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Shell Programming and Scripting

Should I learn bash scripting or is it going obsolete?

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Top Forums Shell Programming and Scripting Should I learn bash scripting or is it going obsolete?
# 8  
Old 10-30-2010
Quote:
Originally Posted by Corona688
This question is almost too good: "Hm... I could go to unix.com and ask whether a fundamental underpinning of UNIX systems is obsolete and should give forth before the windows brigade... Eh, a bit too obvious. I know -- ask that about an unusual shell, one that divides the community, in a manner that suggests I believe it's all shell scripting! The nerd rage will be hysterical!"

I'll be generous and assume you're not trolling. Is BASH obsolete? No. Is it for the things you use C# or Python for? Also no.

Scripting is somewhere between difficult and useless on a Windows machine because there are so many unscriptables(awkward, undocumented, or impossible). A program as simple as "cdrecord -dao cd_image.iso && /sbin/poweroff" (i.e. burn a cd, then turn off the computer) in UNIX might, in Windows, need an entire development environment, plus peering into undocumented OLE hell to figure out how (if at all!) your favorite CD burning program tells the computer whether burning completed successfully. Ever had to type in the same thing, or closely related things, 37 seperate times? Ever had to repetitively copy/paste data from one program into another because you can't just tell one to read from the other? Ever had to sit and wait for the computer to finish just so you can tell it to do something you wanted it to do all along? That's the kind of automatic tasks shell scripting and pipes are for. They join entire programs together at a very high level, if they're equipped to communicate that way; most UNIX programs are, most Windows ones aren't.

You should learn shell scripting, not just "bash scripting". BASH is just one shell. Learn how to program in a general Bourne shell and you can program in BASH, SH, and KSH the same way, and know what features BASH has and SH doesn't.
wait so you cant use python within linux to substitute shell scripting? i wasnt referring to windows at all...
# 9  
Old 10-31-2010
Quote:
Originally Posted by KalEl
wait so you cant use python within linux to substitute shell scripting?
Python is not a shell, no.

You can use pipes in Python, much the same way you use pipes in C -- doing everything yourself, creating processes and creating pipes and redirecting file descriptors explicitly all the time, step by painful step.

Python has instead become a twelve-ton all-singing all-dancing do-everything language with every possible feature nailed to the side so you theoretically don't need an efficient way to use anything outside Python, with the side-effect that it opens hundreds of files to do nothing at all, much like Perl, Java, and .Net have done. It even has expansion modules to just call a proper UNIX shell.
Last edited by Corona688; 10-31-2010 at 02:42 PM..
# 10  
Old 10-31-2010
Quote:
Originally Posted by Corona688
Is it capable of interacting with a program that doesn't have the special hooks to do so?
yes, of course.
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