Bash to Array

This week I’ve published a submodule for converting strings to Bash arrays. Check the documentation for detailed getting started and usage instructions, the source code is available on GitHub. What follows is the TLDR for installation and usage…

Clone/Install

cd "<your-git-project-path>"

mkdir modules

git submodule add -b main\
                  --name to-array\
                  https://github.com/bash-utilities/to-array.git\
                  modules/to-array

Usage

#!/usr/bin/env bash


__SOURCE__="${BASH_SOURCE[0]}"
while [[ -h "${__SOURCE__}" ]]; do
    __SOURCE__="$(find "${__SOURCE__}" -type l -ls | sed -n 's@^.* -> \(.*\)@\1@p')"
done
__DIR__="$(cd -P "$(dirname "${__SOURCE__}")" && pwd)"


## Provides to_array -t '<array_reference>' -i '<string>'
source "${__DIR__}/modules/to-array/to-array.sh"


__usage__() {
    cat <<EOF
Converts list of arguments to array(s) and prints results
EOF
}


_arguments=( "${@}" )
for _index in "${!_arguments[@]}"; do
    _argument="${_arguments[${_index}]}"
    case "${_argument}" in
        -h|--help)
            __usage__
            exit 0
        ;;
        *)
            target=()
            to_array -t 'target' -i "${_argument}" --strip-quotes
            printf '_argument[%i] -> ( %s )\n' "${_index}" "${target[*]@Q}"
        ;;
    esac
done

Provide executable permissions and run example.sh script…

chmod u+x example.sh

./example.sh '"spam flavored" ham "in a can"'
#> _argument[0] -> ( 'spam flavored' 'ham' 'in a can' )