With only one character for IFS, it works fine:
shell@kernel: ~> l="2.4.3"; IFS="." read -a la <<< "$l"; for ((i = 0; i < ${#la[@]}; ++i)) do echo ${la[$i]}; done;
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While there are two characters for IFS, extra space element generated
shell@kernel: ~> l="2->4->3"; IFS="->" read -a la <<< "$l"; for ((i = 0; i < ${#la[@]}; ++i)) do echo ${la[$i]}; done;
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shell@kernel: ~> l="2..4..3"; IFS=".." read -a la <<< "$l"; for ((i = 0; i < ${#la[@]}; ++i)) do echo ${la[$i]}; done;
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How can I get rid of the extra space element in the array?
Continuing from the comment, you can either test for an empty element before storing the value in the array, or you can deal with the empty value when you echo
it. Frankly, its simpler to do the latter, e.g.
l="2->4->3"; IFS="->" read -a la <<< "$l"; \
for ((i = 0; i < ${#la[@]}; ++i)) do \
[ -n "${la[i]}" ] && echo ${la[$i]}; done
Output
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i would just use sed to replace the separator
see, reusing your script + sed
bash$ l="2->4->3"
bash$ read -a la <<< "$(echo $l | sed 's/->/ /g')"
bash$ for ((i = 0; i < ${#la[@]}; ++i)) do echo ${la[$i]}; done
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but I think I would do it entirely differently
bash$ l="2->4->3"
bash$ for x in `echo $l | sed 's/->/ /g'`; do echo $x; done
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hope this helps
You could transform the separator ->
into a single character with:
l="2->4->3"
IFS="-" read -a la <<< "${l//->/-}"
printf '%s' "${la[@]}"
If there is the risk that the string may contain additional -
then use a character that is improbable that will be in the string:
IFS="┵" read -a la <<< "${l//->/┵}"