On 27.01.2010 13:49, Sharuzzaman Ahmat Raslan wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I found the behaviour of the function below is a little bit odd. Appreciate
> if someone can share his/her knowledge regarding the behaviour.
>
> The output of the script will be:
>
> sharuzza...@debian:~$ ./case1.sh
> Nice behaviour,
>
> Somehow, the backtick for foo() execute the function, echoing the correct
> output, but fails to set the variable $gang to the correct value. Because of
> that, the function bar() did not echoing anything because the variable $gang
> is null.
>
> I would expect that $gang is set with the correct value and function bar()
> will work after that.
>
> Thanks.
>
>
> System information:
>
> OS: Debian Squeeze
> Hardware: Intel x86 Pentium 4
> Bash: 4.1.0(1)-release (i486-pc-linux-gnu)
>
>
>
> #startscript----------
> #!/bin/bash
>
> # test case for variable assignment in string returning function
> # case 1: function with echo
>
> name="optimus"
>
> foo () {
> if [ "$name" = "optimus" ]
> then
> gang="good"
> echo "Nice behaviour"
> else
> gang="bad"
> echo "Naughty behaviour"
> fi
> }
>
> bar () {
> case "$gang" in
>
> good)
> echo "autobot"
> ;;
>
> bad)
> echo "decepticon"
> ;;
> esac
> }
>
> behaviour=`foo`
> group=`bar`
>
> echo $behaviour,$group
> #endscript------------------------
>
the 'gang' variable is set in a subshell. it is destroyed as the
subshell exits. that's why it's not available at the time the bar()
function is run.
