Calculate maximum argument passed to a bash script - bash

I'm trying to calculate maximum argument passed to a bash script. Here's the code:
#!/bin/sh
max=$1
for var in "$#"
do
if ($var>$max)
then
max=$var
fi
done
echo $max
Here is what I get:
$ /bin/sh my_script 1 2 3
rgz: 11: 1: not found
rgz: 11: 2: not found
rgz: 11: 3: not found
1
What am I doing wrong?

This might work for you -
#!/bin/bash
max="$1"
for var in "$#"
do
if [ "$var" -gt "$max" ] # Using the test condition
then
max="$var"
fi
done
echo "$max"

This is mine. Minor improvement...
#!/bin/bash
max="$1"
for v in "$#"
do
[[ $v -gt $max ]] && max=$v
done
echo "$max"

You can pipe the results to sort and find the maximum (the last item in the sorted list) with tail:
your stuff | sort -n | tail -1
May be this is not the computationally most efficient way to get the maximum, but gets the job done.

Related

bash comparing variables that are integers with -gt -lt

I'm trying to make a bash script that reads integers from a file (one number per line, name of the file is passed as the script argument), finds maximum, minimum and sum. I've got a problem with the part, where I'm comparing variables, though. Code below (I've skipped here the part which checks whether the file exists or is empty):
#!/bin/bash
min=`cat "$1" | head -n 1`
max=$min
sum=0
lw=`cat "$1" | wc -l`
while [ $lw -gt 0 ];
do
num=`cat "$1" | tail -n $lw | head -n 1`
if [ "$num" -gt "$max" ]
then
max=$num
elif [ "$num" -lt "$min" ]
then
min=$num
fi
sum=$[sum+num]
lw=$[$lw-1]
done
echo "Maximum: $max"
echo "Minimum: $min"
echo "Sum: $sum"
With this code I'm getting errors in lines 13 and 16: [: : integer expression expected
If I change the comparision part inside the while loop to:
if [ $num -gt $max ]
then
max=$num
elif [ $num -lt $min ]
then
min=$num
fi
I'm getting errors:
line 13: [: -gt: unary operator expected
line 16: [: -lt: unary operator expected
What am I doing wrong? I'm a total newbie in bash, so I'll be extremely grateful for any help.
Data that I used for testing:
5
6
8
2
3
5
9
10
Probably your input file contains DOS line endings or other improper formatting. Your code should work for well-formed inputs.
However, the proper way to loop over the lines in a file is
#!/bin/bash
min=$(sed 1q "$1")
max=$min
sum=0
while read -r num; do
if [ "$num" -gt "$max" ]
then
max=$num
elif [ "$num" -lt "$min" ]
then
min=$num
fi
((sum+=num))
done<"$1"
echo "Maximum: $max"
echo "Minimum: $min"
echo "Sum: $sum"
Notice also that backticks and $[[...]]] use syntax which has been obselescent for decades already.
My guess would be that the expression
num=`cat "$1" | tail -n $lw | head -n 1`
assigns to num some value that is not a number in one of the iterations. I would suggest adding echo "$num" in the prev line to check this assumption
Another thing: instead of reading lines using cat | tail | head it is easier to read file line by line using the following syntax
while IFS= read -r line
do
echo "$line"
done < "$input"
This will read contents of input file into line variable.
See here for explanations about IFS= and -r https://www.cyberciti.biz/faq/unix-howto-read-line-by-line-from-file/ - both of them not really necessary in your case

