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This question already has an answer here:

I am attempting to write a script to list all the shebang lines in python files.

What I would like to do is

sudo bash -c 'for logf in $(find / -name "*.py"); do fgrep '#!/usr/bin' "$logf"; done'

This gives error bash: !/usr/bin': event not found. I understand why, although the meaning of the error is unclear.

The trouble is I can't figure out how to pass a string to bash which includes another string without command execution.

If I leave off the "#!" it works, but of course includes a number of other lines.

I have tried practically every combination of escape and string without success.

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marked as duplicate by Gilles bash Feb 20 at 19:32

This question has been asked before and already has an answer. If those answers do not fully address your question, please ask a new question.
1  
you could do this simply with the find command: find / -name "*.py" -exec fgrep '#!/usr/bin' {} \; -print – Ketan Feb 20 at 3:45
    
Escaping the # didn't help? – Jeff Schaller Feb 20 at 3:47
    
Do you want to make this command work (with minimal changes), or nest strings in general? – Michael Homer Feb 20 at 4:04
    
@MichaelHomer At this stage I just want to make it work. I have had similar problems before, so would like to understand if there is a solution. I retried the plain command suggested by @Ketan with sudo, and this works. As I am only using a single command there is no need for the bash command. – Milliways Feb 20 at 4:14
1  
fgrep '\\#\\!/usr/bin' worked for me. – jai_s Feb 20 at 4:14
up vote 1 down vote

Thanks to the comments I have 2 versions which work. Note I have made a couple of changes (to only find shebang at beginning of line) and to allow white space after shebang.

sudo bash -c 'for logf in $(find / -name "*.py"); do grep '^\\#\\!/usr/bin' "$logf"; done'

For some reason when I tried to allow white space after shebang I couldn't get it to work.

Even better (and simpler)

sudo find / -name "*.py" -exec grep '^#! */usr/bin' {} \;
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