspend its execution until the process identified as job finishes
executing. Job can be a process id number or a job_id. If job is not supplied, the shell waits for all
child processes to finish executing. If more than one process id is listed, wait will wait for them all
to complete.
wait is useful for waiting for processes to finish that have been sent to the background for execution.

Example
sort large_file > sorted_file &
. . .
wait
plotdata sorted_file

sort in the background

Continue processing
Now wait for sort to finish

The variable $! can be used to obtain the process id number of the last process sent to the background.

The while Command

General Format:
while commandt
do
command
command
...
done

Shell Summary

297

commandt is executed and its exit status tested. If it is zero, the commands enclosed between the
do and done are executed. Then commandt is executed again and its status tested. If it is zero, the
commands between the do and done are once again executed. Execution of commandt and subsequent execution of the commands between the do and done continues until commandt returns
a nonzero exit status, at which point the loop is terminated. Execution then continues with the command that follows the done.
Note that because commandt gets evaluated immediately on entry into the loop, the commands
between the do and done may never be executed if it returns a nonzero exit status the first time.

Example
# fill up the rest of the buffer with blank lines
while [ $lines -le $maxlines ]
do
echo >> $BUFFER
lines=$((lines + 1))
done

298

Appendix B. For More Information

IN THIS APPENDIX
Online Documentation
Documentation on the Web
Books
Many sources of information on the Unix system are available; however, we have selectively listed
some titles and Web sites here of particular value to shell programmers. All Web sites and URLs
are valid as of the publication of this book, but as is often the case on the Internet, some may not
be available by the time you read this.
There is one reference that you cannot do without. This is the Unix documentation for your particular
system. It gives detailed descriptions on the syntax and various options for each of the commands.

Online Documentation
If a printed version of your system's documentation isn't available, you can use the man command
to get information (referred to as the man pages by Unix users) about any specific Unix command.
The format is
man command

Some systems have an interactive documentation command called info. To invoke it, simply type
info. After it starts up, just type h for a tutorial.
Note that some smaller systems may not have online documentation due to disk space limitations.
However, almost all this information is also available on the Web and in printed form.

Documentation on the Web

The authors of this book maintain the Web site at www.kochan-wood.com. You can download the
rolo program; get answers to the exercises; and find out more about Unix, the C programming
language, and shell programming there.
The best place on the Web for information on the POSIX standard is at www.unix.org. This site is
maintained by The Open Group, an international consortium that worked with the IEEE to create
the current POSIX specification. The complete specification is available on its Web site. You must
register first to read it, but registration is free. The URL for accessing the documentation is
www.unix.org/online.html. You can also purchase for download a printable copy of the Open Group
Unix documentation at www.opengroup.org/pubs/catalog/un.htm. (The standards publications are
only available for download or on CD-ROM, although you may still be able to find some older, outof-print hard-copy versions at Amazon.com.)
The Free Software Foundation maintains online documentation for a variety of Unix utilities, including Bash, at www.fsf.org/manual.

For More Information

299

David Korn, the developer of the Korn shell, maintains www.kornshell.com. It contains documentation, downloads, information on books on the Korn shell, and links to information on other shells.
If you want to experiment with the Korn shell, or you're using a system that doesn't have a POSIX
compliant shell, you can download the Korn shell executable for a variety of Unix systems for free
from www.research.att.com/sw/download/.
If you only have access to Microsoft Windows systems but still want to try your hand at shell programming, or you just want to get a taste of Unix, install the Cygwin package from www.cygwin.com. The base system includes Bash, and you can also download other shells such as zsh.
The total feel of the system is remarkably like Unix, even though it's running on Windows. There's
even an X Window System available to enhance the Unix look and feel. Best of all, the entire Cygwin
package is free.

Books
O'Reilly & Associates
One of the best sources of books on Unix-related topics is O'Reilly and Associates
(www.ora.com). Their books cover a wide variety of subjects and are available from their Web site,
from booksellers online, and in book stores. Their Web site also has many useful articles on Unix
and Linux.
Two good references on Unix and Linux, respectively:

Unix in a Nutshell: System V Edition, 3rd Edition, A. Robbins, O'Reilly & Associates, 1999 (ISBN
1565924274).
Linux in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition, E. Siever, S. Spainhour, J. P. Hekman, and S. Figgins, O'Reilly &
Associates, 2000 (ISBN 0596000251).
Four good books on Perl programming, from beginner to advanced:

Learning Perl, 3rd Edition, R. L. Schwartz and T. Phoenix, O'Reilly & Associates, 2001 (ISBN
0596001320).
Perl in a Nutshell, 2nd Edition, S. Spainhour, E. Siever, and N. Patwardhan, O'Reilly & Associates,
2002 (ISBN 0596002416).
Programming Perl, 3rd Edition, L. Wall, T. Christiansen, and J. Orwant, O'Reilly & Associates, 2000
(ISBN 0596000278).
Advanced Perl Programming, S. Srinivasan, O'Reilly & Associates, 1997 (ISBN 1565922204).
A good book covering both the POSIX standard versions of awk and sed as well as the GNU
versions:

Sed & Awk, 2nd Edition, D. Dougherty and A. Robbins, O'Reilly & Associates, 1997 (ISBN
1565922255).

Sams and Que

Learn the essentials of Unix shell programming from the ground up:

Sams Teach Yourself Shell Programming in 24 Hours, 2nd Edition, Sriranga Veeraraghaven, Sams
Publishing, 2002 (ISBN 0672323583).
A good book for learning Unix and programming in C and Perl on a Unix system:

Sams Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours, 3rd Edition, Dave Taylor, Sams Publishing, 2001 (ISBN
0672321270).

For More Information

300

This book offers a series of lectures written by several Unix experts who have years of experience
to share with their audience:

Unix Unleashed, Robin Anderson and Andy Johnston, Sams Publishing, 2001 (ISBN 067232251X).
This book offers detailed information on a broad range of Red Hat Linux topics, from installation to
multimedia:

Red Hat Linux 8 Unleashed, Billy Ball, Sams Publishing, 2002 (ISBN 067232458X).
Learn how to efficiently install Red Hat Linux 8 and then get the most out of your system:

Sams Teach Yourself Red Hat Linux 8.0 in 24 Hours, Aron Hsiao, Sams Publishing, 2003 (ISBN
067232475X).
This title offers a broad range of FreeBSD-related topics. It is detailed in its approach and offers
information not found anywhere else:

FreeBSD Unleashed, Michael Urban and Brian Tiemann, Sams Publishing, 2001 (ISBN
0672322064).
Learn FreeBSD from the ground up. This book is the only beginning level tutorial that offers all the
ins and outs of the FreeBSD operating system:

Sams Teach Yourself FreeBSD in 24 Hours, Michael Urban and Brian Tiemann, 2002 (ISBN
0672324245).

Other Publishers
This is the set of standard documentation for System V, Release 4 produced by AT&T. Although
thorough, this two-book set dates from the early 1990s:

User's Reference Manual/System Administrator's Reference Manual, Prentice Hall, 1992 (ISBN
0139513108).
The following book contains complete coverage of the Korn shell, and is coauthored by its creator:

The New KornShell Command and Programming Language, 2nd Edition, D. Korn and M. Bolsky,
Prentice Hall, 1995 (ISBN 0131827006).
An in-depth reference to the C shell:

The Unix C Shell Field Guide, G. Anderson and P. Anderson, Prentice Hall, 1986 (ISBN
013937468X).
A complete description of the awk language authored by its creators:

The AWK Programming Language, A. V. Aho, B. W. Kernighan, and P. J. Weinberger, AddisonWesley, 1988 (ISBN 020107981X).
An advanced Unix programming book:

The Unix Programming Environment, B. W. Kernighan and R. Pike, Prentice Hall, 1984 (ISBN
013937681X).
An advanced Linux programming book:

Advanced Linux Programming, M. Mitchell, J. Oldham, and A. Samuel, New Riders Publishing, 2001
(ISBN 0735710430).

