I have a variable which contains a space-delimited string:
line="1 1.50 string"
I want to split that string with space as a delimiter and store the result in an array, so that the following:
echo ${arr[0]}
echo ${arr[1]}
echo ${arr[2]}
outputs
1
1.50
string
Somewhere I found a solution which doesn't work:
arr=$(echo ${line})
If I run the echo statements above after this, I get:
1 1.50 string
[empty line]
[empty line]
I also tried
IFS=" "
arr=$(echo ${line})
with the same result. Can someone help, please?
In order to convert a string into an array, please use
arr=($line)
or
read -a arr <<< $line
It is crucial not to use quotes since this does the trick.
In: arr=( $line )
. The "split" comes associated with "glob".
Wildcards (*
,?
and []
) will be expanded to matching filenames.
The correct solution is only slightly more complex:
IFS=' ' read -a arr <<< "$line"
No globbing problem; the split character is set in $IFS
, variables quoted.
If you need parameter expansion, then try:
eval "arr=($line)"
For example, take the following code.
line='a b "c d" "*" *'
eval "arr=($line)"
for s in "${arr[@]}"; do
echo "$s"
done
If the current directory contained the files a.txt
, b.txt
and c.txt
, then executing the code would produce the following output.
a
b
c d
*
a.txt
b.txt
c.txt
line="1 1.50 string"
arr=$( $line | tr " " "\n")
for x in $arr
do
echo "> [$x]"
done