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Full Discussion: How do I pass a wild card as an argument
Top Forums UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers How do I pass a wild card as an argument Post 302112492 by eja on Wednesday 28th of March 2007 10:31:03 AM
Old 03-28-2007
How do I pass a wild card as a variable
Hi,

I would like to pass a wild card as part of an argument. But when I do it the script views the wild card as text.
Example:
sFile=MG1A*
sort $sFile > $sFile.sorted

What I get is MG1A*.sorted

The problem is I am passed a series of files where the first few characters like "MG1A" are constant. The additional part of the file name is a date time stamp. I will never know the exact date time stamp. I need to do a search for MG1A* which will find me one file. How can I write my script so the variable $sFile will know that the "*" in MG1A* is a wild card not text?

I know I can write code to run "ls" on a directory and get all file names then write a loop or do statement to do my sort based upon that list regardless of the file name. But I have more files in the dir than I want to grab. I also know I can run the "ls" command output the file names in the dir to a file and grep for the part fo the file names I am looking for. I also think this can be done if I pput the whole comamnd iBut current design restricts me form going that path. It would require a whole re-write and I am trying to avoid that.

Thank you.
Last edited by eja; 03-28-2007 at 11:37 AM..
 

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LEARN ABOUT REDHAT

unix2dos

unix2dos(1)						      General Commands Manual						       unix2dos(1)

NAME

       unix2dos - UNIX to DOS text file format converter

SYNOPSYS

       unix2dos [options] [-c convmode] [-o file ...] [-n infile outfile ...]

       Options:

       [-hkqV] [--help] [--keepdate] [--quiet] [--version]

DESCRIPTION

       This manual page documents unix2dos, the program that converts text files in UNIX format to DOS format.

OPTIONS

       The following options are available:

       -h --help
	      Print online help.

       -k --keepdate
	      Keep the date stamp of output file same as input file.

       -q --quiet
	      Quiet mode. Suppress all warning and messages.

       -V --version
	      Prints version information.

       -c --convmode convmode
	      Sets conversion mode. Simulates unix2dos under SunOS.

       -o --oldfile file ...
	      Old file mode. Convert the file and write output to it. The program default to run in this mode. Wildcard names may be used.

       -n --newfile infile outfile ...
	      New  file  mode.	Convert the infile and write output to outfile. File names must be given in pairs and wildcard names should NOT be
	      used or you WILL lost your files.

EXAMPLES

       Get input from stdin and write output to stdout.

	      unix2dos

       Convert and replace a.txt. Convert and replace b.txt.

	      unix2dos a.txt b.txt

	      unix2dos -o a.txt b.txt

       Convert and replace a.txt in ASCII conversion mode.  Convert and replace b.txt in ISO conversion mode.

	      unix2dos a.txt -c iso b.txt

	      unix2dos -c ascii a.txt -c iso b.txt

       Convert and replace a.txt while keeping original date stamp.

	      unix2dos -k a.txt

	      unix2dos -k -o a.txt

       Convert a.txt and write to e.txt.

	      unix2dos -n a.txt e.txt

       Convert a.txt and write to e.txt, keep date stamp of e.txt same as a.txt.

	      unix2dos -k -n a.txt e.txt

       Convert and replace a.txt. Convert b.txt and write to e.txt.

	      unix2dos a.txt -n b.txt e.txt

	      unix2dos -o a.txt -n b.txt e.txt

       Convert c.txt and write to e.txt. Convert and replace a.txt.  Convert and replace b.txt. Convert d.txt and write to f.txt.

	      unix2dos -n c.txt e.txt -o a.txt b.txt -n d.txt f.txt

DIAGNOSTICS

BUGS

       The program does not work properly under MSDOS in stdio processing mode.  If you know why is that so, please tell me.

AUTHOR

       Benjamin Lin - ( blin@socs.uts.edu.au )

MISCELLANY

       Tested environment:

	      Linux 1.2.0 with GNU C 2.5.8

	      SunOS 4.1.3 with GNU C 2.6.3

	      MS-DOS 6.20 with Borland C++ 4.02

       Suggestions and bug reports are welcome.

SEE ALSO

       dos2unix(1)

1995.03.31							   unix2dos v2.2						       unix2dos(1)
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