Dear Ed,
try to load the page without inputting your log. You will see advertisement of linux biooks, when of them is BasicShellScripting. Try with this one.
For debugging use
Code:
set -x
.....
your code here
....
set +x
Your knowledge of C/C++/c# will let you to understand quickly unary operators, boolean, conditionals and looping. You just need to learn another way to say the same.
Regards,
M