301

Index

Symbols
! (logical negation) operator, 121
!= operator, 116
# (pound sign), 78, 172, 202, 269
# command (vi), 273
#! construct, 241
$ (dollar sign), 36, 45, 46, 199
$ command (vi), 244, 245, 272
$! variable, 216, 270
$# variable, 103, 104, 270
$$ variable, 166, 270
$(...) construct, 96, 97, 98, 99, 274
$* variable, 104, 140, 270
$- variable, 270
$0 variable, 204, 270
$? variable, 112, 113, 114, 270
$@ variable, 140, 141, 270
$array construct, 260
${#array[i]} construct, 260
${#parameter} construct, 271
${#variable} construct, 203
${array[*]} construct, 260
${array[i]} construct, 260, 261
${n} variable, 108
${parameter##pattern} construct, 271
${parameter#pattern} construct, 271
${parameter%pattern} construct, 271
${parameter+value} construct, 271
${parameter-value} construct, 271
${parameter=value} construct, 271
${parameter?value} construct, 271
${parameter[colon]+value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]-value} construct, 200, 271
${parameter[colon]=value} construct, 200, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]?value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter} construct, 199, 200, 271
${variable} construct (***italicize variable), 84, 85
% (percent sign), 169, 277
& (ampersand), 269
&& construct, 134, 135, 136, 269
' (single quote), 88, 89, 90, 91, 274
((...)) construct, 257
() (parentheses), 121
(...) construct, 193, 194, 195, 276
(backslash), 93, 94, 274
backslash inside double quotes, 94, 95
line continuation character, 94
(double quotes), 91, 92, 93, 274
(semicolon), 268
(semicolon) command (vi), 273
* (asterisk), 47, 48, 49, 129, 130
filename substitution, 19, 20, 275

* command (vi), 273

+ (plus sign), 172
, command (vi), 273
- (hyphen), 172
- option (cd command), 264
-- option
set command, 206, 207, 208
-- option (set command), 290
-a (logical AND) operator, 121
-o (logical OR) operator, 122
. (period), 43, 44
. command, 189, 190, 191, 278
. command, 189, 190, 191
. pathname, 10
.. pathname, 10
... construct, 51, 52
.precision modifier, 171
/ (slash), 9
/ command (vi), 245, 246
0 command (vi), 244, 245, 272
0 exit status, 111
0 signal, 294
0 signal number, 217
1 signal, 294
1 signal number, 217
14 signal, 294
15 signal, 294
15 signal number, 217
2 signal, 294
2 signal number, 217
3 signal, 294
6 signal, 294
9 signal, 294
< redirection operator, 275
<& redirection operator, 275
<&- characters, 220
<&- redirection operator, 275
<< redirection characters, 220, 221
<< redirection operator, 275
<[left angle bracket] redirection operator, 275
= (equal sign), 79
= command (vi), 273
= operator, 116
? (question mark), 129
filename substitution, 21, 275
@letter command (vi) (italic @letter), 273
[*] construct, 257
[...] construct, 46, 47, 129
[colon] (null command), 134
[colon] command, 278
[count]+ command (vi), 272
[count]- command (vi), 272
[count]. command (vi), 273
[count]/ command (vi), 272
[count]b command (vi), 272
[count]B command (vi), 272
[count]d motion command (vi) (italic motion), 273
[count]e command (vi), 272
[count]E command (vi), 272
[count]F command (vi), 272
[count]fc command (vi) (italic c), 272
[count]Fc command (vi) (italic c), 273
[count]h command (vi), 272
[count]j command (vi), 272
[count]k command (vi), 272
[count]l command (vi), 272
[count]rc command (vi) (italic c), 273

Index
[count]tc command (vi) (italic c), 273
[count]Tc command (vi) (italic c), 273
[count]v command (vi), 273
[count]w command (vi), 272
[count]W command (vi), 272
[count]x command (vi), 273
[count]_ command (vi), 273
[double left angle bracket] redirection operator, 275
[left angle bracket] redirection operator, 275
[left angle bracket]& notation, 219
[left angle bracket]& redirection operator, 275
[left angle bracket]&- characters, 220
[left angle bracket]&- redirection operator, 275
[left angle bracket]| redirection operator, 275
[] (brackets)
filename substitution, 21, 275
\\escape character, 281
\\escape characters, 158
^ (caret), 44, 45, 113
^ command (vi), 272
_ (underscore), 79, 243
` (backquote), 96, 274
{ ...[semicolon] } construct, 193, 194, 195, 276
{...} construct, 49, 50, 51
{} (braces), 257
| (pipe symbol), 133, 134, 269
pattern matching, 133
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
| (pipe), 42
|| construct, 134, 135, 136, 269
~ (tilde)
tilde substitution, 264, 265, 274
~ command (vi), 273

A
a () escape character, 281
a command (vi), 243, 246, 273
A command (vi), 273
a option (set command), 290
ABRT signal, 294
access modes, 14
accessing
command history, 271
fc command, 249, 250
history command, 249
r command, 250, 251
active jobs
printing list of, 288
add program, 105, 106, 231
addi program, 167
Advanced Linux Programming , 300
Advanced Perl Programming , 299
alias command, 254, 255, 256, 278
aliases
defining, 254, 255, 256
removing, 256
allexport shell mode, 291
ALRM signal, 294
ampersand
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
ampersand (&), 269
AND operators
logical AND operator (-a), 121
apostrophe ('), 88, 89, 90, 91, 274
archive files
creating, 221, 222, 223, 224

302
args program, 103, 104, 140, 141, 142
arguments
functions, 224
passing, 102, 103
$# variable, 103, 104
$* variable, 104
${n} variable, 108
phonebook file example, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
shift command, 108, 109
positional parameters, 199
defined, 102, 269
left shifting, 108, 109
reassigning values to, 199, 205, 206
arithemetic operators, 274, 275
arithmetic
integer arithmetic
arithmetic bases, 253, 254
arithmetic expressions, 251, 252
integer types, 252, 253
arithmetic expansion, 85, 86
arithmetic expressions, 274, 275
arithmetically sorting files, 70, 71
arrays, 256, 257, 258, 259, 260
assigning elements to, 256
retrieving elements from, 257
subscripts, 256
array[i]=val construct, 260
assigning
values to keyword parameters, 199
variable values, 40, 79
to other variables, 81
asterisk (*), 47, 48, 49, 129, 130, 273
filename substitution, 19, 20, 275
asynchronous execution, 216
automatically loaded functions, 251
awk command, 74
AWK Programming Language, The , 300

B
b (" " \b)escape character, 158
b (" " \b)escapecharacte, 281
b command (vi), 244, 245
b conversion specification character, 169
b option (set command), 290
background
executing loops in, 149
sending commands to, 29
background processes
waiting for, 216
background, executing jobs in, 279
background, running jobs in, 261
backquote (`), 96, 274
backslash (, 93, 94, 269, 273, 274
backslash inside double quotes, 94, 95
line continuation character, 94
bases (arithmetic), 253, 254
Bash shell, 240
beginning of line, matching, 44, 45
bg command, 261, 262, 279
books
AWK Programming Language, The, 300
Learning Pearl, 74
Programming Pearl, 74
Unix C Shell Field Guide, The, 300
Unix in a Nutshell[colon] System V Edition, 299
Unix Programmers Manual, Volume II, 74

Index
Unix Programming Environment, The, 300
Bourne shell, 1
Bourne, Stephen, 1, 38
braces ({}), 257
brackets ([])
filename substitution, 21, 275
break command, 147, 148, 234, 279
Break key, 216
breaking
loops, 279
breaking loops, 147, 148

