shell script variable use - bash

Question

I'll get to the meat and bones:
MY_VAR=6
until [$MY_VAR = 0]
do
dir/dir_$MY_VAR.log
ps | grep "NAME_$MY_VAR.ksh"
check some things
if [results = ok]
echo "program $MY_VAR sucessful"
else
echo "program $MY_VAR failure"
MY_VAR = `expr $MY_VAR - 1`
done
Now I am getting the following errors MY_VAR not found and [6: not found, so I'm assuming a rather noobish mistake. I feel the logic is sound enough just a simple syntax error I am making somewhere by the looks of the two errors I think it could be in the declaration.

Answer 1

You need to have a space after [ and before ] since [ is actually a command and not a delimiter.
Here is your script re-written in Bash (or ksh):
my_var=6
until ((my_var == 0))
do
dir/dir_$my_var.log # I have no idea what this is supposed to be
ps | grep "NAME_$my_var.ksh"
# check some things
if [[ $results = ok ]]
then
echo "program $my_var successful"
else
echo "program $my_var failure"
((my_var--))
fi
done
However:
for my_var in {6..1}
do
dir/dir_$my_var.log # I have no idea what this is supposed to be
ps | grep "NAME_$my_var.ksh"
# check some things
if [[ $results = ok ]]
then
echo "program $my_var successful"
else
echo "program $my_var failure"
fi
done

Answer 2

Your two errors are caused by:
until [$MY_VAR = 0]
MY_VAR = $(expr $MY_VAR - 1)
[I've used $() instead of backticks because I couldn't get backticks into the code section]
The first problem is the lack of spaces around the square brackets - on both ends. The shell is looking for the command [6 (after expanding $MY_VAR), instead of [ (have a look at /usr/bin/[ - it's actually a program). You should also use -eq to do numeric comparisons. = should work ok here, but leading zeros can break a string comparison where a numeric comparison would work:
until [ "$MY_VAR" -eq 0 ]
The second problem is you have spaces in your variable assignment. When you write MY_VAR = ... the shell is looking for the command MY_VAR. Instead write it as:
MY_VAR=`expr $MY_VAR - 1`
These answers directly answer your questions, but you should study Dennis Williamson's answer for better ways to do these things.