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4
votes
1answer
94 views

What does the command “$()” do in UNIX?

What does the command $() do in UNIX? Could someone explain what is the significance of $ in the below examples; $(echo var=10) and eval $(echo var=10)
3
votes
0answers
66 views

Trapping errors in command substitution using “-o errtrace” (ie set -E)

According to this ref manual: -E (also -o errtrace) If set, any trap on ERR is inherited by shell functions, command substitutions, and commands executed in a subshell environment. The ERR ...
1
vote
4answers
99 views

Command substitution grepping ls output causes error

I'm trying to make a tar.tgz file using command substitution There are backups of 17 Aug 2012 -rw-r----- 1 ossec 502 804M Aug 17 2012 BKPMDISINT_i6nir20j.F_bkp -rw-r----- 1 ossec 502 2.7G Aug 17 ...
4
votes
4answers
76 views

How to deal with spaces in a variable

I'm working on some scripting: for x in `find ./ -name *.pdf` do echo pathname $x done My filenames are Test1 ( Volume II), Test2 ( Volume II). I'm getting a return of pathname Test1 pathname ( ...
1
vote
2answers
45 views

Adding commands to VIM?

I keep accidentally entering W instead of w as the command to save my changes. Is it possible to create a shortcut, alias, or command to write, and give it the hotkey of W?
5
votes
2answers
259 views

Special character '#' in Perl SSH command

I try to send command using SSH in my perl script with # but it gets truncated right at # Example: Input text is : $message = "Product ID # STK000134" The SSH command is : $execute=`ssh -q ...
2
votes
5answers
127 views

Command substitution - single quotes and spaces

How can I make command substitution pass a list of single-quoted POSIX paths separated by spaces? command1 $(command2) command1 '/path/to/file 1' '/path/to/file 2' '/path/to/file 3' How can I trace ...
2
votes
1answer
134 views

Compare two data streams without both being stored as files

I have these two files:- [root@localhost base_filters]# cat aix_old joe amadeus image bill juliet charlie romeo ftp [root@localhost base_filters]# cut -d: -f1 passwd2 henry amadeus image bill julie ...
0
votes
1answer
99 views

Command substitution in alias resolved in bash profile? [duplicate]

I want to make an alias for randomly changing my mac address alias chrandmac="sudo ifconfig en0 ether $(openssl rand -hex 6 | sed 's/\(..\)/\1:/g; s/.$//')" but the command substitution part is ...
1
vote
1answer
84 views

starting vim with command substitution

I am working on a project on two different machines - one running Mac OSX 10.8.3, and one running Red Hat Enterprise Linux. On my Mac, I can do this: vim $(ls -R */*.@(h|cpp) */*/*.@(h|cpp)) and ...
3
votes
1answer
81 views

Different behavior of $() and `` [duplicate]

% PATH="MYPATH" % VAR="PATH" % echo $(eval echo \$$VAR) MYPATH % echo `eval echo \$$VAR` 5707VAR ^^ This is the process number. I thought those two were exactly the same, but obviously there are ...
1
vote
2answers
66 views

Configure bash to execute command with last argument when no argument was provided

I would like to configure bash so that when I execute command (preferably from a list of commands, not any command) without an argument, it takes the argument of previous command. So, for example I ...
2
votes
2answers
145 views

How to pass the output of a script to a command like ls without the output being split?

Suppose I have a script like this: #!/bin/bash printf '%q\n' "b c" Executing the script prints: b\ c on the commandline. Now, being in a directory which contains a file named b c I want to pass ...
2
votes
1answer
427 views

How does wc -l `ls` give the actual number of lines?

Can anyone explain to me how does this command work. wc -l `ls` while this command gives the total number of java lines or txt lines.
1
vote
5answers
256 views

Run a command on all the files in a directory tree and put the output into a variable

I want to run this bash command : #!/bin/bash rep="*" for f in `ls -R`$rep; do d='git log '$f'| wc -l' c=$d echo $c done how to excute a command git log myFile | wc -l from bash ? ps : this ...
7
votes
3answers
3k views

Understanding backtick (`)

I am trying out the command $ b=5; echo `$b`; -bash: 5: command not found but it does not print 5 as it is supposed to. What am I missing here? What does ` (backquote/backtick) mean in bash? seems ...
3
votes
3answers
727 views

Split command output by linebreak?

I have a command returning multiple lines. For further processing I need to process each single line of those lines. My current code works by modifying the IFS (Internal Field Separator): ...
2
votes
1answer
217 views

Command substitution: file or command not found

The following script #!/bin/bash QUERY='select * from cdr;' MYROWS=$("sqlite3 -list -nullvalue NULL -separator ',' /var/log/asterisk/master.db '${QUERY}'") gives me ./bla.sh: row 35: sqlite3 -list ...
7
votes
3answers
1k views

Multivariable For Loops

Is there a way to specify multiple variables (not just integers) in for loops in bash? I may have 2 files containing arbitrary text that i would need to work with. What i functionally need is ...
3
votes
1answer
194 views

Command substitution: cat with executable content

I have a file called test and the contents are: ubuntu@regina:~$ cat test ** test ** catting this file via command line works fine, but if I use command substitution I get an understandable but ...
8
votes
4answers
3k views

Command substitution: splitting on newline but not space

I know I can solve this problem several ways, but I'm wondering if there is a way to do it using only bash built-ins, and if not, what is the most efficient way to do it. I have a file with contents ...
1
vote
2answers
385 views

Create MySQL database name using variable from date

for the variable dbnya="echo $(date +%Y%m%d%H%M%S)" When running below code, I will get an error (SQL syntax error) mysql -u root -pthepass -e "CREATE DATABASE demo$dbnya CHARACTER SET utf8 ...
9
votes
1answer
1k views

How can I execute `date` inside of a cron tab job?

I want to create a log file for a cron script that has the current hour in the log file name. This is the command I tried to use: 0 * * * * echo hello >> ~/cron-logs/hourly/test`date "+%d"`.log ...
3
votes
1answer
2k views

Bash: Merge foldername from variable with filename

First I write a configfile with all my parameters like this path="/home/test/" I name it test.conf. Then I write a shell script with this content, name it test, and make it executable with chmod ...
6
votes
4answers
300 views

Run a Command and then Parameter Substitution in one line

bash# hostname host1.example.com I only want host1. So: SHORT_HOST=$(/bin/hostname) SHORT_HOST=${SHORT_HOST%%.*} Can I turn this into a one liner? - or - what is the best way to make $SHORT_HOST ...
6
votes
5answers
1k views

Why does shell Command Substitution gobble up a trailing newline char?

As per the following example, and as in my recent question In bash, where has the trailing newline char gone?, I want to know "why" it happens x="$(echo -ne "a\nb\n")" ; echo -n "$x" | xxd -p # ...
10
votes
2answers
568 views

Where has the trailing newline char gone from my command substitution?

The following code best describes the situation.  Why is the last line not outputting the trailing newline char?  Each line's output is shown in the comment.  I'm using GNU bash, version 4.1.5 ...
4
votes
4answers
878 views

file $(ls /usr/bin/* | grep zip) command gives me errors. What's wrong?

I'm a total noob when it comes to unix/linux commands and I decided to read a book. I've reached a chapter where they try to explain how to pass the output of commands as expansions to the shell. ...
114
votes
4answers
6k views

What's the difference between $(stuff) and `stuff`?

Running top -p $(pidof init) and top -p `pidof init` gives the same output. Are these two ways of doing the same thing, or are there differences?