ksh Scripting

Contents
Principle of Script
Variables
Branching
Looping
Command line Arguments
Comparisons
Variable Manipulations
ksh Regular Expressions
Functions
Data Redirection
Pipes
Co-processes
Read Input from User and from Files
Special Variables
Action on Success or Failure of a Command
Trivial Calculations
Numerical Calculations using "bc"
"grep"
"sed"
"awk"
"perl"
 Principle of Script
Defining the Shell Type
To make a ksh script (which is a ksh program) crate a new file with a starting line like:
#!/usr/bin/ksh
It is important that the path to the ksh is proper and that the line doesn’t not have more
than 32 characters. The shell from which you are starting the script will find this line and
hand the whole script over to ksh. Without this line the script would be interpreted by the
same typ of shell as the one, from which it was started. But since the syntax is different
for all shells, it is necessary to define the shell with that line.

Four Types of Lines

A script has four types of lines: The shell defining line at the top, empty lines,
commentary lines starting with a # and command lines. See the following top of a script
as an example for these types of lines:

#!/usr/bin/ksh

# Commentary......

file=/path/file
if [[ $file = $1 ]];then
command
fi

Start and End of Script

The script starts at the first line and ends either when it encounters an "exit" or the last
line. All "#" lines are ignored.

Start and End of Command

A command starts with the first word on a line or if it's the second command on a line
with the first word after a";'.
A command ends either at the end of the line or with a ";". So one can put several
commands onto one line:
print -n "Name: "; read name; print ""

One can continue commands over more than one line with a "\" immediately followed by
a newline sign which is made be the return key:
grep filename | sort -u | awk '{print $4}' | \
uniq -c >> /longpath/file

Name and Permissions of Script File

The script must not have a name which is identical to a unix command: So the script must
NOT be called "test"!
After saving the file give it the execute permissions with: chmod 700 filename.

Variables
Filling in
When filling into a variable then one uses just its name: state="US" and no blanks. There
is no difference between strings and numbers: price=50.

Using
When using a variable one needs to put a $ sign in front of it: print $state $price.

Arrays
Set and use an array like:
arrname[1]=4 To fill in
print ${arraname[1]} To print out
${arrname[*]} Get all elements
${#arrname[*]} Get the number of elements

Declaration
There are happily no declarations of variables needed in ksh. One cannot have decimals
only integers.

Branching
if then fi
if [[ $value -eq 7 ]];then
print "$value is 7"
fi
or:

if [[ $value -eq 7 ]]
then
print "$value is 7"
fi
or:

if [[ $value -eq 7 ]];then print "$value is 7";fi

if then else fi
if [[ $name = "John" ]];then
print "Your welcome, ${name}."
else
print "Good bye, ${name}!"
fi

if then elif then else fi

if [[ $name = "John" ]];then
print "Your welcome, ${name}."
elif [[ $name = "Hanna" ]];then
print "Hello, ${name}, who are you?"
else
print "Good bye, ${name}!"
fi

case esac
case $var in
john|fred) print $invitation;;
martin) print $declination;;
*) print "Wrong name...";;
esac

Looping
while do done
while [[ $count -gt 0 ]];do
print "\$count is $count"
(( count -= 1 ))
Done

until do done
until [[ $answer = "yes" ]];do
print -n "Please enter \"yes\": "
read answer
print ""
done

for var in list do done

for foo in $(ls);do
if [[ -d $foo ]];then
print "$foo is a directory"
else
print "$foo is not a directory"
fi
done

continue...break
One can skip the rest of a loop and directly go to the next iteration with: "continue".
while read line
do
if [[ $line = *.gz ]];then
continue
else
print $line
fi
done
One can also prematurely leave a loop with: "break".
while read line;do
if [[ $line = *!(.c) ]];then
break
else
print $line
fi
done

Command Line Arguments

(Officially they are called "positional parameters")
The number of command line arguments is stored in $# so one can check
for arguments with:
if [[ $# -eq 0 ]];then
print "No Arguments"
exit
fi

The single Arguments are stored in $1, ....$n and all are in $* as one string. The
arguments cannot directly be modified but one can reset the whole command line for
another part of the program.
If we need a first argument $first for the rest of the program we do:
if [[ $1 != $first ]];then
set $first $*
fi

One can iterate over the command line arguments with the help of the shift command.
Shift indirectly removes the first argument.
until [[ $# -qe 0 ]];do
# commands ....
shift
done

One can also iterate with the “for” loop, the default with for is $*:
for arg;do
print $arg
done

The program name is stored in $0 but it contains the path also!

Comparisons
To compare strings one uses "=" for equal and "!=" for not equal.
To compare numbers one uses "-eq" for equal "-ne" for not equal as well as "-gt" for
greater than and "-lt" for less than.
if [[ $name = "John" ]];then
# commands....
fi
if [[ $size -eq 1000 ]];then
# commands....
fi

With "&&" for "AND" and "||" for "OR" one can combine statements:
if [[ $price -lt 1000 || $name = "Hanna" ]];then
# commands....
fi
if [[ $name = "Fred" && $city = "Denver" ]];then
# commands....
fi

Variable Manipulations
Removing something from a variable
Variables that contain a path can very easily be stripped of it: ${name##*/} gives you just
the filename.
Or if one wants the path: ${name%/*}. % takes it away from the left and # from the right.
%% and ## take the longest possibility while % and # just take the shortest one.

