SHELLdorado Newsletter 1/99 - February 21, 1999

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The "SHELLdorado Newsletter" covers shell script related topics.
To subscribe to this newsletter, leave your e-mail address
at the SHELLdorado homepage:

	http://www.shelldorado.com/

"Heinerīs SHELLdorado" (http://www.shelldorado.com/)
is a place for UNIX shell script programmers providing

     Many shell script examples,
     shell scripting tips & tricks + more...

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Contents
 o  Editorial
 o  What's new at the SHELLdorado?
 o  Shell Tip: Positioning cursor from shell scripts
 o  Shell Tip: How to set the title of an XTERM window
 o  Q&A: How can I write a shell by myself?

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Dear readers,

Welcome to the "SHELLdorado Newsletter"!

This newsletter is intended to provide interesting and useful
information for UNIX shell script programmers. Some articles will
be for beginners, and some for profis, but hopefully everybody
using sh, ksh, bash & co. will find some interesting article
from time to time.

Best regards,

    Heiner Steven (ed.)
    heiner.steven@odn.de

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>> What's new at SHELLdorado?
-----------------------------------------------------------------

 o  New Article "The Ignorant's Guide to Shell Programming":

    http://www.shelldorado.com/articles/ignorantsguide.html

 o  The SHELLdorado "bibliography" list has been extended and now
    provides links to "amazon.com". This way interested readers
    can view the book cover and peruse other book reviews there:

	http://www.shelldorado.com/articles/unixbib/

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>> Shell Tip: Positioning the cursor from within shell scripts
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    [ Further shell scripting tips & tricks:             ]
    [ http://www.shelldorado.com/shelltips/ ]

    For some shell scripts it would be desirable, if the script
    could position the cursor to arbitrary (row, column) pairs
    (i.e. to display a status line, ...)

    The following shell function uses the "tput" command to
    move the cursor to the specified (row, column) position:

	# move cursor to row $1, col $2 (both starting with zero)
	# usage: writeyx message rowno colno
	writeyx () {
	    tput cup $2 $3
	    echo "$1"
	}

    Example usage:

	clear           # clear the screen
	writeyx "This is a centered message" 11 26
	writeyx "press any key to continue..." 22 0
	read dummy

    The "tput" command looks up the escape command sequence for
    a feature needed for the current terminal. You can use it
    for other terminal related things, too:

	tput smso		# "start mode shift out": usually
				# reverse
	echo "This is printed reverse"
	tput rmso		# "reset mode shift out"

    All available capability names are listed on the terminfo(5)
    manual page.

    Portability:
	The "tput" command is available with the "terminfo"
	terminal information database

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>> Shell Tip: How to set the title of a XTERM window
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    The title of a XTERM window can be set using the following
    escape sequence:

    	ESC ] 0 ; title ^G

    Example:

    	echo "^[]0;This is a title^G"

    Enter the escape character (the first character of the
    string) as CTRL-V ESC. On the screen you will see "^[". The
    last character is entered as CTRL-V CTRL-G.

    The example above is the core of the (lengthy) script
    "xtitle":

    	http://www.shelldorado.com/scripts/cmds/xtitle

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>> Q&A: How can I write a shell by myself?
-----------------------------------------------------------------

    Common shells like sh, ksh, bash, are quite complex, but
    basically a shell just reads an input line from standard
    input, parses the line into commands and arguments, calls the
    command with the arguments and waits for it to terminate. A
    small example follows:

	#include <stdio.h>
	#include <string.h>

	int main (int argc, char *argv [])
	{
	    char inbuf [256];		/* input buffer */
	    char *cmd, *arg;		/* command name, one argument */
	    int childstatus;

	    for ( ; ; ) {
	    	/* Print the prompt string character */
		fprintf (stderr, "%s ", "%"); fflush (stderr);
		if ( !gets (inbuf) ) break; /* EOF: terminate our "shell" */

		/* Get the command name */
		if ( !(cmd = strtok (inbuf, " \t\n")) ) continue;
		/* We only support one argument at this time */
		arg = strtok (NULL, " \t\n");

		if ( fork () == 0 ) {
		    /* We are the child: execute command */
		    fprintf (stderr, "child: executing %s\n", cmd);
		    execlp (cmd, cmd, arg, 0);
		    return 2;	/* "exec" only returns in case of errors */
		}

		/* Parent: wait for child to terminate */
		wait (&childstatus);
		fprintf (stderr, "parent: child returned %d\n",
			childstatus & 0xff);
	    }
	}

    Now you just have to add i/o redirection, environment
    variables, parameter and command substitution, command
    line editing and all the other features that make us like
    a certain shell more than others ;-)

    Even though the source code for some shells (bash, pdksh,
    zsh, ...) is available freely, it is quite complex and hard
    to read. A beginner will like the well commented example
    of a small shell in the following book:

	Marc J. Rochkind: Advanced Unix Programming.
	    Prentice Hall, Englewood Cliffs 1985.

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an article of your own, send a mail to

	mailto:heiner.steven@shelldorado.com

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