Login or Register to Ask a Question and Join Our Community

Sponsored Content
Full Discussion: Test -e not working as expected (by me)
Top Forums UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users Test -e not working as expected (by me) Post 302938028 by bakunin on Wednesday 11th of March 2015 11:55:00 AM
Old 03-11-2015
Quote:
Originally Posted by rbatte1
Consider testing for a link instead:-
Code:
$ if [ -L b ]

See my first post above, i know that. The question is: why does "-e" work like it does and: is the POSIX documentation buggy there? According to the definition of "file" it should work like this:

if "file" exists and:
- is a regular file, "-f" will return TRUE
- is a block special file "-b" will return TRUE
- is a directory "-d" will return TRUE
...etc. analogously for "-c", "-h", "L", "-p", ...

and "-e" should return TRUE if any one of the above return TRUE.

bakunin
 

10 More Discussions You Might Find Interesting

1. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

test:argument expected

Hi all, I am getting "test:argument expected" error in the following script LOGDIR=$XXAR_TOP/log PROGRAM_NAME=XXAR_GPS_LBFDMSGEN .. .. .. Check_Errors() { sqllogfile=$1 cd ${LOGDIR} countfile=${LOGDIR}/${PROGRAM_NAME}.tmp echo "countfile is " $countfile >> $LOGFILE echo... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: rrs
4 Replies

2. Shell Programming and Scripting

test: argument expected

Can someone help me with a very simple query I have the following script: #!/bin/sh VAR1="" if then VAR1="Message" fi echo $VAR1 put when i run it i get the following error test_job.sh: test: argument expected (5 Replies)
Discussion started by: andy202
5 Replies

3. Shell Programming and Scripting

test: argument expected

I'm newbie to coding script so i found test: argument expected when i run it. please help me a=`df -k |awk '{print $5 }'|egrep "(100%|%)"|cut -d"%" -f1|tail -1` if then df -k|egrep "(100%|%)"|awk '{print $1,$5,$6}' else echo "No disk capacity more than 80%" fi thk in advance (7 Replies)
Discussion started by: unitipon
7 Replies

4. Shell Programming and Scripting

test: argument expected

+ test.sh: test: argument expected #!/bin/bash if then echo thennnn else echo elseeee fi why does it show this error? Clearly from debug mode, the argument is passed. I also tried if Run on Solaris 9. Thanks (10 Replies)
Discussion started by: lalelle
10 Replies

5. Shell Programming and Scripting

crontab test argument expected

Hello folks, I've got this script which runs perfectly when i run it manually. But when i am running it from a crontab i am getting an error saying test argument expected. The line from where it is coming is something like this: if then do something fi Any idea why? (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: King Nothing
2 Replies

6. Shell Programming and Scripting

Test: argument expected.

Hi, Since i am new to Unix and on suggestion on some smart guys on unix... i have decide to learn more deeply on Unix...so i was kind of playing with if statements and found this error... though i tried to correct is for hours now i couldnt find whats wrong in my loop. if then ... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: bhagya2340
4 Replies

7. Shell Programming and Scripting

test: argument expected

# to search a file if it exists and whether its readable or not # if yes print its first 5 lines echo enter the filename to be searched read fname if #-d $fname then echo file doesn exists elif then echo its a directory elif then cat $fname else echo its not readable fi # end of... (9 Replies)
Discussion started by: gotam
9 Replies

8. Shell Programming and Scripting

error : test: argument expected

Hello all, I am trying to figure out why i am getting an error while executing the script...altought it seems like its work...but still get the test arguement error...any help would be appericiate...this script basically connects to any oracle db ( just have to pass db name to it)... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: abdul.irfan2
4 Replies

9. Shell Programming and Scripting

Error- test: argument expected

check_build_info_table() { if then export build_info_table=`sqlplus -s sna/dbmanager <<! set pagesize 0 heading off feedback off SELECT DISTINCT TABLE_NAME FROM ALL_TABLES WHERE OWNER = 'XYZ' AND TABLE_NAME = 'MY_TABLE'; exit !` ... (3 Replies)
Discussion started by: ambarginni
3 Replies

10. Shell Programming and Scripting

Test: argument expected

The following example prompts are passed into the shell script. $1 = /tmp/dir/ $2 = varies (test.txt, test1.txt, test2.txt...) $3 = test_YYYYMMDD.txt --------------------------------------------------------------------------- #!/bin/sh cd $1 if ; then if ; then ... (3 Replies)
Discussion started by: smkremer
3 Replies

LEARN ABOUT HPUX

symlink

symlink(4)						     Kernel Interfaces Manual							symlink(4)

NAME

       symlink - symbolic link

DESCRIPTION

       A symbolic (or soft ) link is a file whose name indirectly refers (points) to a relative or absolute path name.

       During  path  name  interpretation,  a symbolic link to a relative path name is expanded to the path name being interpreted, and a symbolic
       link to an absolute path name is replaced with the path name being interpreted.

       Thus, given the path name

	      If is a symbolic link to a relative path name such as the path name is interpreted as

	      If is a symbolic link to an absolute path name such as the path name is interpreted as

       All symbolic links are interpreted in this manner, with one exception: when the symbolic link is the last component of a path name,  it	is
       passed  as  a  parameter  to  one of the system calls: or (see readlink(2), rename(2), symlink(2), unlink(2), chown(2) and lstat(2)).  With
       these calls, the symbolic link, itself, is accessed or affected.

       Unlike normal (hard) links, a symbolic link can refer to any arbitrary path name and can span different logical devices (volumes).

       The path name can be that of any type of file (including a directory or another symbolic link), and may be invalid if no such  path  exists
       in  the	system.   (It is possible to make symbolic links point to themselves or other symbolic links in such a way that they form a closed
       loop.  The system detects this situation by limiting the number of symbolic links it traverses while translating a path name.)

       The mode and ownership of a symbolic link is ignored by the system, which means that affects the actual file, but not the  file	containing
       the symbolic link (see chmod(1)).

       Symbolic links can be created using or (see ln(1) and symlink(2)).

AUTHOR

       was developed by HP and the University of California, Berkeley.

SEE ALSO

       cp(1), symlink(2), readlink(2), link(2), stat(2), mknod(1M).

																	symlink(4)
All times are GMT -4. The time now is 04:30 PM.
Unix & Linux Forums Content Copyright 1993-2022. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy