#!/bin/bash OPTIONS="Hello Quit" select opt in $OPTIONS; do if [ "$opt" = "Quit" ]; then echo done exit elif [ "$opt" = "Hello" ]; then echo Hello World else clear echo bad option fi done
If you run this script you'll see that it is a programmer's dream for text based menus. You'll probably notice that it's very similar to the 'for' construction, only rather than looping for each 'word' in $OPTIONS, it prompts the user.
#!/bin/bash if [ -z "$1" ]; then echo usage: $0 directory exit fi SRCD=$1 TGTD="/var/backups/" OF=home-$(date +%Y%m%d).tgz tar -cZf $TGTD$OF $SRCD
What this script does should be clear to you. The expression in the first conditional tests if the program has received an argument ($1) and quits if it didn't, showing the user a little usage message. The rest of the script should be clear at this point.