C
c () escape character, 281
c () escape characters, 158
C command (vi), 273
c conversion specification character, 169
c option
sh command, 268
uniq command, 74
wc command, 6
C option (set command), 290
caret (^), 44, 45, 113
case command, 279, 280
pattern matching characters, 129, 130, 131
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
* (asterisk), 129, 130
? (question mark), 129
[...] construct, 129
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
pipe symbol (|), 133, 134
syntax, 128, 129
case statement, 163
cat command, 6, 106
cd command, 10, 11, 12, 13, 188, 280
- option, 264
cdh function, 258, 259, 260
CDPATH variable, 188, 189, 270
cdtest program, 187
change program, 234, 235
changing
command prompt, 181
directories
cd command, 10, 11, 12, 13
groups, 288, 289
characters
# (pound sign), 78
= (equal sign), 79
extracting from files
cut command, 53, 54, 55, 56
matching
multiple characters, 19, 20
single characters, 21
newline characters, 39
pattern matching
any character, 43, 44
beginning of line, 44, 45
end of line, 45, 46
grep command, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68
parameter substitution constructs, 202, 203
precise number of characters, 49, 50, 51
saving matched characters, 51, 52
specific characters, 46, 47
summary of regular expressions, 52
zero or more characters, 47, 48, 49
repeating

303
echo command, 5
translating from standard input, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64
whitespace characters, 39
_ (underscore), 79
child processes, 216
closing
standard input, 220
standard output, 220
comamnds
bg, 261, 262
comma (,), 273
command (vi), 273
command files, 76
comments, 78, 79
# (pound sign), 78
creating, 76
examples, 77, 78
execute permissions, 76, 77
passing arguments to, 102, 103
$# variable, 103, 104
$* variable, 104
${n} variable, 108
phonebook file example, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
shift command, 108, 109
command history, 242, 243
. , 243
(see also edit modes)
accessing, 271
accessing with fc command, 249, 250
accessing with history command, 249
accessing with r command, 250, 251
editing, 283
file location, 271
size of, 271
sizing, 242, 243
command line, 39
command prompt
changing, 181
command substitution, 95
$(...) construct, 96, 97, 98, 99, 274
expr command, 99, 100, 101
` (backquote), 96, 274
command-line editing, 242
command-line tools. (see commands)
commands, 268, 269
. , 108
(see also command files, programs)
. (period), 189, 190, 191, 278
alias, 254, 255, 256, 278
aliases
defining, 254, 255, 256
removing, 256
awk, 74
bg, 279
break, 147, 148, 234, 279
case, 279, 280
pattern matching characters, 129, 130, 131
pipe symbol (|), 133, 134
syntax, 128, 129
cat, 6, 106
cd, 10, 11, 12, 13, 188, 280
- option, 264
command cycle, 37
command files, 76
comments, 78, 79
creating, 76
examples, 77, 78

Index
execute permissions, 76, 77
command history, 242, 243
. , 243
(see also edit modes)
accessing, 271
accessing with fc command, 249, 250
accessing with history command, 249
accessing with r command, 250, 251
editing, 283
file location, 271
size of, 271
sizing, 242, 243
command options, 6, 7
command substitution, 95
$(...) construct, 96, 97, 98, 99, 274
expr command, 99, 100, 101
` (backquote), 96, 274
command-line editing, 242
continue, 148, 149, 280
continuing to next line, 269
cp, 7, 15
cut
-d option, 54, 55, 56
-f option, 54, 55, 56
examples, 53, 54
syntax, 53
date, 4, 197
echo, 5, 106, 163, 280, 281
escape characters, 158
emacs line edit mode, 248
entering, 36, 37, 38
entering multiple, 28
eval, 214, 215, 281
exec, 192, 193, 281, 282
executing
asynchronous execution, 216
executing in background, 269
exit, 124, 125, 282
exit status, 268
export, 282, 283
-p option, 180
expr, 99, 100, 101
false, 283
fc, 249, 250, 271, 283
fg, 261, 262, 284
for, 284
$* variable, 140
$@ variable, 140, 141
examples, 138, 139, 140
for without the list, 141, 142
syntax, 138
general format of, 268
getopts, 151, 152, 153, 284, 285
grep, 104, 105
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
grouping, 193, 194, 195, 276
hash, 286
history, 249
if, 286, 287, 288
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
elif construct, 125, 126, 127
else construct, 122, 123, 124
exit status, 111, 112, 113, 114

304
syntax, 111
testing conditions in. (see test command)
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
info, 298
jobs, 277, 288
kill, 261, 288
ln, 16, 17, 18, 19
ls, 5, 6, 13, 14
man, 298
mkdir, 14
multiple commands
entering on one line, 268
mv
moving files, 16
renaming files, 7
newgrp, 288, 289
null command ([colon]), 134
paste, 56
-d option, 57
-s option, 58
examples, 56, 57
syntax, 56
perl, 74
printf, 169, 170, 171, 172, 233
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
examples, 169, 170, 171, 172
syntax, 169
printing information about, 295
ps, 29, 30
pwd, 10, 11, 187, 289
r, 250, 251
read, 289
syntax, 156
readonly, 211, 289, 290
return, 226, 290
returning information about, 29, 30
type command, 227
rm, 7, 8
rmdir, 19
scanning twice before execution, 214, 215
sed, 58
-d option, 60
-n option, 59, 60
examples, 58, 59, 60
syntax, 58
sending to background, 29
set, 199, 204, 208, 233, 290, 291
-- option, 206, 207, 208
-x option, 204, 205
executing without arguments, 205
reassigning positional parameters with, 205, 206
sh
-x option, 131, 132, 133
shift, 108, 109, 291, 292
sort, 69
+ln option, 71
-n option, 70, 71
-o option, 69, 70
-r option, 69
-t option, 71, 72
-u option, 69
summary of, 30
test, 292, 293
alternative format, 118
file operators, 120
integer operators, 118, 119, 120

Index
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122
parentheses, 121
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
syntax, 114
times, 293, 294
tr
-d option, 63, 64
-s option, 63
examples, 61, 62, 64
syntax, 60
trap, 216, 217, 218, 294
executing without arguments, 218
ignoring signals, 218
resetting traps, 219
signal numbers, 217
syntax, 217
true, 295
type, 227, 295
umask, 295
unalias, 256, 295
uniq
-c option, 74
-d option, 73, 74
examples, 72, 73
syntax, 72
unset, 211, 295
until, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 295, 296
examples, 144, 145, 146, 147
syntax, 143, 144
vi line edit mode, 245, 246, 272, 273
$, 244, 245
/, 245, 246
0, 244, 245
a, 243, 246
b, 244, 245
commands, 272, 273
dw, 245
h, 243, 244, 245
i, 243, 246
j, 244, 245, 246
k, 244, 245, 246
l, 243, 244, 245
r, 245
w, 244, 245
x, 243, 244, 245
wait, 296
$! variable, 216
example, 216
syntax, 216
while, 142, 143, 296, 297
who, 4, 5
wv, 6
[colon], 278
commaneds
read
exit status, 167, 168, 169
commans
executing, 38, 39, 40
comments, 78, 79, 269
comments# (pound sign), 78
comparing values
case command
command syntax, 128, 129
pattern matching characters, 129, 130, 131
pipe symbol (|), 133, 134

305
compatibility of shells, 265, 266
contents of files
displaying
cat command, 6
continuation character (, 269
continue command, 148, 149, 280
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
Coorinated Universal Time, 197
copying
files
checking destination files, 158, 159
cp command, 7, 15
echo escape characters, 158
final code listing, 160, 161, 162
initial code listing, 156, 157
read command, 157
counting
words in files
wc command, 6
cp command, 7, 15
Ctrl+j command (vi), 273
Ctrl+l command (vi), 273
Ctrl+m command (vi), 273
Ctrl+v command (vi), 272
Ctrl+w command (vi), 272
curly braces ({}), 257
current directory, 187, 188
current program, replacing with new program, 192, 193
current working directories
changing
cd command, 10, 11, 12, 13
defined, 9
displaying
pwd command, 10
cut command
-d option, 54, 55, 56
-f option, 54, 55, 56
examples, 53, 54
syntax, 53
Cygwin
Web site, 299

D
d (-d) operator, 120
D command (vi), 273
d conversion specification character, 169
d option
cut command, 54, 55, 56
paste command, 57
sed command, 60
uniq command, 73, 74
d options
tr command, 63, 64
dangling symbolic links, 18
data types, 79
integer, 252, 253
date command, 4, 197
date/time
displaying
date command, 4
defining
aliases, 254, 255, 256
functions, 224
Delete key, 216, 217
deleting

