UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

is there a difference between quotes at the beginning of a line of code and quotes at the end of a code?
e.g.
"code here "

this book i read has 2 different meanings for beginning and end quotes

quote the book.

there are 2 differnt styles of quotes and each set of quotes is comprised of an open quote and a closeing quote.

you have a litteral quote (single quote) ' $fred '
this will equal litterly $fred

then you have a interpretive quote (double quote) " $fred "
this will equal the value of $fred.

I still do not understand the double quotes.

all that my unix book says about the double quotes is previous context (first double quote) and at first non white (second double quote)

e.g. " code here "

does anyone have know?

Please reply back to your original thread, do not make new threads when replying. This thread now makes no sense by itself!

As far as quotes go, it is very simple. You have 3 flavors, ' (single quote), " (double quote), and ` (back quote). The back quote is the key immediately to the left of the '1' key on a standard US keyboard.

Anything surrounded by single quotes is a What you see is what you get quote. Meaning, the shell does not expand any variables inside of single quotes.

Example:
#Given the variable FOO which is set to BAR.
FOO=BAR
echo 'This will print $FOO on the screen'

This will print $FOO on the screen

Using Double quotes will cause the variable to be interpolated.
FOO=BAR
echo 'This will print $FOO on the screen'

This will print BAR on the screen

The back ticks ` cause execution of the command sequence inside of the backquotes before assignment to a variable is made.

Example:
Given a user named iamyou
FOO=`whoami`

echo $FOO
iamyou

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