Having difficulty writing a script to sort words

I am dealing with sorting words in Bash according to a given argument. I am given either argument -r, -a , -v or -h and according to it there are options to sort the words, as you can see at my "help".
Somehow, if I pass the argument -r it creates an error. I really don't understand what I am doing wrong, as if[["$arg"=="-a"]] works, but I have to use case somehow.
Here is my code:
#!/bin/bash
# Natalie Zubkova , zubkonat
# zubkonat#cvut.fel.cz , LS
#help
help="This script will calculate occurances of words in a given file, and it will sort them according to the given argument in following order> \n
without parametre = increasing order according to a number of occurance\n
-r = decreasing order according to a number of occurance\n
-a = in alphabetical increasing order\n
-a -r = in alphabetical decreasing order\n
There are also special cases of the given parametre, when the script is not sorting but:\n
-h = for obtaining help \n
-v = for obtaining a number of this task "
# this function will divide a given chain into a words, so we can start calculating the occurances, we also convert all the capital letters to the small ones by - tr
a=0;
r=0;
EXT=0;
if [ "$1" == "-h" ]; then
echo $help
exit 0
fi
if [ "$2" == "-h" ]; then
echo $help
exit 0
fi
if [ "$1" == "-v" ]; then
echo "5"
exit 0
fi
if [ "$2" == "-v" ]; then
echo "5"
exit 0
fi
function swap {
while read x y; do
echo "$y" "$x";
done
}
function clearAll {
sed -e 's/[^a-z]/\n/gI' | tr '[A-Z]' '[a-z]' | sort | uniq -c |awk '{i++; if(i!=1) print $2" "$1}' #swap
}
for arg do
case "$arg" in
"-a")
a=1
;;
"-r")
r=1
;;
"-v")
echo "5" #number of task is 5
exit 0
;;
"-h")
echo $help
exit 0
;;
"-?")
echo "invalid parametre, please display a help using argument h"
exit 0
;;
esac
done
#Sort according to parametres -a and -r
function sortWords {
if [[ a -eq 1 ]]; then
if [[ r -eq 0 ]]; then
clearAll | sort -nk1
fi
fi
if [[ a -eq 1 ]]; then
if [[ r -eq 1 ]]; then
clearAll | sort -nk1 -r
fi
fi
if [[ r -eq 1 ]]; then
if [[ a -eq 0 ]]; then
clearAll | sort -nk2 -r
fi
fi
if [[ a -eq 0 ]]; then
if [[ r -eq 0 ]]; then
clearAll | sort -nk2
fi
fi
}
#code is from Stackoverflow.com
function cat-all {
while IFS= read -r file
do
if [[ ! -z "$file" ]]; then
cat "$file"
fi
done
}
#histogram
hist=""
for arg do
if [[ ! -e "$arg" ]]; then
EXT=1;
echo "A FILE DOESNT EXIST" >&2
continue;
elif [[ ! -f "$arg" ]]; then
EXT=1;
echo "A FILE DOESNT EXIST" >&2
continue;
elif [[ ! -r "$arg" ]]; then
EXT=1;
echo "A FILE DOESNT EXIST" >&2
continue;
fi
done
for arg do
hist="$hist""$arg""\n"
done
echo -e "$hist" | cat-all | sortWords
exit $EXT;
Here is what our upload system which does some test to see if our program works says:
Test #6
> b5.sh -r ./easy.txt
ERROR: script output is wrong:
--- expected output
+++ script stdout
## --- line 1 (167 lines) ; +++ no lines ##
-the 89
-steam 46
-a 39
-of 37
-to 35
...
script written 484 lines, while 484 lines are expected
script error output:
A FILE DOESNT EXIST
cat: invalid option -- 'r'
Try `cat --help' for more information.
script exit value: 1
ERROR: Interrupted due to failed test
If anyone could help me I would really appreciate it.
You forgot to move the parameter index position with shift:
"-r")
r=1
shift
;;
shift above moves to the next command line arg: ./easy.txt in your case.
Without it, read -r file will read -r instead of the file name.

Error while executing bash script

I have a file named 1.txt which contains numbers, like 2, 30,20,1 etc. I am trying to compare each number in this text file with a numeric value 20 and I would like to run a command if the value is equal to 20, otherwise exit.
My code is given below. When I try to run the bash script, getting error as
----------
email.sh: line 2: [[2: command not found
email.sh: line 2: [[1: command not found
for f in $( cat 1.txt ); do
if [[$f -eq "20"]];
then
echo "sucess"
fi
done
You should have space after the [[ in the if
if [[ "$f" -eq "20" ]];
Example
$ if [[ "$f" -eq "20" ]]; then echo "sucess"; fi
sucess
Why?
In bash the [[ ]] construct is called extended test command, and you always need to separate tokens in any language with spaces.
There is an error in your if, syntax error. try including space:
#!/bin/bash
for f in $( cat 1.txt ); do
if [ $f -eq "20" ];
then
echo "sucess"
fi
done