Index

306

aliases, 256
directories
rmdir command, 19
duplicate lines, 69
files
rm command, 7, 8
function definitions, 226
lines of text
sed command, 60
phone book entries, 107, 108, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233,
234
variable definitions, 211
delimiter characters
sort command, 71, 72
design
rolodex program, 228, 229
destination files, 7
checking, 158, 159
directories, 5, 8
.,8
(see also files)
changing
cd command, 10, 11, 12, 13
copying files between, 15
creating
mkdir command, 14
current directory, 187, 188
current working directories
changing, 10, 11, 12, 13
defined, 9
displaying, 10
deleting
rmdir command, 19
directory structure, 9
home directories, 9
identifying, 181, 182
listing files in
ls command, 13, 14
moving files between, 16
parent directories, 11
pathnames, 9, 10
. pathname, 10
.. pathname, 10
full pathnames, 9
relative pathnames, 9
root directories, 9
working directory
printing, 289
disabling
trace mode, 205
display program, 232, 233
displaying
current working directory
pwd command, 10
date/time
date command, 4
file contents
cat command, 6
list of files
ls command, 5, 6, 13, 14
list of variables, 205
logged-in users
who command, 4, 5
phone book entries, 232, 233
traps, 218
variable values, 80
documentation

man pages, 298

tutorials, 298
Web sites, 298, 299
Cygwin, 299
Free Software Foundation, 298
Korn shell, 299
POSIX standard, 298
dollar sign ($), 36, 45, 46, 199
double quotes (), 91, 92, 93, 274
downloading
Korn shell, 299
duplicate lines
deleting, 69
duplicating
lines, 72, 73, 74
dw command (vi), 245

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

e (-e) operator, 120

e option
fc command, 271
e option (set command), 290
echo command, 5, 106, 163, 280, 281
escape characters, 158
edit mode commands (vi), 272, 273
edit modes
emacs, 246, 247, 248
commands, 248
cursor, 246
vi, 243, 244
command mode, 243
commands, 243, 244, 245, 246
input mode, 243
editing
command history, 283
command-line editing, 242
files
sed command, 58, 59, 60
phone book entries, 234, 235
editors
stream editor (sed), 58
-d option, 60
-n option, 59, 60
examples, 58, 59, 60
syntax, 58
elements of arrays
assigning, 256
retrieving, 257
elif construct, 125, 126, 127
else construct, 122, 123, 124
emacs line edit mode, 246, 247, 248
commands, 248
cursor, 246
enabling
trace mode, 204, 205
end of line, matching, 45, 46
Enter command (vi), 272, 273
entering
commands, 36, 37, 38
loops on one line, 150, 151
entering multiple commands on one line, 268
entries (phone book)
adding, 231
deleting, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
displaying, 232, 233
editing, 234, 235

Index
listing, 235, 236
looking up, 232
rolo program listing, 229, 230, 231
ENV files, 241, 242
ENV variable, 241, 270
environment
. , 174
(see also variables)
defined, 174
ENV file, 241, 242
subshells, 175, 177
environmental control, 42
eof command (vi), 272
eq (-eq) operator, 119
equal sign (=), 79, 116, 273
erase command (vi), 272
errexit shell mode, 291
errors
standard error, 28
ESC command (vi), 272
escape character, 281
escape characters, 281
echo command, 158
eval command, 214, 215, 281
evaluating
expressions
expr command, 99, 100, 101
exec command, 192, 193, 281, 282
execute permissions
command files, 76, 77
executing
commands, 38, 39, 40
asynchronous execution, 216
background execution, 269
scanning twice before execution, 214, 215
file contents in current shell, 189, 190, 191
functions, 224
terminating execution, 226
jobs
background execution, 261, 279
foreground execution, 262, 284
loops
background execution, 149
exercises
chapter 1, 30, 31
chapter 10, 172
chapter 11, 198
chapter 12, 211, 212, 213
chapter 13, 227
chapter 14, 238, 239
chapter 15, 266, 267
chapter 4, 74
chapter 5, 86, 87
chapter 6, 101
chapter 7, 109, 110
chapter 8, 136, 137
chapter 9, 154, 155
exit command, 124, 125, 282
EXIT signal, 294
exit status, 111, 112, 268
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
nonzero values, 111
read command, 167, 168, 169
zero, 111
exiting
loops
break command, 147, 148

307
programs, 282
expansion
arithmetic expansion, 85, 86
export command, 282, 283
-p option, 180
exported variables, 177, 178, 179, 180, 276
exporting
variables, 177, 178, 179, 180, 276, 282, 283
expressions
arithmetic expressions, 251, 252, 274, 275
evaluating
expr command, 99, 100, 101
expressions (regular expressions), 43
... construct, 51, 52
asterisk (*), 47, 48, 49
caret (^), 44, 45
dollar sign ($), 45, 46
grep command
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
period (.), 43, 44
summary of, 52
[...] construct, 46, 47
{...} construct, 49, 50, 51
extracting
characters from files
cut command, 53, 54, 55, 56

F
f (" " \f )escapecharacte, 281
f (" " \f )escapecharacter, 158
f (-f) operator, 120
F command (vi), 273
f option
cut command, 54, 55, 56
f option (set command), 290
false command, 283
fc command, 249, 250, 271, 283
FCEDIT variable, 270, 271
fg command, 261, 262, 284
fields
Input Field Separator (IFS) variable, 208, 209, 210
skipping during sorts, 71
file descriptors, 219
file operators, 120
filename substitution, 40, 275
* (asterisk), 19, 20
? (question mark), 21
examples, 21, 22
multiple character matching, 19, 20
single character matching, 21
variables, 82, 83, 84
[] (brackets), 21
filenames, 5
filename substitution, 40, 275
* (asterisk), 19, 20
? (question mark), 21
examples, 21, 22
multiple character matching, 19, 20
single character matching, 21
variables, 82, 83, 84
[] (brackets), 21
files

Index
.,5
(see also directories)
.profile, 196, 197
archive files
creating, 221, 222, 223, 224
command files, 76
comments, 78, 79
creating, 76
examples, 77, 78
execute permissions, 76, 77
command history file. (see command history)
copying
checking destination files, 158, 159
cp command, 7, 15
echo escape characters, 158
final code listing, 160, 161, 162
initial code listing, 156, 157
read command, 157
counting words in
wc command, 6
deleting
rm command, 7, 8
destination files, 7
displaying contents of
cat command, 6
duplicating lines in, 72, 73, 74
editing
sed command, 58, 59, 60
ENV files, 241, 242
executing contents in current shell, 189, 190, 191
extracting characters from
cut command, 53, 54, 55, 56
file descriptors, 219
file operators, 120
filename substitution, 40, 275
* (asterisk), 19, 20
? (question mark), 21
examples, 21, 22
multiple character matching, 19, 20
single character matching, 21
variables, 82, 83, 84
[] (brackets), 21
filenames, 5
linking
dangling symbolic links, 18
ln command, 16, 17, 18, 19
symbolic links, 18
listing
ls command, 5, 6, 13, 14
moving between directories
mv command, 16
ordinary files, 5
paths
CDPATH variable, 188, 189, 270
PATH variable, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 270
phonebook file
adding entries to, 105, 106
deleting entries from, 107, 108
looking up entries, 104, 105
reading data from, 156
renaming
mv command, 7
searching
grep command, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68
sorting, 69
arithmetic sorts, 70, 71
delimiter characters, 71, 72

308

fils

duplicate lines, 69
reversing sort order, 69
skipped fields, 71
writing sorted data to standard output, 69, 70
source files, 7
special files, 5
temporary files, 166, 167

reading
. command, 278
filters, 27
finding
home directories, 181, 182
phone book entries, 104, 105, 232
for command, 284
$* variable, 140
$@ variable, 140, 141
examples, 138, 139, 140
for without the list, 141, 142
syntax, 138
foreground, executing jobs in, 284
foreground, running jobs in, 262
formatted output
printing, 169, 170, 171, 172
command syntax, 169
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
examples, 169, 170, 171, 172
Fox, Brian, 240
FPATH variable, 251
Free Software Foundation
Web site, 298
FreeBSD Unleashed , 300
full pathnames, 9
functions, 251, 276, 277
advantages, 225, 226
arguments, 224
automatically loaded functions, 251
cdh, 258, 259, 260
defining, 224
deleting, 226
executing, 224
mycd function, 225
recursive functions, 251
stopping execution of, 290
terminating execution of, 226

