I'm asking the user to enter a number and if the number is greater than 2 then I like to add the string -n to that number. Here's my code:
read -p "Enter a number " result_sort
if [ $result_sort >2 ]; then
result_sort = $result_sort + " -n"
fi
echo "$result_sort"
I'm getting the error: command not found
Your code should look like this:
read -p "Enter a number " result_sort
if [ $result_sort -gt 2 ]; then
result_sort=$(echo "$result_sort -n")
fi
echo "$result_sort"
There were two mistakes:
The test utility ([) you used doesn't accept < and > as greater and less. Those characters are redirection characters (see I/O Redirection) in the shell. Your statement in the if clause is always true, even if $result_sort is less than 2. You are writing the result of that command [ $result_sort ] to a file called 2.
The concatenation of two strings cannot be done in your way.
try this
result_sort=`echo "${result_sort} -n"`
there should be no space between the result_sort and the "=" sign. In your case because of the space, it identifies result_sort as a command and tries to interpret it.
You can do this in BASH:
read -p "Enter a number " result_sort
((result_sort>2)) && result_sort+=" -n"
The result can be accomplished simply by concatenating the string values of the variables:
read -p "Enter a number " result_sort
[ "$result_sort" > 2 ] &&
result_sort="${result_sort}-n"
echo "$result_sort"
brace protecting the variable can prevent ambiguity. Also using the arithmetic comparison given by anubhava can protect against users entering something other than numbers.
