How to perform pattern substitution on the keys of a bash associative array - bash

I need to perform a pattern substitution on the keys of a bash associative array. Example:
$ declare -A aa=( [A]=0 [B]=1 [C]=2 )
To prefix the values with foo_ one can use:
$ echo --${aa[#]/#/foo_}--
--foo_0 foo_1 foo_2--
But how to prefix the keys? This does not work (at least in GNU bash, version 4.3.30(1)-release):
$ echo --${!aa[#]/#/foo_}-- # <- does not work
----
Is there a better way than the following workaround?
$ declare -a keys=( ${!aa[#]} )
$ echo --${keys[#]/#/foo_}--
--foo_A foo_B foo_C--

You can use printf:
printf 'foo_%s\n' "${!aa[#]}"
foo_A
foo_B
foo_C

Related

how to assign each of multiple lines in a file as different variable?

this is probably a very simple question. I looked at other answers but couldn't come up with a solution. I have a 365 line date file. file as below,
01-01-2000
02-01-2000
I need to read this file line by line and assign each day to a separate variable. like this,
d001=01-01-2000
d002=02-01-2000
I tried while read commands but couldn't get them to work.It takes a lot of time to shoot one by one. How can I do it quickly?
Trying to create named variable out of an associative array, is time waste and not supported de-facto. Better use this, using an associative array:
#!/bin/bash
declare -A array
while read -r line; do
printf -v key 'd%03d' $((++c))
array[$key]=$line
done < file
Output
for i in "${!array[#]}"; do echo "key=$i value=${array[$i]}"; done
key=d001 value=01-01-2000
key=d002 value=02-01-2000
Assumptions:
an array is acceptable
array index should start with 1
Sample input:
$ cat sample.dat
01-01-2000
02-01-2000
03-01-2000
04-01-2000
05-01-2000
One bash/mapfile option:
unset d # make sure variable is not currently in use
mapfile -t -O1 d < sample.dat # load each line from file into separate array location
This generates:
$ typeset -p d
declare -a d=([1]="01-01-2000" [2]="02-01-2000" [3]="03-01-2000" [4]="04-01-2000" [5]="05-01-2000")
$ for i in "${!d[#]}"; do echo "d[$i] = ${d[i]}"; done
d[1] = 01-01-2000
d[2] = 02-01-2000
d[3] = 03-01-2000
d[4] = 04-01-2000
d[5] = 05-01-2000
In OP's code, references to $d001 now become ${d[1]}.
A quick one-liner would be:
eval $(awk 'BEGIN{cnt=0}{printf "d%3.3d=\"%s\"\n",cnt,$0; cnt++}' your_file)
eval makes the shell variables known inside your script or shell. Use echo $d000 to show the first one of the newly defined variables. There should be no shell special characters (like * and $) inside your_file. Remove eval $() to see the result of the awk command. The \" quoted %s is to allow spaces in the variable values. If you don't have any spaces in your_file you can remove the \" before and after %s.

Dynamically creating associative arrays in bash

I have a variable ($OUTPUT) that contains the following name / value pairs:
member_id=4611686018429783292
platform=Xbox
platform_id=1
character_id=2305843009264966985
period_dt=2020-11-25 20:31:14.923158 UTC
mode=all Crucible modes
mode_id=5
activities_entered=18
activities_won=10
activities_lost=8
assists=103
kills=233
average_kill_distance=15.729613
total_kill_distance=3665
seconds_played=8535
deaths=118
average_lifespan=71.72269
total_lifespan=8463.277
opponents_defeated=336
efficiency=2.8474576
kills_deaths_ratio=1.9745762
kills_deaths_assists=2.411017
suicides=1
precision_kills=76
best_single_game_kills=-1
Each line ends with \n.
I want to loop through them, and parse them into an associative array, and the access the values in the array by the variable names:
while read line
do
key=${line%%=*}
value=${line#*=}
echo $key=$value
data[$key]="$value"
done < <(echo "$OUTPUT")
#this always prints the last value
echo ${data['seconds_played']}
This seems to work, i.e. key/value print the right values, but when I try to pull any values from the array, it always returns the last value (in this case -1).
I feel like im missing something obvious, but have been banging my head against it for a couple of hours.
UPDATE: My particular issue is I'm running a version of bash (3.2.57 on OSX) that doesn't support associative arrays). I'll mark the correct answer below.
Without declare -A data, then data is a normal array. In normal arrays expressions in [here] first undergo expansions, then arithmetic expansion. Inside arithmetic expansion unset variables are expanded to 0. You are effectively only just setting data[0]=something, because data[$key] is data[seconds_played] -> variable seconds_played is not defined, so it expands to data[0]
Add declare -A data and it "should work". You could also just:
declare -A data
while IFS== read -r key value; do
data["$key"]="$value"
done <<<"$OUTPUT"
Try declaring data as an associative array before populating it, eg:
$ typeset -A data # declare as an associative array
$ while read line
do
key=${line%%=*}
value=${line#*=}
echo $key=$value
data[$key]="$value"
done <<< "${OUTPUT}"
$ typeset -p data
declare -A data=([mode]="all Crucible modes" [period_dt]="2020-11-25 20:31:14.923158 UTC" [deaths]="118" [best_single_game_kills]="-1" [efficiency]="2.8474576" [precision_kills]="76" [activities_entered]="18" [seconds_played]="8535" [total_lifespan]="8463.277" [average_lifespan]="71.72269" [character_id]="2305843009264966985" [kills]="233" [activities_won]="10" [average_kill_distance]="15.729613" [activities_lost]="8" [mode_id]="5" [assists]="103" [suicides]="1" [total_kill_distance]="3665" [platform]="Xbox" [kills_deaths_ratio]="1.9745762" [platform_id]="1" [kills_deaths_assists]="2.411017" [opponents_defeated]="336" [member_id]="4611686018429783292" )
$ echo "${data['seconds_played']}"
8535

