This is a little tutorial that I found in my search to learn how to use getopt
(mind: not getopts
, which is a completely different thing). I want to share it here because I find it refreshingly to the point. Just the main code block already tells almost the whole story:
#!/bin/bash
# Set some default values:
ALPHA=unset
BETA=unset
CHARLIE=unset
DELTA=unset
usage()
{
echo "Usage: alphabet [ -a | --alpha ] [ -b | --beta ]
[ -c | --charlie CHARLIE ]
[ -d | --delta DELTA ] filename(s)"
exit 2
}
PARSED_ARGUMENTS=$(getopt -a -n alphabet -o abc:d: --long alpha,bravo,charlie:,delta: -- "$@")
VALID_ARGUMENTS=$?
if [ "$VALID_ARGUMENTS" != "0" ]; then
usage
fi
echo "PARSED_ARGUMENTS is $PARSED_ARGUMENTS"
eval set -- "$PARSED_ARGUMENTS"
while :
do
case "$1" in
-a | --alpha) ALPHA=1 ; shift ;;
-b | --beta) BETA=1 ; shift ;;
-c | --charlie) CHARLIE="$2" ; shift 2 ;;
-d | --delta) DELTA="$2" ; shift 2 ;;
# -- means the end of the arguments; drop this, and break out of the while loop
--) shift; break ;;
# If invalid options were passed, then getopt should have reported an error,
# which we checked as VALID_ARGUMENTS when getopt was called...
*) echo "Unexpected option: $1 - this should not happen."
usage ;;
esac
done
echo "ALPHA : $ALPHA"
echo "BETA : $BETA "
echo "CHARLIE : $CHARLIE"
echo "DELTA : $DELTA"
echo "Parameters remaining are: $@"
Just be sure to correct the inadvertent mixing of beta
and bravo
.
If you find yourself needing this, the correct thing to do is to stop writing that shell scripts and switch to a proper language.
While I agree with you, I think it’s a bit unkind to reply in this way. Sometimes bash is all you have, and it’s interesting to learn about tools even if you’re unlikely to use them.