Scripting & Arrays : How to fill an array with filenames which consist of spaces?

klss · 01-15-2009, 04:20 AM

Hi folks.

I have a problem with spaces-in-filenames and array fields.

I can't get the fields properly defined if I e.g. do this:

Code:

#!/bin/bash

directory=$1

arraytmp=/dev/shm/arraytmp

ls -1 "$directory"| while read K ; do 
echo "$K" >> $arraytmp 
done

files=( $(cat "$arraytmp") )

cnt=${#files[@]}

for (( I = 0 ; I < cnt ; I++ )) ; do
echo ${files[${I}]}
done

What am I doing wrong here?

THX again

zer0x333 · 01-15-2009, 05:23 AM

Hi,

I would change the bash IFS (Internal Field Seperator - man bash). I am probably doing it totally wrong here, but it works!

Can anyone can tell me the best way to specify newline here?

Code:

#!/bin/bash
IFS="

"
<rest of script>

Cheers,
zer0x

klss · 01-15-2009, 12:05 PM

In fact -- below seems to work.

THX a lot. I need to check it out a bit further.

Quote:

OLDIFS=$IFS
IFS=$'\n'
files=( $(ls -1 "$file") )
IFS=$OLDIFS

klss · 01-18-2009, 09:51 AM

Hi folks.

I need to extent "spaces" to other weired characters.
Something like '`!:" can also cause problems. Quite obvious - isn't it.
I guess you guys know the cddb filenames!

Any ideas?

Below is another interesting solution, I found, how to handle spaces without fiddling around with IFS. I am wondering if I should try to
apply this. Are there similar expression such as [[:space:]]
for the other weired characters?

THX again.

Code:

list=$(ls -1 | sed -e s/[[:space:]]/SP/g )
for file in $list
do
file=$(echo $file | sed -e s/SP/\ /g)
echo $file
done

chrism01 · 01-18-2009, 11:35 PM

http://www.mkssoftware.com/docs/man5/regexp.5.asp

jschiwal · 01-19-2009, 12:16 AM

Post #5 won't work because you are adding the spaces back too soon. You could read in the array with the "SP" characters, and then iterate through the array converting SP to spaces.

You could substitute a non-printing character instead. In the shell you can insert control characters by pressing [CTRL-v] just before it. Just don't use one that would cause a problem like CTRL-D which will exit the shell.