Book Image

Mastering Linux Shell Scripting - Second Edition

By : Mokhtar Ebrahim, Andrew Mallett
5 (1)
Book Image

Mastering Linux Shell Scripting - Second Edition

5 (1)
By: Mokhtar Ebrahim, Andrew Mallett

Overview of this book

In this book, you’ll discover everything you need to know to master shell scripting and make informed choices about the elements you employ. Grab your favorite editor and start writing your best Bash scripts step by step. Get to grips with the fundamentals of creating and running a script in normal mode, and in debug mode. Learn about various conditional statements' code snippets, and realize the power of repetition and loops in your shell script. You will also learn to write complex shell scripts. This book will also deep dive into file system administration, directories, and system administration like networking, process management, user authentications, and package installation and regular expressions. Towards the end of the book, you will learn how to use Python as a BASH Scripting alternative. By the end of this book, you will know shell scripts at the snap of your fingers and will be able to automate and communicate with your system with keyboard expressions.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)

Significant whitespace

A major difference between Python and most other languages is that additional whitespace can mean something. The indent level of your code defines the block of code to which it belongs. So far, we have not indented the code we have created past the start of the line. This means that all of the code is at the same indent level and belongs to the same code block. Rather than using brace brackets or the do and done keywords to define the code block, we use indents. If we indent with two or four spaces or even tabs, then we must stick to those spaces or tabs. When we return to the previous indent level, we return to the previous code block.

This seems complex but it is really quite simple and keeps your code clean and uncluttered. If we edit the arg.py file to prevent unwelcomed errors, if an argument is not supplied, we can see this in action:

#!/usr/bin/python3...