G
ge (-ge) operator, 119
getopts command, 151, 152, 153, 284, 285
getty program, 33, 34
Greenwich Mean Time, 197
greg command
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
grep command, 104, 105
grouping
commands, 193, 194, 195, 276
groups
changing, 288, 289
gt (-gt) operator, 119

Index

H
h command (vi), 243, 244, 245
h option (set command), 290
hash command, 286
hierarchical directory structure, 9
HISTFILE variable, 270, 271
history command, 249
history file. (see command history)
HISTSIZE variable, 270, 271
home directories, 9
identifying, 181, 182
HOME variable, 181, 182, 270
HUP signal, 294
hyphen (-), 172

I
i command (vi), 243, 246, 273
I command (vi), 273
i option
sh command, 268
I/O (input/output), 219, 220
filters, 27
formatted output
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
printing, 169, 170, 171, 172
in-line input redirection, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224
creating archives with, 221, 222, 223, 224
example, 220, 221
input redirection, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
loops, 149, 150
output redirection, 24, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
loops, 149, 150
pipes, 25, 26, 27
pipeline hookup, 42
standard error, 28
redirecting, 219
writing to, 219
standard input, 22, 23
closing, 220
translating characters from, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64
standard output, 22, 23
closing, 220
writing sorted data to, 69, 70
stream editor (sed), 58
-d option, 60
-n option, 59, 60
examples, 58, 59, 60
syntax, 58
IDs
job_ids, 277
PIDs (process ids), 29
PPIDs (parent process ids), 29
if command, 286, 287, 288
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
elif construct, 125, 126, 127
else construct, 122, 123, 124
exit status, 111
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
nonzero values, 111
zero values, 111
syntax, 111
testing conditions in. (see test command)
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
IFS variable, 208, 209, 210, 270

309
ignoreeof shell mode, 291
ignoring
signals, 218
in-line input redirection, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224
creating archives with, 221, 222, 223, 224
example, 220, 221
info command, 298
init program, 34, 36
Input Field Separator (IFS) variable, 208, 209, 210
input mode commands (vi), 272
input redirection, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
input. (see I/O (input/output))
input/output. (see I/O)
inserting
phone book entries, 231
INT signal, 294
integer arithmetic
arithmetic bases, 253, 254
arithmetic expressions, 251, 252
integer types, 252, 253
integer expansion, 85, 86
integer operators, 118, 119, 120
integers
integer operators, 118, 119, 120
interpreted programming languages, 42
interrupt signals
ignoring, 218
sending, 217
signal numbers, 217
trapping, 216, 217, 218
ison program
passing arguments to, 103

J
j command (vi), 244, 245, 246
job numbers, 29
jobs, 260
. , 288
(see also processes)
active jobs, printing list of, 288
defined, 260
job_ids, 277
killing, 261, 288
messages, 277
running in background, 261, 279
running in foreground, 262, 284
status of, 261
stopping, 261, 262, 277
suspending, 261, 262
terminating, 261
jobs command, 277, 288
job_ids, 277
Joy, Bill, 38

K
k command (vi), 244, 245, 246
kernel
defined, 1, 32
keys
Break, 216
Delete, 216, 217
keyword parameters, 199
assigning values to, 199
kill command, 261, 288
kill command (vi), 272

Index
KILL signal, 294
killing
jobs, 261, 288
Korn shell, 240
Korn shell Web site, 299
Korn, David, 38, 240

L
L (-L) operator, 120
l command (vi), 243, 244, 245
L command (vi), 273
l option
grep command, 68
wc command, 6
languages
. (see shell programming language)
shell programming language, 42
comments, 78
shell programming languages
variables, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86
le (-le) operator, 119
Learning Pearl , 74
Learning Perl , 299
left shifting positional parameters, 108, 109
line continuation character, 94
line numbering program, 210
LINENO variable, 270
lines
(of text), 72
deleting
sed command, 60
duplicate lines
deleting, 69
duplicating, 72, 73, 74
line numbering program, 210
pasting together
paste command, 56, 57, 58
pattern matching
beginning of line, 44, 45
end of line, 45, 46
sorting, 69
arithmetic sorts, 70, 71
delimiter characters, 71, 72
duplicate lines, 69
reversing sort order, 69
skipped fields, 71
writing sorted data to standard output, 69, 70
linking
files
dangling symbolic links, 18
ln command, 16, 17, 18, 19
symbolic links, 18
Linux in a Nutshell , 299
listall program, 235, 236
listing
files
ls command, 5, 6, 13, 14
phone book entries, 235, 236
variables, 205
ln (+ln) option
sort command, 71
ln command, 16, 17, 18, 19
local variables, 174, 175
logged-in users
displaying
who command, 4, 5

310
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122
login program, 34, 35
login shell, 33, 34, 35, 36
getty program, 33, 34
init program, 34, 36
logins
.profile file, 196, 197
login cycle, 37
login shell, 33, 34, 35, 36
looking up
phone book entries, 232
looking up phone book entries, 104, 105
loops, 138
breaking, 147, 148, 279
executing in background, 149
for command
$* variable, 140
$@ variable, 140, 141
examples, 138, 139, 140
for without the list, 141, 142
syntax, 138
I/O redirection, 149, 150
piping data into and out of, 150
shorthand notation, 150, 151
skipping commands in, 148, 149, 280
terminating, 279
typing on one line, 150, 151
until command, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147
examples, 144, 145, 146, 147
syntax, 143, 144
while command, 142, 143
ls command, 5, 6, 13, 14
lt (-lt) operator, 119
lu program, 104, 105, 232

M
m option (set command), 290
MAIL variable, 270
MAILCHECK variable, 270
MAILPATH variable, 270
man command, 298
man pages, 298
matching patterns, 129, 130, 131
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
* (asterisk), 129, 130
? (question mark), 129
any character, 43, 44
beginning of line, 44, 45
end of line, 45, 46
grep command
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
parameter substitution constructs, 202, 203
precise number of characters, 49, 50, 51
saving matched characters, 51, 52
specific characters, 46, 47
summary of regular expressions, 52
zero or more characters, 47, 48, 49
[...] construct, 129
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
menu-driven phone program. (see rolodex program)

Index
messages
job messages, 277
mkdir command, 14
modes
access modes, 14
trace mode
disabling, 205
enabling, 204, 205
vi line edit mode, 272, 273
commands, 272, 273
modes (shell), 291
emacs, 246, 247, 248
commands, 248
cursor, 246
vi, 243, 244
command mode, 243
commands, 243, 244, 245, 246
input mode, 243
mon program, 144, 145, 146, 147, 151, 152, 153
monitor shell mode, 291
mounset shell mode, 291
moving
files
mv command, 16
multiple characters
matching, 19, 20
multiple commands
entering, 28
entering on one line, 268
mv command
moving files, 16
renaming files, 7
mycd function, 225
mycp program
destination files, checking, 158, 159
echo escape characters, 158
final code listing, 160, 161, 162
initial code listing, 156, 157
read command, 157

N
n () escape character, 281
n () escape characters, 158
n command (vi), 272
N command (vi), 272
n option
grep command, 68
sed command, 59, 60
sort command, 70, 71
n option (set command), 290
naming
files
mv command, 7
naming conventions
filenames, 5
pathnames, 9, 10
. pathname, 10
.. pathname, 10
full pathnames, 9
relative pathnames, 9
variables, 79
ne (-ne) operator, 119
negation operators
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122

311
New KornShell Command and Programming Language,
The , 300
newgrp command, 288, 289
newline characters, 39
nnn escape characters (italic ns), 158
noclobber shell mode, 291
noexec shell mode, 291
noglob shell mode, 291
nolog shell mode, 291
nonzero exit status, 268
null command ([colon]), 134
null values, 81, 82
number program, 167, 168
number2 program, 210
numbers
exit status, 111, 112
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
nonzero values, 111
zero, 111
job numbers, 29
line numbering program, 210
signal numbers, 217, 294

