Re: bash: var contains full line. How to input this data with spaces into a var

From: Ed Morton (morton_at_lsupcaemnt.com)
Date: 03/30/05 

Date: Wed, 30 Mar 2005 13:40:40 -0600

stevenbentley@yahoo.com wrote:
<snip>
> Thanks both for the help.
> I settled on the eval method and this works as i required ...until I
> hit the following:
>
> VAR1='one "two three"; four'
> Now I would like:
> VAR2=one
> VAR3="two three"; #including the " and the ;
> VAR4=four
>
> Using the eval and the awk methods, the " and the ; are both stripped
> off. I have tried using backslash but get syntax problems with eval and
> I'm not even sure how to structure this for awk. Can you help me with
> the quoting here?

Put this:

BEGIN{FS="";nv=1}{
     for (i=1;i<=NF;i++) {
         if ( $i == "\"" ) {
             quoted = !quoted
             $i = "\\" $i
         }
         if ((quoted) || ($i != " ")) {
                 var = var $i
         } else if (($i == " ") && (var != "")) {
                 printf "VAR%s=\"%s\"\n",++nv,var
                 var = ""
         }
     }
}END{ printf "VAR%s=\"%s\"\n",++nv,var }

in a file named "setvars.awk". Then run these commands:

PS1> VAR1='one "two three"; four'
PS1> eval `echo "$VAR1" | gawk -f setvars.awk`
PS1> echo "VAR2=$VAR2\nVAR3=$VAR3\nVAR4=$VAR4"
VAR2=one
VAR3="two three";
VAR4=four

Note that I'm using "gawk" not one of the other awks.

> Thanks
>
> 2nd Question
> I'd like to be able to use the value stored in a variable to determine
> which positional parameter to use. Something like:
> $2=5
> count=2
> echo $($2) #5 should be outputted

eval echo \$$2

> Obviously the above does not work. How can I achieve this?
>
> Many Thanks for all help!
>

Regards,
        
        Ed.

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