Counter using Bourne Shell 1

[Michael42]

Hello all,

In a Bourne shell script on Solaris 8 I am attempting to use the expr command to implement a counter in my script. The problem is my COUNTER variable seems to lose it's value after the loop. While in the loop the COUNTER works as it echos out incrementing values properly.

Here is my script snippet:

COUNTER=0
while read LINE
do
echo Processing: $LINE
   [COLOR=green]# The below line displays the correct value[/color]
   COUNTER=`expr $COUNTER + 1`
   echo $COUNTER
done < /tmp/items.lst

[COLOR=green]# The below line displays [b]0[/b] ????!!![/color]
echo $COUNTER

What can you recommend?



Thanks,

Michael42

 

[PHV]

The reason why is that the while loop is executed in a subshell due the i/o redirection.
You may try something like this:
exec </tmp/items.lst
while read LINE
...
done
echo $COUNTER

Hope This Helps, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ222-2244

 

[Michael42]

PHV,

Perfect! Thanks for taking the time to post.

-Michael42