Examples of Bash Shell Features
Learning Objectives
After completing this reading, you will be able to:
List examples of metacharacters
Use quoting to specify literal or special character meanings
Implement input and output redirection
Apply command substitution
Describe applications for command line arguments
Metacharacters
Metacharacters are characters having special meaning that the shell interprets as
instructions.
Metacharacter Meaning
# Precedes a comment
; Command separator
* Filename expansion wildcard
? Single character wildcard in filename expansion
Pound #
The pound # metacharacter is used to represent comments in shell scripts or
configuration files. Any text that appears after a # on a line is treated as a comment
and is ignored by the shell.
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1. #!/bin/bash
2.
3. # This is a comment
4. echo "Hello, world!" # This is another comment
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Comments are useful for documenting your code or configuration files, providing
context, and explaining the purpose of the code to other developers who may read
it. It's a best practice to include comments in your code or configuration files
wherever necessary to make them more readable and maintainable.
Semicolon ;
The semicolon ; metacharacter is used to separate multiple commands on a single
command line. When multiple commands are separated by a semicolon, they are
executed sequentially in the order they appear on the command line.
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1. $ echo "Hello, "; echo "world!"
2. Hello,
3. world!
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As you can see from the example above, the output of each echo command is
printed on separate lines and follows the same sequence in which the commands
were specified.
The semicolon metacharacter is useful when you need to run multiple commands
sequentially on a single command line.
Asterisk *
The asterisk * metacharacter is used as a wildcard character to represent any
sequence of characters, including none.
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1. ls *.txt
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In this example, *.txt is a wildcard pattern that matches any file in the current
directory with a .txt extension. The ls command lists the names of all matching
files.
Question mark ?
The question mark ? metacharacter is used as a wildcard character to represent any
single character.
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1. ls file?.txt
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In this example, file?.txt is a wildcard pattern that matches any file in the current
directory with a name starting with file, followed by any single character, and
ending with the .txt extension.
Quoting
Quoting is a mechanism that allows you to remove the special meaning of
characters, spaces, or other metacharacters in a command argument or shell script.
You use quoting when you want the shell to interpret characters literally.
Symbol Meaning
\ Escape metacharacter interpretation
" " Interpret metacharacters within string
' ' Escape all metacharacters within string
Backslash \
The backslash character is used as an escape character. It instructs the shell to
preserve the literal interpretation of special characters such as space, tab, and $. For
example, if you have a file with spaces in its name, you can use backslashes
followed by a space to handle those spaces literally:
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1. touch file\ with\ [Link]
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Double quotes " "
When a string is enclosed in double quotes, most characters are interpreted literally,
but metacharacters are interpreted according to their special meaning. For example,
you can access variable values using the dollar $ character:
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1. $ echo "Hello $USER"
2. Hello <username>
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Single quotes ' '
When a string is enclosed in single quotes, all characters and metacharacters
enclosed within the quotes are interpreted literally. Single quotes alter the above
example to produce the following output:
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1. $ echo 'Hello $USER'
2. Hello $USER
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Notice that instead of printing the value of $USER, single quotes cause the terminal
to print the string "$USER".
Input/Output redirection
Symbol Meaning
> Redirect output to file, overwrite
>> Redirect output to file, append
2> Redirect standard error to file, overwrite
2>> Redirect standard error to file, append
< Redirect file contents to standard input
Input/output (IO) redirection is the process of directing the flow of data between
a program and its input/output sources.
By default, a program reads input from standard input, the keyboard, and writes
output to standard output, the terminal. However, using IO redirection, you can
redirect a program's input or output to or from a file or another program.
Redirect output >
This symbol is used to redirect the standard output of a command to a specified file.
ls > [Link] will create a file called [Link] if it doesn't exist, and write the
output of the ls command to it.
Warning: When the file already exists, the output overwrites all of the file's
contents!
Redirect and append output >>
This notation is used to redirect and append the output of a command to the end of
a file. For example,
ls >> [Link] appends the output of the ls command to the end of
file [Link], and preserves any content that already existed in the file.
Redirect standard output 2>
This notation is used to redirect the standard error output of a command to a file.
For example, if you run the ls command on a non-existing directory as follows,
ls non-existent-directory 2> [Link] the shell will create a file
called [Link] if it doesn't exist, and redirect the error output of the ls command
to the file.
Warning: When the file already exists, the error message overwrites all of the file's
contents!
Append standard error 2>>
This symbol redirects the standard error output of a command and appends the
error message to the end of a file without overwriting its contents.
ls non-existent-directory 2>> [Link] will append the error output of
the ls command to the end of the [Link] file.
Redirect input <
This symbol is used to redirect the standard input of a command from a file or
another command. For example,
sort < [Link] will sort the contents of the [Link] file.
Command Substitution
Command substitution allows you to run command and use its output as a
component of another command's argument. Command substitution is denoted by
enclosing a command in either backticks (`command`) or using the $() syntax.
When the encapsulate command is executed, its output is substituted in place, and it
can be used as an argument within another command. This is particularly useful for
automating tasks that require the use of a command's output as input for another
command.
For example, you could store the path to your current directory in a variable by
applying command substitution on the pwd command, then move to another
directory, and finally return to your original directory by invoking the cd command
on the variable you stored, as follows:
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1. $ here=$(pwd)
2. $ cd path_to_some_other_directory
3. $ cd $here
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Command Line Arguments
Command line arguments are additional inputs that can be passed to a program
when the program is run from a command line interface. These arguments are
specified after the name of the program, and they can be used to modify the
behavior of the program, provide input data, or provide output locations. Command
line arguments are used to pass arguments to a shell script.
For example, the following command provides two arguments, arg1, and arg2, that
can be accessed from within your Bash script:
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1. $ ./[Link] arg1 arg2
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