Quote:

Originally Posted by praveen.1 This is my shell script... test.sh DIRECTORY=/XYZ/PQR if [ -f $DIRECTORY/TTT/* ]; then echo "In test.." else echo "lno.." fi when i run this script through a putty its output is: ./test.sh: line 2: [: too many arguments lno..

If the wildcard expands to more than one file, you will get that error.

Use a function instead:

Code:

is_file () 
{ 
    for f in "$@";
    do
        [ -f "$f" ] && return;
    done;
    return 1
}

if is_file "$DIRECTORY"/TTT/*; then
...

There there's something wrong with plink (whatever that is), or you are using it in a situation where the wildcard doesn't expand to more than one file.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smiling Dragon [ -f * ] is generally something to avoid.

Not generally: always.

Unless there is exactly one matching file, the result will always be wrong (a syntax error, or a false positive).

Quote:

Originally Posted by praveen.1 if i add the interperet explicitly then its working fine.. #!/bin/sh DIRECTORY=/XYZ/PQR if [ -f $DIRECTORY/TTT/* ]; then echo "In test.." else echo "lno.." fi This works fine..

That will not work fine unless there is exactly one file that matches the pattern.

That is wrong in any and all shells.

Have you tried it on an empty directory?

Have you tried it on a directory containing more than one file?

If will also not be fine if $DIRECTORY contains whitespace.

See the is_file function I posted earlier.