Counting down in a loop to zero by the number being given

I am trying to write a while loop to determine the number is being given to count down to 0. Also, if there's no argument given, must display "no parameters given.
Now I have it counting down but the last number is not being 0 and as it is counting down it starts with the number 1. I mush use a while loop.
My NEW SCRIPT.
if [ $# -eq "0" ] ;then
echo "No paramters given"
else
echo $#
fi
COUNT=$1
while [ $COUNT -gt 0 ] ;do
echo $COUNT
let COUNT=COUNT-1
done
echo Finished!
This is what outputs for me.
sh countdown.sh 5
1
5
4
3
2
1
Finished!
I need it to reach to 0
#Slizzered has already spotted your problem in a comment:
You need operator -ge (greater than or equal) rather than -gt (greater than) in order to count down to 0.
As for why 1 is printed first: that's simply due to the echo $# statement before the while loop.
If you're using bash, you could also consider simplifying your code with this idiomatic reformulation:
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Count is passed as the 1st argument.
# Abort with error message, if not given.
count=${1?No parameters given}
# Count down to 0 using a C-style arithmetic expression inside `((...))`.
# Note: Increment the count first so as to simplify the `while` loop.
(( ++count ))
while (( --count >= 0 )); do
echo $count
done
echo 'Finished!'
${1?No parameters given} is an instance of shell parameter expansion
bash shell arithmetic is documented here.
You should also validate the variable before using it in an arithmetic context. Otherwise, a user can construct an argument that will cause the script to run in an infinite loop or hit the recursion limit and segfault.
Also, don't use uppercase variable names since you risk overriding special shell variables and environment variables. And don't use [ in bash; prefer the superior [[ and (( constructs.
#!/usr/bin/env bash
shopt -s extglob # enables extended globs
if (( $# != 1 )); then
printf >&2 'Missing argument\n'
exit 1
elif [[ $1 != +([0-9]) ]]; then
printf >&2 'Not an acceptable number\n'
exit 2
fi
for (( i = $1; i >= 0; i-- )); do
printf '%d\n' "$i"
done
# or if you insist on using while
#i=$1
#while (( i >= 0 )); do
# printf '%d\n' "$((i--))"
#done
Your code is far from being able to run. So, I don't know where to start to explain. Let's take this small script:
#!/bin/sh
die() {
echo $1 >&2
exit 1;
}
test -z "$1" && die "no parameters given"
for i in $(seq $1 -1 0); do
echo "$i"
done
The main part is the routine seq which does what you need: counting from start value to end value (with increment in between). The start value is $1, the parameter to our script, the increment is -1.
The test line tests whether there is a parameter on the command line - if not, the script ends via the subroutine die.
Hth.
There are a number of ways to do this, but the general approach is to loop from the number given to an ending number decrementing the loop count with each iteration. A C-style for loop works as well as anything. You will adjust the sleep value to get the timing you like. You should also validate the required number and type of input your script takes. One such approach would be:
#!/bin/bash
[ -n "$1" ] || {
printf " error: insufficient input. usage: %s number (for countdown)\n" "${0//*\//}"
exit 1
}
[ "$1" -eq "$1" >/dev/null 2>&1 ] || {
printf " error: invalid input. number '%s' is not an integer\n" "$1"
exit 1
}
declare -i cnt=$(($1))
printf "\nLaunch will occur in:\n\n"
for ((i = cnt; i > 0; i--)); do
printf " %2s\n" "$i"
sleep .5
done
printf "\nFinished -- blastoff!\n\n"
exit 0
Output
$ bash ./scr/tmp/stack/countdown.sh 10
Launch will occur in:
10
9
8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
Finished -- blastoff!
Your Approach
Your approach is fine, but you need to use the value of COUNT $COUNT in your expression. You also should declare -i COUNT=$1 to tell the shell to treat it as an integer:
#!/bin/bash
if [ $# -eq "0" ] ;then
echo "No paramters given"
else
echo -e "\nNumber of arguments: $#\n\n"
fi
declare -i COUNT=$1
while [ $COUNT -gt 0 ] ;do
echo $COUNT
let COUNT=$COUNT-1
done
echo -e "\nFinished!\n"

Getting command line argument that stores in a variable

I am writing a bash script to finger the first three line of user's info.
ex:
$ ./c.sh bob unknown
Login: bob Name: Bob
Directory: /u1/h7/bob Shell: /bin/tcsh
Office: AA 044, x8361 Home Phone: 000-000-0000
unknown: no such user.
Here is my code so far
#!/bin/bash
if [ $# == 0 ]; then
echo "Usage: ./c.sh Login/Username"
exit
else
i=$#
j=1
while [ "$j" -le "$i" ]; do
finger ${$j} | head -n+3
echo
j=$(($j+1))
done
fi
instead of giving what user types for the command line arguments, ${$j} is giving me the the value of $j, any suggestion and help for how to get the login/username? I've tried $($j), $((j)), ${$j}....
The easy answer: stop using unnecessary indirection:
#!/bin/bash
if (( $# == 0 )); then
echo "Usage: ./c.sh Login/Username"
exit
else
while [[ $1 ]]; do
finger "$1" | head -n+3
echo
shift
done
fi
or…
…
for user; do # equivalent to `for user in "$#"; do`
finger "$user" | head -n+3
…
done
You could write it this way:
i=$#
j=1
while [ $j -le $i ]; do
finger "${#:j++:1}" | head -n+3
echo
done
…but you don't need to work that hard.
#!/bin/bash
if [[ $# -eq 0 ]]; then
echo "Usage: $0 Login/Username"
exit
else
for ARG in "$#"; do
finger "$ARG" | head -n 3
echo # If you want a newline
done
fi
As simple as it can be.

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