Creating and populating dynamically named arrays in bash

I am creating dynamic arrays which all have different letters in their name. For the purpose of this question, my initial array of letters has been set at a fixed length. However, in my final implementation this letter array will be any length.
For each letter, I construct a string
I declare a new array with that string, making use of eval to evaluate the variable's value within the declare command.
I add some values to the array, again using eval to evaluate any variable values.
Here is the code:
declare -a LETTER_ARRAY=( "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" )
for i in "${LETTER_ARRAY[#]}"
do
name_string="apple${i}"
color0="red"
color1="green"
eval "declare -a ${name_string}_array"
eval "${name_string}_array[0]=$color0"
eval "${name_string}_array[1]=$color1"
done
So, how can I iterate through these dynamic arrays and echo what is in them? I have tried the following:
for i in "${LETTER_ARRAY[#]}"
do
eval "array_name='apple${i}_array'"
echo ${array_name[0]}
done
This has not worked for me. I can confirm that my dynamic arrays were successfully created and populated, as when I echo out a value manually, I get a result:
echo ${appleA_array[0]}
red
A perfect place to use a namereference:
letter_array=(A B C D E)
for i in "${letter_array[#]}"; do
declare -n var="apple${i}_array"
var[0]=red
var[1]=green
done
declare -p appleA_array
would output:
declare -a appleA_array=([0]="red" [1]="green")
how can I iterate through these dynamic arrays and echo what is in them?
With the above:
for i in "${letter_array[#]}"; do
declare -n var="apple${i}_array"
printf "%s\n" "${var[0]}"
done
Notes:
Do not use eval. Eval is evil.
Do not use upper case variables, by convention they are used for exported variables, like COLUMNS, PWD, UID, EUID, LINES. Use lower case variables in your scripts.
Check your scripts with http://shellcheck.net for most common mistakes
But if you are creating a 2d array, then an associative array might be better:
declare -A apple_arrays
letter_array=(A B C D E)
for i in "${letter_array[#]}"; do
apple_arrays[$i,0]=red
apple_arrays[$i,1]=green
done
for i in "${letter_array[#]}"; do
printf "one=%s two=%s\n" "${apple_arrays[$i,0]}" "${apple_arrays[$i,1]}"
done
how can I iterate through these dynamic arrays
echo ${array_name[0]} does not work because array_name is not the name of an array; $array_name is. Therefore, eval "echo \"\${${array_name}[0]}\"" would to the trick.
However, I'd recommend namerefs.
By The way: declare works without eval and is more reliable that way.
#! /usr/bin/env bash
letters=({A..E})
for i in "${letters[#]}"; do
declare -a "apple${i}_array=(red green)"
done
for i in "${letters[#]}"; do
declare -n array="apple${i}_array"
# now you can use `array` as if it was `appleA_array`, `appleB_array`, ...
echo "${array[0]}"
done
Your first line is not bash syntax. If I try the line
declare -a LETTER_ARRAY = [ "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" ]
I get:
bash: declare: `=': not a valid identifier
bash: declare: `[': not a valid identifier
bash: declare: `]': not a valid identifier
I think, you get similar error messages, but you ignored them
More errors:
Forgotten do
case mismatch: suffix on definition: _array, and for output: _ARRAY
Use always double quotes when using [#]
One correct syntax is:
declare -a LETTER_ARRAY=( "A" "B" "C" "D" "E" )
for i in "${LETTER_ARRAY[#]}"
do
name_string="apple${i}"
color0="red"
color1="green"
eval "declare -a ${name_string}_array"
echo "${name_string}_array[0]=$color0"
eval "${name_string}_array[0]=$color0"
eval "${name_string}_array[1]=$color1"
done
echo ${appleA_array[0]}
Your eval "array_name='AZ${i}_ARRAY'" makes array_name a scalar, not an array. Arrays in bash are usually created like this
arr=( your elements go here )
If you want to assign one array to another, you have to interpolate the elements between those parenthesis, for instance:
arr=( ${other_array[#]} )
Since you are using bash, this would perform word splitting the elements of other_array, if they contain spaces. Hence you would usually write it for the safe side as
arr=( "${other_array[#]}" )
Hence, for your case, you could do a
eval "array_name=( \${AZ${i}_ARRAY[#]} )"
This causes an array array_name to be created, with the elements of the respective AZi_ARRAY.
I omitted here for simplicity the prevention against word splitting, because in your example, the array elements contain single words only.

