grab permstring and file name from ls -la 3

[littleIdiot]

I need to pass a ls -al output and grab just the:
. permission string
. month
. day
. swing (time/year)
. filename

This seems to be failing:

$line is the entire line, e.g.

-rw-------   1 sam      samadm        11 Feb 17 15:19 file.txt

echo "$line" | IFS=" " read permstring junk junk junk junk \
				month day swing rawname

To be clear:
this snippet comes from a much larger script called HardFeed that I found here:

http://www.unix.com/showthread.php?t=9174

i have spent ages working out that this script is failing at this point for some reason.

Simple suggestions please!

Thanks

 

[Annihilannic]

When you pipe to read for some reason it is run in a subshell under some operating systems, so the variable is not inherited by the current, parent shell.

Try dumping the line to a temporary file and then doing a permstring junk junk junk junk month day swing rawname < filename instead.

You don't need to set IFS since it will use spaces, tabs or newlines by default.

Annihilannic.

 

[littleIdiot]

Thanks for your reply - but I can't get this to work

I have altered the script to read

\rm /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
echo "$line" > /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
permstring junk junk junk junk month day swing rawname < /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
[\code]

I also tried

[code]
\rm /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
echo "$line" > /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
awk '{print $1}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp > permstring
[\code]

Any other ideas?
(can't get code to work on this post)

 

[Annihilannic]

You're using the wrong type of slashes to terminate the code tags.

Where has your "read" command gone from the first script you attempted?

Annihilannic.

 

[littleIdiot]

I guess that's why I'm littleIdiot ... (-:

I have got this to work in a rather unelegant way:

\rm /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
echo "$line" > /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp
echo "Read line to tmp file"

permstring=`awk '{print $1}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp`
     month=`awk '{print $6}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp`
       day=`awk '{print $7}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp`
     swing=`awk '{print $8}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp`
   rawname=`awk '{print $9}' /tmp/HardFeed.line.tmp`

I'm happy with that - after spending a whole afternoon finding where the error was and fixing it.

Any better, more elgant solutions welcome!

thanks for your help.

lil'Id

 

[PHV]

And what about this ?
set -- $line
permstring=$1
month=$6
day=$7
swing=$8
rawname=$9

Hope This Helps, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ181-2886

 

[Annihilannic]

One possibility:

lsinfo=`ls -l filename`
set -- $lsinfo
permstring=$1
month=$6
day=$7
swing=$8
rawname=$9

Annihilannic.

 

[Annihilannic]

Great minds....

Annihilannic.

 

[littleIdiot]

Billiant - thank you.

I'll work on that on Monday.

but it's nearly 5pm here in the Netherlands - time I left work and had a beer.

Cheers for your time people - enjoy your weekends.