Hi there,

I'm trying to write a bash script. Most of it has gone fine, but I need
to get the full filename of a command line argument.

For example, if the user types:

myscript bob.txt

in the directory /home/al, I need /home/al/bob.txt. Similarly if they
type myscript ../../etc/bob.txt or /usr/share/bob.txt etc.

I know I can use dirname and pwd, but I it would be quite messy to deal
with situations like:

cd /home/al/documents
myscript ../../someoneelse/test/bob.txt

as from dirname and pwd I'd get
/home/al/documents/../../someoneelse/test/bob.txt instead of
/home/someoneelse/test/bob.txt

Can anyone give me any hints as to how to get round this please?

Many thanks in advance,

Al

On Thu, 20 Nov 2003 at 11:55 GMT, A. S. Budden wrote:
file=../../someoneelse/test/bob.txt

fullpath=$(cd ${file%/*} && echo "$PWD/${file##*/}")

--
Chris F.A. Johnson http://cfaj.freeshell.org
================================================== =================
My code (if any) in this post is copyright 2003, Chris F.A. Johnson
and may be copied under the terms of the GNU General Public License

"A. S. Budden" <newsreader.mail@totalise.co.uk> wrote:
This will give you the path without the "../../"

DIRNAME=$(cd $(dirname "$1") && pwd)

Hence, your myscript file might look like this:

#!/bin/bash
#

echo "Command line arg: \"${1}\""

BASENAME=$(basename "${1}")
DIRNAME=$(cd $(dirname "${1}") && pwd)

echo "Directory: ${DIRNAME}"
echo "Full path: ${DIRNAME}${BASENAME}"


--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@barrow.com

Thus spake Chris F.A. Johnson:
Thanks! This works. I had to make a small alteration, so I thought I'd
post it here for anyone else's benefit. My programming is a bit weak,
so sorry if this is a naff solution. Deals with the situation where the
file is in the current working directory e.g. myscript bob.txt

incwd=`echo $filearg | sed 's#.*/.*#no#'`
if [ "$incwd" = "no" ]
then
fname=$(cd ${filearg%/*} && echo "$PWD/${filearg##*/}")
else
fname=$PWD/$filearg
fi

"A. S. Budden" <newsreader.mail@totalise.co.uk> wrote:
fname="$(cd $(dirname "${filearg}") && pwd)/$(basename "${filearg}")"

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@barrow.com

Thus spake Floyd Davidson:
That's a very neat solution! Thank you.

Al

On Thu, 20 Nov 2003 at 14:35 GMT, A. S. Budden wrote:
Theres no need for an external command (sed):

case $file in
*/*) fname=$(cd ${filearg%/*} && echo "$PWD/${filearg##*/}") ;;
*) fname=$PWD/$filearg ;;
esac

--
Chris F.A. Johnson http://cfaj.freeshell.org
================================================== =================
My code (if any) in this post is copyright 2003, Chris F.A. Johnson
and may be copied under the terms of the GNU General Public License

"A. S. Budden" <newsreader.mail@totalise.co.uk> wrote:
Yeah, but I blew it. That last line should read

echo "Full path: ${DIRNAME}/${BASENAME}"

with a / between the directory name and the basename.

--
Floyd L. Davidson <http://web.newsguy.com/floyd_davidson>
Ukpeagvik (Barrow, Alaska) floyd@barrow.com

Thus spake Floyd Davidson:
Yes, I realised this, about 5 seconds after I'd sent my post!

Thanks again,

Al