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Working With Programs: Takeaways: Syntax

The document discusses working with programs in Bash including syntax like assigning variables, printing variables, creating environment variables, running Python in Bash, and accessing environment variables. It also covers concepts like what a shell is, that Bash is a popular shell, how to use commands, variables, environment variables, and the PATH variable. It ends with some resources for further reading.

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29 views2 pages

Working With Programs: Takeaways: Syntax

The document discusses working with programs in Bash including syntax like assigning variables, printing variables, creating environment variables, running Python in Bash, and accessing environment variables. It also covers concepts like what a shell is, that Bash is a popular shell, how to use commands, variables, environment variables, and the PATH variable. It ends with some resources for further reading.

Uploaded by

Raja
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Working with Programs: Takeaways

by Dataquest Labs, Inc. - All rights reserved © 2021

Syntax
• Assign a variable
OS=Linux

OR
OS="Linux"

• Print a variable
echo $OS

• Create an environment variable


export LINUX="Linux is best"

• Run python inside of Bash


python

• Access environment variables


import os

print(os.environ["LINUX"])

• See what folders are in PATH


echo $PATH

• List files in directory in long mode


ls -l

• Specify a longer flag with two dashes


ls --ignore

Concepts
• A shell is a way to access and control a computer.
• Bash is the most popular of the UNIX shells, and the default on most Linux and OS X computers.
• Command line shells allow us the option of running commands and viewing the results, as
opposed to clicking an icon in a graphical shell.

• Bash is essentially a language, which allows us to run other programs.


• A command language is a special kind of programming language through which we can control
applications and the system as a whole.

• Quotations around strings in Bash are optional, unless they contain a space.
• We can set variables on the command line by assigning values to them.
• In the command line environment, variables consist entirely of uppercase characters, numbers,
and underscores.

• We can assign any data type to a variable.


• Accessing the value of a variable is not much different than Python -- we just need to prepend it
with a dollar sign ( $ ).

• Environment variables are variables you can access outside the shell.
• We can run many programs from Bash, including Python.
• os.environ is a dictionary containing all of the values for the environment variables.

• The PATH environment variable is configured to point to several folders.

• Programs are similar to functions, and can have any number of arguments.
• Programs can also have optional flags, which modify program behavior.
• We can chain multiple flags that have single, short, character names.

Resources
• UNIX Shells
• Environment Variables

Takeaways by Dataquest Labs, Inc. - All rights reserved © 2021

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