When are quotes required in a configuration file?

NotionCommotion · 04-12-2014, 06:46 AM

My /etc/sysconfig/network-scripts/ifcfg-eth0 file looks like the following. How do I determine if quotes are required? For instance, IPV6INIT is set to yes, and IPV6_AUTOCONF is set to "yes". Thank you

Code:

DEVICE=eth0
BOOTPROTO=none
HWADDR=88:51:fb:51:df:70
IPV6INIT=yes
IPV6_AUTOCONF="yes"
NM_CONTROLLED=yes
ONBOOT=yes
TYPE=Ethernet
UUID="3785eaeb-542f-4d1b-989c-5580a314a59f"
IPADDR=192.168.0.200
NETMASK=255.255.255.0
GATEWAY=192.168.0.1
USERCTL=no
DNS2=8.8.4.4
DNS1=8.8.8.8

Madhu Desai · 04-12-2014, 07:45 AM

You don't have to put quotes. its just a personal preference.

NotionCommotion · 04-12-2014, 08:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mddesai

You don't have to put quotes. its just a personal preference.

Thanks mdesai. No exceptions? Is it considered good or bad practice to always include quotes?

Madhu Desai · 04-12-2014, 09:55 AM

Unless there are multiple parameters, quotes are not necessary.
Interface Configuration Files

NotionCommotion · 04-12-2014, 10:04 AM

Thank you

sgosnell · 04-12-2014, 10:14 AM

It reallly depends on the conf file. Each program is free to decide how to parse its config files. Sometimes you need quotes if there are spaces or any other non-alpha characters in the string. Sometimes not. The only way to know for sure is to read the man pages for the package.

NotionCommotion · 04-12-2014, 11:01 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by sgosnell

It reallly depends on the conf file. Each program is free to decide how to parse its config files. Sometimes you need quotes if there are spaces or any other non-alpha characters in the string. Sometimes not. The only way to know for sure is to read the man pages for the package.

One in particular I was having problems with was wpa_supplicant. I see how I can do both "man wpa_supplicant" as well as "man wpa_supplicant.conf". They don't explicitly address quotes, but sometimes show quotes around a string in their examples. Do you typically base whether quotes are required based on an example in the man page?

jpollard · 04-12-2014, 12:14 PM

In this particular instance, the "configuration file" is/used to be a shell script included, so quoting rules follow the requirements of the shell script. You can get REALLY creative with that.

Now that NetworkManager is supposed to do everything it might not be a shell script interpreting it.

NotionCommotion · 04-12-2014, 05:44 PM

Don't know how really creative I wish to get right now

Slightly off topic but what about caps? Is yes and YES and "yes" and "YES" and 'yes' and 'YES' and Yes and 'Yes' and "Yes" typically the same?

chrism01 · 04-12-2014, 09:09 PM

No

For one thing, Linux is case sensitive by default, for cmd, params, filenames etc etc.
However, a programmer can choose to be case insensitive when accepting arguments; fairly normal when accepting Yy/Nn and other variations on yes/no.

As above, quotes are 'usual' if a single arg can have eg spaces in it.
Check bash quoting https://www.gnu.org/software/bash/ma...le-Quotes.html for side effects of single (' ') vs double (" ") quotes.