How to get a last key of an associative array (dictionary)

How I can have an access to the last key of the associative array in bash? In this example I need to have "lot" in the $last variable. I found a way described here: How to get the keys and values of an associative array indirectly in Bash?. But it doesn't work as expected in the example below and return this error:
./test.sh: line 9: keys2: ${!$addict[#]}: must use subscript when assigning associative array
Here are the contents of this test.sh:
declare -A addict=(
["foo"]="bar"
["few"]="baz"
["lot"]="pot"
)
index_last=$(( ${#addict[#]} - 1 ))
eval 'declare -A keys2=(${!$addict[#]})'
last="${keys2[$index_last]}"
echo "$keys2"
echo "$index_last"
echo "$last"
While Tom Fenech is absolutely right saying
The keys are unordered, so the concept of a "last key" doesn't really make sense, you can avoid the error by changing the line with eval to
keys2=( "${!addict[#]}" )
and see what you get. It may also be illuminating to look at declare -p addict. In order to get some key (first key that is returned from unordered keys list, not first key that was declared) you can do:
some_key="${keys2[0]}"
This way you could, for example, unset A[$some_key] and iterate over keys in such manner by picking first returned key each time.
Example:
$ declare -A A=( [a]=x [b]=y [c]=z )
$ echo "${!A[#]}"
c b a
$ keys=( "${!A[#]}" )
$ echo "${keys[0]}"
c
# you see that c was returned instead of a
# (on your computer order could be different)
$ unset A[$some_key]
$ echo "${!A[#]}"
b a
$ declare -p A
declare -A A=([b]="y" [a]="x" )
Further reading: GNU Bash - Arrays.

Creating a string variable name from the value of another string

In my bash script I have two variables CONFIG_OPTION and CONFIG_VALUE which contain string VENDOR_NAME and Default_Vendor respectively.
I need to create a variable with name $CONFIG_OPTION ie VENDOR_NAME and assign the value in CONFIG_VALUE to newly created variable.
How I can do this?
I tried
$CONFIG_OPTION=$CONFIG_VALUE
But I am getting an error on this line as
'./Build.bash: line 137: VENDOR_NAME="Default_Vendor": command not found'
Thanks.
I know that nobody will mention it, so here I go. You can use printf!
#!/bin/bash
CONFIG_OPTION="VENDOR_NAME"
CONFIG_VALUE="Default_Vendor"
printf -v "$CONFIG_OPTION" "%s" "$CONFIG_VALUE"
# Don't believe me?
echo "$VENDOR_NAME"
This uses bash builtins:
#!/bin/bash
VAR1="VAR2"
declare "${VAR1}"="value"
echo "VAR1=${VAR1}"
echo "VAR2=${VAR2}"
The script output:
VAR1=VAR2
VAR2=value
Here's the snippet using your variable names:
#!/bin/bash
CONFIG_OPTION="VENDOR_NAME"
declare "${CONFIG_OPTION}"="value"
echo "CONFIG_OPTION=${CONFIG_OPTION}"
echo "VENDOR_NAME=${VENDOR_NAME}"
The script output:
CONFIG_OPTION=VENDOR_NAME
VENDOR_NAME=value
For pure shell, possibly try:
#!/usr/bin/env sh
option=vendor_name
value="my vendor"
eval $option="'$value'" # be careful with ', \n, and \ in value
eval echo "\$$option" # my vendor
echo "$vendor_name" # my vendor
Why?
#!/usr/bin/env sh
printf -v "var" "val" # prints the flag, var not set
declare var=val # sh: declare: not found
echo ${!var} # sh: syntax error: bad substitution
I don't like eval, but are there any POSIX options?
Existing answers are great for strings, but do not work with arrays.
Here is a working solution for arrays:
ARRAY=(a b c d e f)
array_name="ARRAY_NAME"
TARGET_ARRAY="${array_name}[#]" # ARRAY="ARRAY[#]"
TARGET_ARRAY=("${!TARGET_ARRAY}") # ARRAY=(a b c d e f)
the array_name string can also have * suffix to obtain the array elements.

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