UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Hi Guys,

I'm writing a shell script that presents the user with various options, they select one (numbered 1-9) and it then excecutes the correct code. No problem, but I'm having slight difficulty with one option.

The user can select to backup all the files in the current directory to another directory, but the program must first check to see if the destination directory exists and then if not it must create it before copying the files.

backup) print "Please enter the directory to copy your files to:"
read dir
if [ -f $dir ]; then
mkdir $dir
cp /myhomefolder/* $dir
else
cp /myhomefolder/* $dir
fi;;

This is the code I'm using to take the users chosen directory, see if it exists within the current directory and make it if not then copy the files but it's just not working! It just says that the directory entered is not a directory. I'm a bit of a newbie when it comes to this and I've been trawling through websites and books but I just can't get it to work!

Any thoughts? Thankx

try useing a -d in your if statment.

-d= is a directory

you might even want to do a -w (you have write premissions)

in ksh -f = is a regular file (ie not a directory or other special type of file.

i added a -p in your mkdir so it makes any directorys that would be missing in the $dir variable instead of just the last directory.

so something liek this:

Code:

if [ -d $dir ]; then
cp /myhomefolder/* $dir
else
mkdir -p $dir 
cp /myhomefolder/* $dir
fi;;

Humm, there are a number of problems with this
shell script.

"if [ -f $dir ]" tests that $dir exists and is a regular
file. Use "-d" to test that $dir exists and is a
directory. See the test or [ man page. i.e.
"man test" or "man [".

You also should use the -p option to mkdir to
to create intermediate directories as necessary.
i.e. "mkdir -p $dir".

Another test that should probablly be added is
to ensure that the user actually entered a directory
and did not just hit return. test -n or test -z
will help here.

You also should test that user has permission to
write in the target directory and warm them if they
do not have write permission.

- Finnbarr