Replacing a variable if it does not yet exits

If we wanted $foo or if not set 4 then: ${foo:-4} but it still remains unset. To change that
we use:
${foo:=4}

Exiting and stating something if variable is not set

This is very important if our program relays on a certain vaiable: ${foo:?"foo not set!"}

Just check for the variable

${foo:+1} gives one if $foo is set, otherwise nothing.

ksh Regular Expressions

Ksh has its own regular expressions.
Use an * for any string. So to get all the files ending it .c use *.c.
A single character is represented with a ?. So all the files starting with any sign followed
bye 44.f can be fetched by: ?44.f.

Especially in ksh there are quantifiers for whole patterns:

?(pattern) matches zero or one times the pattern.

*(pattern) matches any time the pattern.
+(pattern) matches one or more time the pattern.
@(pattern) matches one time the pattern.
!(pattern) matches string without the pattern.
So one can question a string in a variable like: if [[ $var = fo@(?4*67).c ]];then ...

Functions
Description
A function (= procedure) must be defined before it is called, because ksh is interpreted at
run time.
It knows all the variables from the calling shell except the command line arguments. But
has it's own command line arguments so that one can call it with different values from
different places in the script. It has an exit status but cannot return a value like a c
function can.

Making a Function
One can make one in either of the following two ways:
function foo {
# commands...
}

foo(){
# commands...
}

Calling the Function

To call it just put it's name in the script: foo. To give it arguments do: foo arg1 arg2 ...
The arguments are there in the form of $1...$n and $* for all at once like in the main
code.
And the main $1 is not influenced bye the $1 of a particular function.

Return
The return statement exits the function immediately with the specified return value as an
exit status.

Data Redirection
General
Data redirection is done with the following signs: "> >> < <<". Every program has at
least a standardinput, standardoutput and standarderroroutput. All of these can be
redirected.

Command Output to File

For writing into a new file or for overwriting a file do: command > file
For appending to a file do: command >> file

Standard Error Redirection

To redirect the error output of a command, do: command 2> file
To discard the error altogether do: command 2>/dev/null
To put the error to the same location as the normal output do: command 2>&1

File into Command

If a program needs a file for input over standard input do: command < file

Combine Input and Output Redirection

command < infile > outfile
command < infile > outfile 2>/dev/null

Commands into Program ( Here Document )

Every unix command can take it's commands from a text like listing with:
command <<EOF
input1
input2
input3
EOF

From eof to eof all is fed into the above mentioned command.
 Pipes
For a serial processing of data from one command to the next do:
command1 | command2 | command3 ...
e.g. last | awk '{print $1}' | sort -u.

Co-processes
One can have one background process with which one can communicate with read -p and
print -p. It is started with command |&. If one uses: ksh |& then this shell in the
background will do everything for us even telnet and so on: print -p "telnet hostname".

Read Input from User and from Files

Read in a Variable
From a user we read with: read var. Then the users can type something in. One should
first print something like: print -n "Enter your favorite haircolor: ";read var; print "". The
-n suppresses the newline sign.

Read into a File Line for Line

To get each line of a file into a variable iteratively do:
{ while read myline;do
# process $myline
done } < filename
To catch the output of a pipeline each line at a time in a variable use:
last | sort | {
while read myline;do
# commands
done }

Special Variables
$# Number of arguments on command line.
$? Exit status of last command.
$$ Process id of current program.
$! Process id of last background job or background function.
$0 Program name including the path if started from another directory.
$1..n Command line arguments, each at a time.
$* All command line arguments in one string.

Action on Success or on Failure of a

Command
If one wants to do a thing only if a command succeeded then:
command1 && command2. If the second command has to be performed only if the first
one failed, then: command1 || command2.

Trivial Calculations
Simple calculations are done with either a "let" in front of it or within (( ... )). One can
increment a variable within the (( )) without a "$": (( a+=1 )) or let a+=1.

Numerical Calculations using "bc"

For bigger calculations one uses "bc" like: $result=$(print
"n=1;for(i=1;i<8;i++)n=i*n;n"|bc)
 "grep"
Search for the occurrence of a pattern in a file: grep 'pattern' file. If one just wants to
know how often something occurs in a file, then: grep -c 'pattern file. This can be used in
a script like:
if [[ $(grep -c 'pattern' file) != 0 ]];then ......;fi. The condition is fulfilled if the pattern was
found.

"sed"
Sed means stream line editor. It searches like grep, but is then able to replace the found
pattern. If you want to change all occurrences of "poor" with "rich", do: sed -e
's/poor/rich/g' filename. Or what is often seen in software packages, that have to be
compiled after getting a proper configuration, is a whole file stuffed with replacements
patterns like: /@foo@/s;;king;g. This file with innumerable lines like that has to be given
to sed with: sed -f sedscript filename. It then processes each line from file with all the sed
commands in the sed script. (Of course sed can do much more:-))

"awk"
Awk can find and process a found line with several tools: It can branch, loop, read from
files and also print out to files or to the screen, and it can do arithmetics.
For example: We have a file with lines like: Fred 300 45 70 but hundreds of them. But
some lines have a "#" as the first sign of them and we have to omit these ones for both,
processing and output. And we want to have lines as output like: 415 Fred where 415 is
the sum of 300, 45 and 70. Then we call on awk:
awk '$1 !~ /^#/ && $0 ~ /[^ ]/ {print $2+$3+$4,"\t",$1}' filename.
This ignores lines with a "#" at the beginning of the first field and also blank lines. It then
prints the desired sum and the $1 ist only printed after a tab. This is the most trivial use of
awk only.

"perl"
Perl is a much richer programming language then ksh, but still one can do perl commands
from within a ksh script. This might touch Randal, but it's true. Let's say you want to
remove all ^M from a file, then take perl for one line in your ksh script:
perl -i -ep 's/\015//g' filename.
Perl can do an infinite amount of things in many different ways. For anything bigger, use
perl instead of a shell script.