Shell Programming and Scripting

Hi,
I am using shell (#!/bin/bash), i am trying to set my date in a script date.sh, i want this dates to be used by another scripts.

I have tried to make:
#!/bin/bash
begin_date =`date +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`,

i also tried:
#!/bin/bash
begin_date =20080709 12:14:11, then i write in other script the date as ($begin_date), but it always gives me begin_date : command not found!

I would like to write the date as numbers like date = 20080721 12:14:11 and then the other script should read it.
I think it should be simple, please can you help me how i can assign this date and time and how i should call it from my other scripts?

Thank you in advance.

Try exporting begin_date

You need to export the variable if you want it to be available to the child shells. Change your date.sh script as

Code:

#!/bin/bash
begin_date =`date +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`
export begin_date

Hi,
it still giving me begin_date: command not found.
here is how i changed in date.sh :

#!/bin/bash
begin_date =`date +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`
export begin_date

i want to change the date from script to script, so i am tryingto make this script to change the date manually, from today to next month etc... i would like to set like 3 variables for example:
begin_date1 = 2008-07-07_11:12:12 (sysdate)
begin_date2 = 2008_08-08 14:13:34 (next month)
etc ...

How are you calling the date.sh script from the other scripts? Can you please post that. I tried the following and it worked:

The following is the date.sh script. Please note that there is no export command in this:

Code:

#!/bin/sh
begin_date=`date +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`

The following is prog1.sh where I want to use the begin_date variable. I have sourced the date.sh script in the prog1.sh script:

Code:

#!/bin/sh
# Source the date.sh script
. ./date.sh
echo $begin_date

Now when I execute prog1.sh as follows:

Code:

$ ./prog1.sh
2008_07_07_16_18_18

Just for clarification, the leading "." in line no 3 in prog1.sh is for sourcing a script within another script, and the ./date.sh is to specify that the date.sh is in the current directory (the same directory where the prog1.sh is located), if you have placed the date.sh in some other location such as /home/user01/comm_scripts, you can replace the ./ with the full path of the script.

Hi,
Thank you very much for your kind explanation. it works now.
but can you tell me how i can decide my own date, if i decide a date and time different than sysdate it gives me command not found. i would like to precise my own special dates and time like next month 2008-08-09 00:00:02 etc.

i am trying like this, but doesn't work:
#!/bin/sh
begin_date=`2008_08_09_11_12_14 +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`

or

#!/bin/sh
begin_date=`2008_08_09_11_12_14`

Thanks in advance, i appreciate it.

The back ticks (also known as grave-accent) you are using means that the contents are to be executed and their result placed in its place, so the lines:

Code:

begin_date=`2008_08_09_11_12_14 +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S`

or

Code:

begin_date=`2008_08_09_11_12_14`

are incorrect as 2008_08_09_11_12_14 +%Y_%m_%d_%H_%M_%S is not a command in unix and neither is 2008_08_09_11_12_14.

If you want to specify your own date then you can do that as follows:

Code:

begin_date="2008_08_09_11_12_14"

HTH.