O
o (+o) option (set command), 290
o conversion specification character, 169
o option
sort command, 69, 70
o option (set command), 291
operators, 274, 275
file operators, 120
integer operators, 118, 119, 120
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
options (command), 6, 7
OR operators
logical OR operator (-o), 122
ordinary files, 5
output redirection, 24, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
output. (see I/O (input/output))
OReilly and Associates
recommended reading, 299
Web site, 299

P
P command (vi), 273
p command (vi), 273
p option
export command, 180
parameter substitution, 199, 270
${#parameter} construct, 271
${#variable} construct, 203
${parameter##pattern} construct, 271
${parameter#pattern} construct, 271
${parameter%pattern} construct, 271
${parameter+value} construct, 271
${parameter-value} construct, 271
${parameter=value} construct, 271
${parameter?value} construct, 271
${parameter[colon]+value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]-value} construct, 200, 271
${parameter[colon]=value} construct, 200, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]?value} construct, 201, 271

Index
${parameter} construct, 199, 200, 271
pattern matching contructs, 202, 203
parameters, 199, 269
. , 199, 269
(see also arguments, variables)
(see also variables)
keyword parameters, 199
assigning values to, 199
parameter substitution, 199, 270, 271
${#parameter} construct, 271
${#variable} construct, 203
${parameter##pattern} construct, 271
${parameter#pattern} construct, 271
${parameter%pattern} construct, 271
${parameter+value} construct, 271
${parameter-value} construct, 271
${parameter=value} construct, 271
${parameter?value} construct, 271
${parameter[colon]+value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]-value} construct, 200, 271
${parameter[colon]=value} construct, 200, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]?value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter} construct, 199, 200, 271
pattern matching contructs, 202, 203
positional parameters, 199
reassigning values to, 199, 205, 206
parent directories, 11
parent process ids (PPIDs), 29
parent processes, 216
parentheses, 121
passing
variables to subshells, 195, 196, 276
passing arguments, 102, 103
$# variable, 103, 104
$* variable, 104
${n} variable, 108
phonebook file example, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
shift command, 108, 109
paste command, 56
-d option, 57
-s option, 58
examples, 56, 57
syntax, 56
pasting
lines
paste command, 56, 57, 58
PATH variable, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 270
pathnames, 9, 10
. pathname, 10
.. pathname, 10
full pathnames, 9
relative pathnames, 9
paths
CDPATH variable, 188, 189, 270
FPATH variable, 251
PATH variable, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 270
pattern matching, 129, 130, 131
&& construct, 134, 135, 136
* (asterisk), 129, 130
? (question mark), 129
any character, 43, 44
beginning of line, 44, 45
end of line, 45, 46
grep command
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67

312
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
parameter substitution contructs, 202, 203
precise number of characters, 49, 50, 51
saving matched characters, 51, 52
specific characters, 46, 47
summary of regular expressions, 52
zero or more characters, 47, 48, 49
[...] construct, 129
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
percent sign (%), 169, 277
period (.), 43, 44
. command, 189, 190, 191, 278
. pathname, 10
.. pathname, 10
perl command, 74
Perl in a Nutshell , 299
permissions
execute permissions
command files, 76, 77
phone book
(rolodex program), 228
design considerations, 228, 229
entries
adding, 231
deleting, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
displaying, 232, 233
editing, 234, 235
listing, 235, 236
looking up, 232
rolo program listing, 229, 230, 231
sample program output, 236, 237, 238
phonebook file
adding entries to, 105, 106
deleting entries from, 107, 108
looking up entries, 104, 105
PHONEBOOK variable, 184, 185, 186, 187
PIDs (process ids), 29
pipe character (|), 42
pipe symbol (|), 133, 134, 269
pattern matching, 133
|| construct, 134, 135, 136
pipes, 25, 26, 27
pipeline hookup, 42
piping data into loops, 150
plus sign (+), 172
pointers to variables
creating, 215
positional parameters, 199
defined, 102, 269
left shifting, 108, 109
reassigning values to, 199, 205, 206
POSIX standard
Web site, 298
POSIX standard shell, 1
pound sign (#), 78, 172, 202, 269, 273
PPID variable, 270
PPIDs (parent process ids), 29
precise number of characters, matching, 49, 50, 51
printf command, 169, 170, 171, 172, 233
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
examples, 169, 170, 171, 172
syntax, 169
printing
command information, 295
formatted output, 169, 170, 171, 172

Index
command syntax, 169
conversion specification characters, 169, 170
conversion specification modifiers, 171, 172
examples, 169, 170, 171, 172
job status, 261
list of active jobs, 288
working directory, 289
process ids (PIDs), 29
processes
. , 288
(see also jobs)
background processes
waiting for, 216
child processes, 216
defined, 36
parent processes, 216
PIDs (process ids), 29
pipeline processes, 25, 26, 27
PPIDs (parent process ids), 29
returning status of, 29, 30
profile (.profile) file, 196, 197
program loops. (see loops)
Programming Pearl , 74
Programming Perl , 299
programs
. , 108
(see also command files, commands)
add, 105, 106, 231
addi, 167
args, 103, 104, 140, 141, 142
cdtest, 187
change, 234, 235
display, 232, 233
exit status, 111, 112
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
nonzero values, 111
zero, 111
exiting, 282
getty, 33, 34
init, 34, 36
interrupt signals
ignoring, 218
sending, 217
signal numbers, 217
trapping, 216, 217, 218
ison, 103
listall, 235, 236
login, 34, 35
lu, 104, 105, 232
mon, 144, 145, 146, 147, 151, 152, 153
mycp
destination files, checking, 158, 159
echo escape characters, 158
final code listing, 160, 161, 162
initial code listing, 156, 157
read command, 157
number, 167, 168
number2, 210
passing arguments to, 102, 103
$# variable, 103, 104
$* variable, 104
${n} variable, 108
phonebook file example, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108
shift command, 108, 109
rem, 107, 108, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
replacing current program with new program, 192, 193
reverse, 258

313
rolo, 162, 163, 164, 165, 229, 230, 231
case statement, 163
echo command, 163
sample runs, 163, 164
rolodex, 228
add program, 231
change program, 234, 235
design considerations, 228, 229
display program, 232, 233
listall program, 235, 236
lu program, 232
PHONEBOOK variable, 184, 185, 186, 187
rem program, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
rolo program, 162, 163, 164, 165, 229, 230, 231
sample output, 236, 237, 238
temporary files, 166, 167
twhile, 142, 143
vartest, 174
vartest2 , 175
vartest3, 177
vartest4, 178, 179
vartest5, 179
prompts
secondary prompts, 91
ps command, 29, 30
PS1 variable, 181, 270
PS2 variable, 181, 270
PS4 variable, 270
pseudo ttys, 36
pwd command, 10, 11, 187, 289
PWD variable, 270

Q
question mark (?), 129
filename substitution, 21, 275
quote characters, 88
back quote (`), 96, 274
backslash (, 93, 94, 274
backslash inside double quotes, 94, 95
line continuation character, 94
double quotes (), 91, 92, 93, 274
single quote ('), 88, 89, 90, 91, 274

R
r (" " \r " ") escape character, 281
r (" " \r " ") escape characters, 158
r (-r) operator, 120
r command, 250, 251
r command (vi), 245
r option
sort command, 69
read command, 289
exit status, 167, 168, 169
syntax, 156
read-only variables, 289, 290
creating, 211
reading
files
. command, 278
reading data, 156
readonly command, 211, 289, 290
reassigning
values to positional parameters, 199, 205, 206
recommended reading. (see books)
recursive functions, 251

