#!/bin/ksh
# Usage: tryme string1 string2 [stringX stringX+1]...
# DESCRIPTION:
#       The tryme utility will demonstrate the use of the split2() shell
#       function by calling it twice for each pair of operands supplied.  It
#       then reports whether each pair of characters in the corresponding
#       strings match.
split2() {
# Usage: split2 arrray_name string
# DESCRIPTION:
#       The split2 function will split string into 2 character pairs and assign
#       those pairs to elements of the array specified by array_name with
#       subscripts starting with 1.  If string consists of an odd number of
#       characters, the last element assigned to the array will only contain
#       one character.
        s2_tmp2=1
        for((s2_tmp1 = 0; s2_tmp1 < ${#2}; s2_tmp1 += 2))
        do
                eval $1[$s2_tmp2]=${2:$s2_tmp1:2}
                s2_tmp2=$((s2_tmp2 + 1))
        done
}
while [ $# -ge 2 ]
do
        printf "Processing %s and %s\n" "$1" "$2"
        split2 v1 "$1"
        split2 v2 "$2"
        if [ ${#v1[@]} -ge ${#v2[@]} ]
        then    m=${#v1[@]}
        else    m=${#v2[@]}
        fi
        for((i = 1; i <= m; i++))
        do      printf "v1[%d]=%s, v2[%d]=%s\n" $i "${v1[$i]}" $i "${v2[$i]}"
                if [[ "X${v1[$i]}" == "X${v2[$i]}" ]]
                then    printf "v1[%d] is the same as v2[%d]\n" $i $i
                else    printf "v1[%d] is not the same as v2[%d]\n" $i $i
                fi
        done
        shift 2
done

tryme excellency exbeuukknn 12345 abc

Processing excellency and exbeuukknn
v1[1]=ex, v2[1]=ex
v1[1] is the same as v2[1]
v1[2]=ce, v2[2]=be
v1[2] is not the same as v2[2]
v1[3]=ll, v2[3]=uu
v1[3] is not the same as v2[3]
v1[4]=en, v2[4]=kk
v1[4] is not the same as v2[4]
v1[5]=cy, v2[5]=nn
v1[5] is not the same as v2[5]
Processing 12345 and abc
v1[1]=12, v2[1]=ab
v1[1] is not the same as v2[1]
v1[2]=34, v2[2]=c
v1[2] is not the same as v2[2]
v1[3]=5, v2[3]=
v1[3] is not the same as v2[3]