Delay for every command execution in shell script

Question

I'm a newbie here so please forgive my ignorance. I just want to ask if there is a way to put a delay for each commands execution in a shell script.

This is my current setup

command1
sleep 1
command2
sleep 1
.....
.....
command1000
sleep 1

Is there a way to put just 1 sleep command ( delay 1 second) after execution of each command. Thank you in advance!

Br, Mark

What shell do you use?

Arkadiusz Drabczyk
– Arkadiusz Drabczyk

2018-07-21 20:26:24 +00:00
Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:26 — Arkadiusz Drabczyk
– Arkadiusz Drabczyk, Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:26
sorry i didnt specity. I'm using a bash shell.

Mark Roy
– Mark Roy

2018-07-21 20:29:37 +00:00
Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:29 — Mark Roy
– Mark Roy, Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:29
command1; sleep 1; command2; sleep 1 ?

nbari
– nbari

2018-07-21 20:36:54 +00:00
Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:36 — nbari
– nbari, Commented Jul 21, 2018 at 20:36

that other guy · Accepted Answer · 2018-07-21 20:31:11Z

3

In Bash (but not other shells) you can do this with a debug trap:

#!/bin/bash
trap 'sleep 1' DEBUG
for word in The GNU General Public License is a free, copyleft license
do
  printf '%s ' "$word"
done

Here's help trap:

trap: trap [-lp] [[arg] signal_spec ...]
Trap signals and other events.

If a SIGNAL_SPEC is DEBUG, ARG is executed before every simple command.

answered Jul 21, 2018 at 20:31

that other guy

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3 Comments

Mark Roy Over a year ago

Thanks a lot!it works! i put trap 'sleep 1' DEBUG at the beginning of my script!I really appreciate your help!

Mark Roy Over a year ago

Hi that_other_guy, i just have an extra question if you are not busy, in my script i put set -e in order to close the script if there is an error. I have a command that was executed fine but script still close. Although the command was executed without output (meaning no existing configuration in the equipment), I thought "set -e" will close the script only if the command is wrong or there is a syntax error.Any idea on this, or maybe my understanding is wrong. Thanks in advance!

that other guy Over a year ago

set -e may (but is not guaranteed to) exit the script when the command itself reports failure. Some commands report failure even though they completed their job perfectly in order to signal a testable condition, like how grep "fails" if it can't find a match.

Shiva · Accepted Answer · 2018-07-21 20:48:03Z

0

Script:

declare -a cmd_list=("echo how" "echo are" "echo you")

for cmd in "${cmd_list[@]}"
do
  eval "$cmd"
  sleep 1
done

You have to replace the echo <param> with your commands and args.

Explanation:
I am have declared an array of commands in strings(first line), then I loop through the array and evaluate(eval "$cmd") each string. After the command from the array, a sleep command is executed.

answered Jul 21, 2018 at 20:48

Shiva

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1 Comment

Mark Roy Over a year ago

Hi shiva! Thanks a lot for your help! Its very nice to include explanation! I havent tried your scipt but I'm sure it will work. I'm a newbie with scripting. I will study your script and will try in few hours. Thanks in advance again! I will let you know of the result.

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