Index
Red Hat Linux 8 Unleashed , 300
redirecting I/O (input/output)
loops, 149, 150
redirection
in-line input redirection, 220, 221, 222, 223, 224
creating archives with, 221, 222, 223, 224
example, 220, 221
input redirection, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
output redirection, 24, 25, 41, 42, 275, 276
standard error, 219
regular expressions, 43
... construct, 51, 52
asterisk (*), 47, 48, 49
caret (^), 44, 45
dollar sign ($), 45, 46
grep command
-l option, 68
-n option, 68
-v option, 67
examples, 64, 65, 66, 67
syntax, 64
period (.), 43, 44
summary of, 52
[...] construct, 46, 47
{...} construct, 49, 50, 51
relative pathnames, 9
rem program, 107, 108, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
removing
aliases, 256
removing. (see deleting)
renaming
files
mv command, 7
repeating characters
echo command, 5
replacing
current program with new program, 192, 193
resetting
traps, 219
restricted shell (rsh), 262, 263
return command, 226, 290
reverse program, 258
reversing
sort order, 69
rm command, 7, 8
rmdir command, 19
rolo program, 162, 163, 164, 165, 229, 230, 231
case statement, 163
echo command, 163
sample runs, 163, 164
rolodex program, 228
add program, 231
change program, 234, 235
design considerations, 228, 229
display program, 232, 233
listall program, 235, 236
lu program, 232
PHONEBOOK variable, 184, 185, 186, 187
rem program, 124, 125, 127, 128, 233, 234
rolo program, 162, 163, 164, 165, 229, 230, 231
case statement, 163
echo command, 163
sample runs, 163, 164
sample output, 236, 237, 238
temporary files, 166, 167
root directories, 9
rsh (restricted shell), 262, 263

314
run command file, 77
passing arguments to, 102, 103
running. (see executing)

S
s (-s) operator, 120
S command (vi), 273
s conversion specification character, 169
s option
fc command, 271
paste command, 58
sh command, 268
s options
tr command, 63
Sams Teach Yourself FreeBSD in 24 Hours , 300
Sams Teach Yourself Red Hat Linux 8.0 in 24 Hours , 300
Sams Teach Yourself Shell Programming in 24 Hours , 299
Sams Teach Yourself Unix in 24 Hours , 299
saving
matched characters, 51, 52
search order, 265
searching
. , 64
(see also pattern matching)
files
grep command, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68
phone book entries, 104, 105, 232
search order, 265
secondary prompts, 91
Sed & Awk , 299
sed command, 58, 59
examples, 58
syntax, 58
selecting
shells, 241
semicolon (), 268
(semicolon) command (vi), 273
sending
commands to background, 29
set command, 199, 204, 208, 233, 290, 291
-- option, 206, 207, 208
-x option, 204, 205
executing without arguments, 205
reassigning positional parameters with, 205, 206
sh command
-x option, 131, 132, 133
shell, 1, 32, 33
command execution, 38, 39, 40
defined, 1
entering commands in, 36, 37, 38
environmental control, 42
filename substitution, 40
input redirection, 41, 42
login shell, 33, 34, 35, 36
getty program, 33, 34
init program, 34, 36
output redirection, 41, 42
pipeline hookup, 42
shell programming language, 42
comments, 78, 79
variables, 79, 80, 81, 82, 83, 84, 85, 86
variables. (see variables)
starting up, 268
trace mode
disabling, 205
enabling, 204, 205

Index
variables
assigning values to, 40
shell archive files
creating, 221, 222, 223, 224
shell programming language, 42
comments, 78, 79
# (pound sign), 78
shell programming languages
variables, 79
$# variable, 103, 104
$* variable, 104
${n} variable, 108
${variable} construct (***italicize variable), 84, 85
arithmetic expansion, 85, 86
assigning to other variables, 81
assigning values to, 79
displaying values of, 80
examples, 80, 81
filename substitution, 82, 83, 84
naming conventions, 79
null values, 81, 82
positional parameters, 102, 108, 109, 269
variable substitution, 80
shell variables. (see variables)
shells
Bash, 240
compatibility summary, 265, 266
jobs
job_ids, 277
messages, 277
stopping, 277
Korn, 240
restricted shell (rsh), 262, 263
selecting, 241
shell modes, 291
subshells, 175, 177, 189, 276
shift command, 108, 109, 291, 292
signals
ignoring, 218
sending to programs, 217
signal numbers, 217, 294
trapping, 216, 217, 218, 294
single characters
matching, 21
single quote ('), 88, 89, 90, 91, 274
sizing
command history, 271
command history file, 242, 243
skipping commands in loops, 148, 149, 280
skipping fields, 71
slash (/), 9
sort command, 69
+ln option, 71
-n option, 70, 71
-o option, 69, 70
-r option, 69
-t option, 71, 72
-u option, 69
sorting files, 69
arithmetic sorts, 70, 71
delimiter characters, 71, 72
duplicate lines, 69
reversing sort order, 69
skipped fields, 71
writing sorted data to standard output, 69, 70
source files, 7
special files, 5

315
special variables. (see variables)
standard error, 28
redirecting, 219
writing to, 219
standard input, 22, 23
closing, 220
translating characters from, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64
standard output, 22, 23
closing, 220
writing sorted data to, 69, 70
starting
shell, 268
startup, 268
status
exit status, 111, 112, 268
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
nonzero values, 111
read command, 167, 168, 169
zero, 111
of jobs, 261
status of processes, returning, 29, 30
stopping
function execution, 290
jobs, 261, 262, 277
loops, 279
stream editor (sed), 58
-d option, 60
-n option, 59, 60
examples, 58, 59, 60
syntax, 58
streams
stream editor (sed), 58
-d option, 60
-n option, 59, 60
examples, 58, 59, 60
syntax, 58
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
strings
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
subscripts, 256
subshells, 175, 177, 189, 276
passing variables to, 195, 196, 276
subsitution
parameter substitution, 271
substituting
variables, 80
substituting filenames, 40, 275
* (asterisk), 19, 20
? (question mark), 21
examples, 21, 22
multiple character matching, 19, 20
single character matching, 21
variables, 82, 83, 84
[] (brackets), 21
substitution
parameter substitution, 199, 270
${#parameter} construct, 271
${#variable} construct, 203
${parameter##pattern} construct, 271
${parameter#pattern} construct, 271
${parameter%pattern} construct, 271
${parameter+value} construct, 271
${parameter-value} construct, 271
${parameter=value} construct, 271
${parameter?value} construct, 271
${parameter[colon]+value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter[colon]-value} construct, 200, 271

Index

316

${parameter[colon]=value} construct, 200, 201, 271

${parameter[colon]?value} construct, 201, 271
${parameter} construct, 199, 200, 271
pattern matching contructs, 202, 203
tilde substitution, 264, 265, 274
substitution (command), 95
$(...) construct, 96, 97, 98, 99, 274
expr command, 99, 100, 101
` (backquote), 96, 274
summary of commands, 30
suspending
jobs, 261, 262
symbolic links, 18

T
t (" " \t " ") escape character, 281
t (" " \t " ") escape characters, 158
t option
sort command, 71, 72
tapping
signals, 294
temporary files, 166, 167
TERM signal, 294
TERM variable, 197
terminal type, 197
terminating
function execution, 226
jobs, 261
loops, 279
test command, 292, 293
alternative format, 118
file operators, 120
integer operators, 118, 119, 120
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122
parentheses, 121
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
syntax, 114
testing
conditions in if commands, 114
file operators, 120
integer operators, 118, 119, 120
logical AND operator (-a), 121
logical negation operator (!), 121
logical OR operator (-o), 122
parentheses, 121
string operators, 114, 115, 116, 117, 118
test command syntax, 114, 118
text
. , 72
(see also lines)
characters
extracting, 53, 54, 55, 56
translating from standard input, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64
editing
sed command, 58, 59, 60
lines
deleting, 60
duplicating, 72, 73, 74
line numbering program, 210
pasting together, 56, 57, 58
sorting, 69, 70, 71, 72
pattern matching
any character, 43, 44
beginning of line, 44, 45

end of line, 45, 46

grep command, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68
parameter substitution constructs, 202, 203
precise number of characters, 49, 50, 51
saving matched characters, 51, 52
specific characters, 46, 47
summary of regular expressions, 52
zero or more characters, 47, 48, 49
searching
grep command, 64, 65, 66, 67, 68
tilde (~), 273
tilde substitution, 264, 265
tilde substitution, 264, 265
tile (~)
tilde substitution, 274
time
recording amount used, 293
time zones
TZ variable, 197, 198
time/date
displaying
date command, 4
times command, 293, 294
tools. (see commands)
tr command
-d option, 63, 64
-s option, 63
examples, 61, 62, 64
syntax, 60
trace mode
disabling, 205
enabling, 204, 205
translating
characters from standard input, 60, 61, 62, 63, 64
trap command, 216, 217, 218, 294
executing without arguments, 218
ignoring signals, 218
resetting traps, 219
signal numbers, 217
syntax, 217
traps
creating, 216, 217
displaying, 218
resetting, 219
signal numbers, 217
true command, 295
tutorials, 298
twhile program, 142, 143
type command, 227, 295
types
integer, 252, 253
types (data), 79
TZ variable, 197, 198

