Use long flags when scripting (2013)

Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by inshadows on Friday September 18, 2020 @01:51PM (#24519787)

It's nice but you cannot comment individual lines. For that you can go one step further and use arrays:

  cmd=(
    command
    -x -y
    --bar OPTARG
    ARG ARG
  )
  $cmd

This works in Zsh. In Bash that would be ${cmd[@]} I think. I use this with long qemu command lines where I often modify and comment out arguments during testing.

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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by tdons on Friday September 18, 2020 @02:58PM (#24520611)

You can comment using a hack; check this out:

  command `# a comment` \
    --longopt1 `# another comment` \
    --longopt2 arg \
    argument

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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by inshadows on Friday September 18, 2020 @03:47PM (#24521147)

I didn't mean commenting arguments for documentation but commenting them out while you're writing and testing the script. I.e. this won't work:

  command `# a comment` \
    # --longopt1 \
    --longopt2 arg \
    argument

AFAIK there's no hack for this.

EDIT: Oh, `# a comment`. Didn't notice that. I'm going to explore it, thanks.

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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by lhoursquentin on Monday September 21, 2020 @06:12AM (#24541641)

You should probably note that this hack spawns an additional shell process per comment :)

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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by periodontal on Friday September 18, 2020 @02:12PM (#24520035)

For bash, add quotes: "${cmd[@]}"

Otherwise, you'll get word splitting. E.g.,

  cmd=(
   test
   "!= !="
   !=
   ""
  )
  "${cmd[@]}" && echo Success
  ${cmd[@]} || echo Failure

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