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bash programming: testing for empty string
- From: "bootleg86 bootleg86" <bootleg86 at gmail dot com>
- To: cygwin at cygwin dot com
- Date: Wed, 5 Mar 2008 17:27:39 +0800
- Subject: bash programming: testing for empty string
Hi,
I'm trying to find the time of a file by doing this.
filetime=`ls -l --time-style=+%a:%H:%M /tmp/1.txt | awk '{print $6}'`
if [ -z "$filetime"]; then
echo "File does not exist"
else
echo "Time file: $filetime"
fi
However, when the file does not exist and filetime returns an empty
string, it does not evaluate [ -z "$filetime" ] to true
I have also tried the reverse which is
if [ -n "$filetime"]; then
echo "Time file: $filetime"
else
echo "File does not exist"
fi
but I still get the same results.
What does $filetime evaluate to when the command exits with an error?
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