Login or Register to Ask a Question and Join Our Community


Shell Programming and Scripting

Why doesn't piping ls to cd work if there's only one directory?

Login to Discuss or Reply to this Discussion in Our Community

 
Thread Tools Search this Thread
Top Forums Shell Programming and Scripting Why doesn't piping ls to cd work if there's only one directory?
# 1  
Old 08-10-2011
Question Why doesn't piping ls to cd work if there's only one directory?
Hey guys. If I'm in a directory with only one directory, for example:
Code:
foo@bar:/$ ls
really-complicated-or-long-dir-name

Why wouldn't piping this single line of output into cd work?
Code:
foo@bar:/$ ls | cd

I'm just getting started with the shell and I was trying to navigate into a directory with a long and complicated name. I've since learned about the tab autocompletion (which is awesome), but I'm still interested in the mechanics of why this situation doesn't work.

Any ideas?
# 2  
Old 08-10-2011
Because cd is in a subshell. It cd's in the subshell and then exits that subshell. It might work in ksh
*edit* Eh .. no it doesn't probably cd does not read stdin...
Last edited by Scrutinizer; 08-10-2011 at 02:34 PM..
Login or Register to Ask a Question

Previous Thread | Next Thread

10 More Discussions You Might Find Interesting

1. Shell Programming and Scripting

-ne 0 doesn't work -le does

Hi, I am using korn shell. until ] do echo "\$# = " $# echo "$1" shift done To the above script, I passed 2 parameters and the program control doesn't enter inside "until" loop. If I change it to until ] then it does work. Why numeric comparison is not working with -ne and works... (3 Replies)
Discussion started by: ab_2010
3 Replies

2. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Why doesn't this work?

find . -name "05_scripts" -type d -exec mv -f {}/'*.aep\ Logs' {}/.LogFiles \; Returns this failure: mv: rename ./019_0120_WS_WH_gate_insideTEST/05_scripts/*.aep\ Logs to ./019_0120_WS_WH_gate_insideTEST/05_scripts/.LogFiles/*.aep\ Logs: No such file or directory I don't know why it's trying... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: scribling
4 Replies

3. Shell Programming and Scripting

My if statement doesn't work why?

I have the following and for some reason I can't have two options together. I mean if I choose -u and -p it won't work... why? #!/bin/bash resetTime=1 mytotalTime=0 totalHour=0 totalMin=0 averagemem=0 finalaverage=0 times=0 function usage() { cat << EOF USAGE: $0 file EOF } (10 Replies)
Discussion started by: bashily
10 Replies

4. Shell Programming and Scripting

my script doesn't work :(

i have this script and when i ejecute it, the console tell me this " sintax error line 41 unexpected element "}" " is the sintaxis ok? #!/bin/bash if ;then { exit 0; } if ; then { sudo /etc/init.d/apache2 start; sudo /etc/init.d/mysql start; php5 & nautilus... (3 Replies)
Discussion started by: keiserx
3 Replies

5. Shell Programming and Scripting

Lipo doesn't work

Hi guys, Am using lipo to merge ppc and i386 version of a static/dylib file based on "file type to load". I am working on Mac OS 10.5.6 and new to shell scripting. Please help me out. This is my code. echo "This file combine ppc and i386 file to form universal library" echo "source... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: vishwesh
4 Replies

6. Shell Programming and Scripting

for loop doesn't work

I have a script which uses below for loop: for (( i = 0 ; i <= 5; i++ )) do echo "Welcome $i times" done But when I run the script, it gives error message: Syntex Error : Bad for loop variable Can anyone guide to run it? Thanks in advance. (10 Replies)
Discussion started by: naw_deepak
10 Replies

7. UNIX for Advanced & Expert Users

Problem: Automounting Home directory for nis & nfs configuration doesn't work

Hi all, First of all, i am so sorry about my bad level in English writing. I have some problem in linux and i hope the experts of this forum to help me if they have enough time to reply to me. I have a scenario of configuring NIS and NFS in Redhat Linux environment such that user can login... (0 Replies)
Discussion started by: pioneer
0 Replies

8. Shell Programming and Scripting

ls -d doesn't work on Solaris

Hello, the ls -d command to only list directories in a directory doesn't seem to work on Solaris and the man command says to use that combination: ls -d Anyone have the same problem and find a resolve? Thanks BobK (9 Replies)
Discussion started by: bobk544
9 Replies

9. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Script doesn't work, but commands inside work

Howdie everyone... I have a shell script RemoveFiles.sh Inside this file, it only has two commands as below: rm -f ../../reportToday/temp/* rm -f ../../report/* My problem is that when i execute this script, nothing happened. Files remained unremoved. I don't see any error message as it... (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: cheongww
2 Replies

10. Shell Programming and Scripting

Why doesn't this work?

cat .servers | while read LINE; do ssh jason@$LINE $1 done exit 1 ./command.ksh "ls -l ~jason" Why does this ONLY iterate on the first server in the list? It's not doing the command on all the servers in the list, what am I missing? Thanks! JP (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: jpeery
2 Replies
Login or Register to Ask a Question