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Bash Quick Start Guide

You're reading from   Bash Quick Start Guide Get up and running with shell scripting with Bash

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Product type Paperback
Published in Sep 2018
Publisher Packt
ISBN-13 9781789538830
Length 186 pages
Edition 1st Edition
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Author (1):
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Tom Ryder Tom Ryder
Author Profile Icon Tom Ryder
Tom Ryder
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Table of Contents (10) Chapters Close

Preface 1. What is Bash? FREE CHAPTER 2. Bash Command Structure 3. Essential Commands 4. Input, Output, and Redirection 5. Variables and Patterns 6. Loops and Conditionals 7. Scripts, Functions, and Aliases 8. Best Practices 9. Other Books You May Enjoy

Quoting correctly

It can't be over-emphasized how important it is to wrap expansions, such as $myvar, ${myvar[1]}, and ${myvar##*/}, in double quotes. Failing to do this will lead to bugs down the line when values contain characters that have special meaning to Bash, especially spaces. This is a common problem with code that has been cut and pasted from old documentation, or from bad advice posted on websites or in chat channels.

It only takes a few examples to realize how dangerous a failure to quote properly can be, especially in circumstances where files can be created by other users, and hence might include shell metacharacters. A file named *, for example, is legal, and if expanded incorrectly, can wreak havoc on your scripts:

$ cd ~/important
$ myfilename='*'
$ echo $myfilename
important-document  passwords-DO-NOT-DELETE  anniversary-plans
$ echo "$myfilename...
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