[SOLVED] which command replaces executable with output
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I am trying to run a program that needs to call several other programs, but the which command at the beginning damages the executables it tries to call.
I get the same issue if I run "which" straight from the command line:
Code:
$ which samtools > ~/samtools-0.1.18/samtools
Doing this erases the samtools executable and replaces it with the which command output (/usr/bin/samtools) in a text file of the same name.
I get this result when running it on VMware Ubuntu 11.10 32 bit and also when running it on Ubuntu 12.10 64 bit. The error occurs with calling "which" on other programs as well, not just the example above.
The command in your first post is doing exactly what you're telling it to do. It redirects the output of "which samtools" into the file "~/samtools-0.1.18/samtools". If that file already exists, then it gets overwritten by whatever is being output by "which samtools". That's what the ">" operator does.
The command in post #4 is simply checking whether "which samtools" exited successfully or with an error, and the output is being redirected to /dev/null since you don't care about it.
These are two very different commands. I'm still not sure what it is you're trying to do here, but from what I can tell the computer is doing exactly what you're telling it to do. In other words, PEBKAC.
If you tell us what you're trying to do, then we can tell you what you're doing wrong.
Last edited by suicidaleggroll; 03-26-2013 at 11:34 AM.
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