UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

I need a script to halt at the end and wait for the user to hit a key...could be any ket or enter. I know it can be done but I am just starting out.. Thanks

echo "Hit return to continue"
read dummy_variable

To allow them to continue after hitting any key, I usually create a function (I usually call it readOne, after the function I stole the idea from ):

Code:

readOne () {
tput smso
echo "Press any key to return \c"
tput rmso
oldstty=`stty -g`
stty -icanon -echo min 1 time 0
dd bs=1 count=1 >/dev/null 2>&1
stty "$oldstty"
echo
}

The call it later from the script:

blah blah ...
readOne
blah blah
exit 0


HTH

Interesting use of dd. Nice post.

Very interesting. I've never seen a way to read a single character from a shell script before. But I want to be able to actually catch the character that is typed. So I changed the dd statement to:
result=`dd bs=1 count=1 2>/dev/null`
which seems to be working. Very cool trick!

Hi,

Well I was trying to see what exactly the script Livinfree posted is doing.

I couldnt understand.

Using man I could get that tput smso and rmso is for getting standout mode seq started and end it.
dd bs sets the blcok size to 1.But why I didnt undertand. Is it because the requirement is that only ONE keystroke is required.

however I couldnt understand how the rest of these work when put together.

Could anyone pls explain.

Thanks.

and I am a fool it seems...Was looking at todays thread and dont know why I ended up on a thread 2 years old!
Sorry folks....Ignore my previous mail... by mistake I thought this thread is new.

Thanks