Shell Script : Assign the outputs to different variables - shell

Question

In a shell script I need to assign the output of few values to different varialbes, need help please.
cat file1.txt
uid: user1
cn: User One
employeenumber: 1234567
absJobAction: HIRED
I need to assign the value of each attribute to different variables so that I can call them them in script. For example uid should be assigned to a new variable name current_uid and when $current_uid is called it should give user1 and so forth for all other attributes.
And if the output does not contain any of the attributes then that attribute value should be considered as "NULL". Example if the output does not have absJobAction then the value of $absJobAction should be "NULL"
This is what I did with my array
#!/bin/bash
IFS=$'\n'
array=($(cat /tmp/file1.txt | egrep -i '^uid:|^cn:|^employeenumber|^absJobAction'))
current_uid=`echo ${array[0]} | grep -w uid | awk -F ': ' '{print $2}'`
current_cn=`echo ${array[1]} | grep -w cn | awk -F ': ' '{print $2}'`
current_employeenumber=`echo ${array[2]} | grep -w employeenumber | awk -F ': ' '{print $2}'`
current_absJobAction=`echo ${array[3]} | grep -w absJobAction | awk -F ': ' '{print $2}'`
echo $current_uid
echo $current_cn
echo $current_employeenumber
echo $current_absJobAction
Output from sh /tmp/testscript.sh follows:
user1
User One
1234567
HIRED

Answer 1

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# assuming bash 4.0 or newer: create an associative array
declare -A vars=( )
while IFS= read -r line; do ## See http://mywiki.wooledge.org/BashFAQ/001
if [[ $line = *": "* ]]; then ## skip lines not containing ": "
key=${line%%": "*} ## strip everything after ": " for key
value=${line#*": "} ## strip everything before ": " for value
vars[$key]=$value
else
printf 'Skipping unrecognized line: <%s>\n' "$line" >&2
fi
done <file1.txt # or < <(ldapsearch ...)
# print all variables read, just to demonstrate
declare -p vars >&2
# extract and print a single variable by name
echo "Variable uid has value ${vars[uid]}"
Note that this must be run with bash yourscript, not sh yourscript.
By the way -- if you don't have bash 4.0, you might consider a different approach:
while IFS= read -r line; do
if [[ $line = *": "* ]]; then
key=${line%%": "*}
value=${line#*": "}
printf -v "ldap_$key" %s "$value"
fi
done <file1.txt # or < <(ldapsearch ...)
will create separate variables of the form "$ldap_cn" or "$ldap_uid", as opposed to putting everything in a single associative array.

Answer 2

Here's a simple example of what you are trying to do that should get you started. It assumes 1 set of data in the file. Although a tad brute-force, I believe its easy to understand.
Given a file called file.txt in the current directory with the following contents (absJobAction intentionally left out):
$ cat file1.txt
uid: user1
cn: User One
employeenumber: 1234567
$
This script gets each value into a local variable and prints it out:
# Use /bin/bash to run this script
#!/bin/bash
# Make SOURCEFILE a readonly variable. Make it uppercase to show its a constant. This is the file the LDAP values come from.
typeset -r SOURCEFILE=./file1.txt
# Each line sets a variable using awk.
# -F is the field delimiter. It's a colon and a space.
# Next is the value to look for. ^ matches the start of the line.
# When the above is found, return the second field ($2)
current_uid="$(awk -F': ' '/^uid/ {print $2}' ${SOURCEFILE})"
current_cn="$(awk -F': ' '/^cn/ {print $2}' ${SOURCEFILE})"
current_enbr="$(awk -F': ' '/^employeenumber/ {print $2}' ${SOURCEFILE})"
current_absja="$(awk -F': ' '/^absJobAction/ {print $2}' ${SOURCEFILE})"
# Print the contents of the variables. Note since absJobAction was not in the file,
# it's value is NULL.
echo "uid: ${current_uid}"
echo "cn: ${current_cn}"
echo "EmployeeNumber: ${current_enbr}"
echo "absJobAction: ${current_absja}"
~
When run:
$ ./test.sh
uid: user1
cn: User One
EmployeeNumber: 1234567
absJobAction:
$