IF syntax

[Hamish Macdonald]

>>>>> In article <965 at ksr.com>, harsha at ksr.com (Paul Harsha) writes:

Paul> You need to put the "then" on a seperate line

Paul> #!/bin/sh
Paul> if [$temp != '']  
Paul> then
Paul>         echo 'remote-caller' >> .people;
Paul> else
Paul>         echo 'inside-caller' >> .people;
Paul> fi

How about 'can put the "then" on a separate line':

if [ "$temp" != "" ]; then

works just fine.  The semicolon terminates the list of statements
forming the condition of the if.

I think there is a problem if you don't double-quote your variable or
leave white space around the "[" and "]" too:

1>@maytag[3]% echo a${temp}a
aa
1>@maytag[4]% if [$temp != '']; then echo blug; else echo bleah; fi
blug

It should echo "bleah"

1>@maytag[12]% if [ "$temp" != "" ]; then echo blug; else echo bleah; fi
bleah

Hamish.
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himacdon at maytag.uwaterloo.ca                 watmath!maytag!himacdon