Thanks for all the help....here what I happened on and got it to work:
if [ "$#" != "1" ]; then
cnt=10
printf "is blank\n"
else
cnt=$1
printf "is not blank\n"
fi
Basically it is checking arguments and if there is not one only, it is
considered blank.
Thanks again,
Mike
On Sat, May 17, 2008 at 4:11 PM, Dylan William Hardison <dylan@hardison.net>
wrote:
> Spake Michael Fisher on Saturday, May 17, 2008 at 01:13PM -0400:
> > I am learning to do some bash programming on my new EmperorLinux lenovo
> T61
> > (prideful plug) and am having a problem in attempting to determine if an
> > argument was included when the bash file was started. I can perform a
> printf
> > statement and it prints whatever I add as an argument but I am attempting
> to
> > do an 'if/then' statement.
>
> Notes for the test command ('[ .... ]')
>
> 1 -eq is numeric equality, not string equality.
> Use "=" (and sometimes ==, depending on shell) for string equality.
> (If you ever learn perl, remember that it's the opposite.)
>
> 2) -z returns true if a string is empty
>
> 3) -n is the logical negation of -z
>
> 4) use [[ ]] instead of [ ], as the former handles empty strings in a more
> sane way
>
> 5) variables can be assigned a default value, like so: var=${1:-"default
> value"}
>
> 6) It's irrelevant, but someone mentioned to quote "$1", that's a good
> idea.
> Bash and similar shells expand variables in a really moronic way:
> foo="one two three"
> echo $foo
> ## echo gets three arguments, not one
> echo "$foo"
> ## echo gets one argument.
>
> (my login shell, zsh, however, always treats $foo as a single argument --
> unless
> it's an array.)
>
>
> --
> He who knows not and knows that he knows not is ignorant. Teach him.
> He who knows not and knows not that he knows not is a fool. Shun him.
> He who knows and knows not that he knows is asleep. Wake him.
> -
> GPG Fingerprint: 412C CCE9 DDA2 4FE9 C34F 754B 0863 0EA6 712E BBE1
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