Shell Programming and Scripting

Ah.

Try cat instead of su and you'll see what's happening.

Code:

$ cat <<EOF
export var2=345
echo "var0 is $var0"
echo "var1 is $var1"
echo "var2 is $var2"
EOF

export var2=345
echo "var0 is "
echo "Var1 is "
echo "var2 is "

$

Your variables are getting substituted too soon.

Try <<"EOF" The quotes make it take the contents inside the here-doc entirely literally. No substitution.

The script in post #10 would be much better as:

Code:

cat "${SRCDIR}/install.control" | grep -v "^#" | while read filestring
do
        echo "FILESTRING=${filestring}"
done

Never use a for loop for open-ended lists.
Third time this week I have seen the "cat and for" combination but I have still never seen this construct in a manual or course notes.


Still thinking about your main question because it is virtually impossible to work out what is intended from faulty code. So, general answer only:

What I usually do is the following construct:
1) Create the script "scriptname" which you want to run and make it accept parameters ($1 $2 $3 ...) and convert those parameters to the Environment Variable names required by the installation script. Ensure that the Environment Variables are exported.

2) Run the script from the su command line, complete with the parameters.

Code:

su username -c "scriptname param1 param2 param3"

I'd only execute su - if I really wanted to execute the other user's profile. I'd rather set all the Environment Variables I need in the script itself.

Hope this helps.

Addendum: If you need to pass parameters back to the calling script, echo the parameters from the sub script and read them:

Code:

su username -c "scriptname param1 param2 param3" |  read subscript_param1 subscript_param2 subscript_param3

This will only work if you deal with absolutely all other output from the called script by redirection to logfiles or whatever.