Licensed by
Terry Wyatt
2330833

U
u command (vi), 273
U command (vi), 273
u conversion specification character, 169
u option
sort command, 69
u option (set command), 291
umask command, 295
unalias command, 256, 295
underscore (_), 79, 243
uniq command
-c option, 74

Index
-d option, 73, 74
examples, 72, 73
syntax, 72
Unix C Shell Field Guide, The , 300
Unix in a Nutshell[colon] System V Edition , 299
Unix Programmers Manual, Volume II , 74
Unix Programming Environment, The , 74, 300
Unix Unleashed , 300
unset command, 211, 295
until command, 143, 144, 145, 146, 147, 295, 296
examples, 144, 145, 146, 147
syntax, 143, 144
users
logged-in users
displaying, 4, 5
Users Reference Manual/System Administrators
Reference Manual , 300
utilities
. , 32
(see also commands, shell)
defined, 32
utilities. (see commands)

V
v () escape character, 281
v option
grep command, 67
v option (set command), 291
values
assigning to keyword parameters, 199
assigning to variables, 40, 79
comparing with case command
command syntax, 128, 129
pattern matching characters, 129, 130, 131
pipe symbol (|), 133, 134
displaying, 80
null values, 81, 82
reassigning to positional parameters, 199, 205, 206
variables, 79, 269, 270
$!, 270
$! variable, 216
$#, 270
$# variable, 103, 104
$$, 270
$$ variable, 166
$*, 270
$* variable, 104, 140
$-, 270
$0, 270
$0 variable, 204
$?, 270
$? variable, 112, 113, 114
$@, 270
$@ variable, 140, 141
${n} variable, 108
${variable} construct (***italicize variable), 84, 85
arithmetic expansion, 85, 86
assigning to other variables, 81
assigning values to, 79
assigning variables to, 40
CDPATH, 188, 189, 270
displaying values of, 80
ENV, 241, 270
examples, 80, 81
exporting, 177, 178, 179, 180, 276, 282, 283
FCEDIT, 270, 271

317
filename substitution, 82, 83, 84
FPATH, 251
HISTFILE, 270, 271
HISTSIZE, 270, 271
HOME, 181, 182, 270
IFS, 270
IFS variable, 208, 209, 210
LINENO, 270
listing, 205
local variables, 174, 175
MAIL, 270
MAILCHECK, 270
MAILPATH, 270
naming conventions, 79
null values, 81, 82
passing to subshells, 195, 196, 276
PATH, 182, 183, 184, 185, 186, 187, 270
PHONEBOOK, 184, 185, 186, 187
pointers
creating, 215
positional parameters
defined, 102, 269
left shifting, 108, 109
PPID, 270
PS1, 181, 270
PS2, 181, 270
PS4, 270
PWD, 270
read-only variables, 289, 290
creating, 211
removing from environment, 211
TERM, 197
TZ, 197, 198
unsetting, 211, 295
variable substitution, 80
vartest program, 174
vartest2 program, 175
vartest3 program, 177
vartest4 program, 178, 179
vartest5 program, 179
verbose shell mode, 291
vi line edit mode, 243, 244, 272, 273
command mode, 243
commands, 245, 246, 272, 273
$, 244, 245
/, 245, 246
0, 244, 245
a, 243, 246
b, 244, 245
dw, 245
h, 243, 244, 245
i, 243, 246
j, 244, 245, 246
k, 244, 245, 246
l, 243, 244, 245
r, 245
w, 244, 245
x, 243, 244, 245
input mode, 243
vi shell mode, 291

W
w (-w) operator, 120
w command (vi), 244, 245
w option
wc command, 7

Index

318

wait command, 296

$! variable, 216
example, 216
syntax, 216
waiting for processes, 216
wc command, 6
Web sites, 298, 299
Cygwin, 299
Free Software Foundation, 298
Korn shell, 299
OReilly and Associates Web site, 299
POSIX standard, 298
while command, 142, 143, 296, 297
whitespace characters, 39
who command, 4, 5
words
counting
wc command, 6
working directory
printing, 289
writing
sorted data to standard output, 69, 70
to standard error, 219

X
x (-x) operator, 120
x command (vi), 243, 244, 245
x conversion specification character, 169
X conversion specification character, 169
x option
set command, 204, 205
sh command, 131, 132, 133
x option (set command), 291
xtrace shell mode, 291

Y
Y command (vi), 273

Z
zero (0) exit status, 111
zero exit status, 268

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Unix Shell Programming

Uploaded by

Unix Shell Programming

Uploaded by

Table of Contents

Chapter 3. What Is the Shell?................................................................................................ 36

Chapter 4. Tools of the Trade................................................................................................ 47

Chapter 5. And Away We Go................................................................................................. 80

Chapter 6. Can I Quote You on That?.................................................................................... 92

Chapter 7. Passing Arguments............................................................................................. 106

Chapter 8. Decisions, Decisions........................................................................................... 115

Chapter 9. 'Round and 'Round She Goes............................................................................. 142

Chapter 10. Reading and Printing Data............................................................................... 160

Chapter 11. Your Environment............................................................................................ 178

Chapter 12. More on Parameters........................................................................................ 203

Chapter 13. Loose Ends....................................................................................................... 218

Chapter 14. Rolo Revisited.................................................................................................. 232

Chapter 15. Interactive and Nonstandard Shell Features.................................................... 244

Appendix A. Shell Summary................................................................................................ 272

Appendix B. For More Information.................................................................................... 302

Copyright 2003 by Sams Publishing

Warning and Disclaimer

To Gregory, Linda, and Julia for giving meaning to my life

About the Authors

We Want to Hear from You!

Chapter 2. A Quick Review of the Basics

Some Basic Commands

Finding Out Who's Logged In: The who Command

A Quick Review of the Basics

Echoing Characters: The echo Command

Working with Files

Listing Files: The ls Command

A Quick Review of the Basics

Displaying the Contents of a File: The cat Command

Counting the Number of Words in a File: The wc Command

To count just the number of characters in a file, the -c option is specified:

A Quick Review of the Basics

Making a Copy of a File: The cp Command

Renaming a File: The mv Command

Removing a File: The rm Command

that you have the proper permission to write to the file.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Working with Directories

Figure 2.1. Example directory structure.

Figure 2.2. Directories containing subdirectories.

A Quick Review of the Basics

The Home Directory and Pathnames

Figure 2.3. Hierarchical directory structure.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Displaying Your Working Directory: The pwd Command

Changing Directories: The cd Command

Figure 2.4. Current working directory is steve.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.5. cd documents.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.7. cd documents/letters.

A Quick Review of the Basics

More on the ls Command

To take a look at the subdirectory memos, you follow a similar procedure:

A Quick Review of the Basics

80 Jun 25 13:27 documents

358 Jun 25 13:31 collect

Creating a Directory: The mkdir Command

The directory structure now appears as shown in Figure 2.8.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Figure 2.8. Directory structure with newly created misc directory.

Copying a File from One Directory to Another

A Quick Review of the Basics

Moving Files Between Directories

Linking Files: The ln Command

This links the file from to the file to.

A Quick Review of the Basics

Look what happens when you execute an ls -l:

358 Jun 25 13:31 collect

pat's program directory

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

A Quick Review of the Basics

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

1358 Jan 15 11:01 lcat

A Quick Review of the Basics