Shell Programming and Scripting

Hi,

I am using bash script

I want some help in handling loops in my script...

I need to check for a specific interval of time whether a file in a paritcular directory exists. If exists, i need to do some action and continue with the next iteration..

//my script

attempt=0
totalattempts=2

until [ $attempt -gt `expr $totalattempts - 1`]
do
i=0
until [ $i -gt ${#input[@]} -1 ]
do

if [ -f ${input[i]}/out.txt ]; then
//blah blah blah

continue

else
sleep 60
fi
done
done


Say my input array contains test1, test2, test3,test4...etc

Now i have to loop to check for the out.txt in the ${input[i]} directory.If out.txt is found in a particular directory, i shuould not check that directory the next time.

For example If test2/out.txt is found in my first attempt, i should be continuing with checking only test1/out.txt, test3/out.txt for the next consecutive attempts.
I should avoid checking test1/out.txt.

I am not sure how to handle that....Can anyone please help?

Thanks in adv

It's a bit kludgey, but you could always append the value to a temporary file if it exists, and check that next time round

e.g. your code segment

Code:

if [ -f ${input[i]}/out.txt ]; then
//blah blah blah

continue

else
sleep 60
fi

could be changed to

Code:

if [ -f ${input[i]}/out.txt ]; then

   grep "${input[i]}" tempfile >/dev/null 2>&1

   if [ "$?" -ne 0 ]; then  # it isn't in tempfile, so
      # append the filename to the tempfile so its avoided
      # next time around
      echo "${input[i]}" >> tempfile
      # do processing here so it's only processed the first
      # time its encountered
   fi

   continue

else
   sleep 60
fi

Remember to rm the tempfile when it's no longer needed, and set up a trap, etc.

Just an idea

Cheers
ZB