Using getopts to process long and short command line options

Question

I wish to have long and short forms of command line options invoked using my shell script.

I know that getopts can be used, but like in Perl, I have not

Answer 1

I wanted something without external dependencies, with strict bash support (-u), and I needed it to work on even the older bash versions. This handles various types of params:

• short bools (-h)
• short options (-i "image.jpg")
• long bools (--help)
• equals options (--file="filename.ext")
• space options (--file "filename.ext")
• concatinated bools (-hvm)

Just insert the following at the top of your script:

# Check if a list of params contains a specific param
# usage: if _param_variant "h|?|help p|path f|file long-thing t|test-thing" "file" ; then ...
# the global variable $key is updated to the long notation (last entry in the pipe delineated list, if applicable)
_param_variant() {
  for param in $1 ; do
    local variants=${param//\|/ }
    for variant in $variants ; do
      if [[ "$variant" = "$2" ]] ; then
        # Update the key to match the long version
        local arr=(${param//\|/ })
        let last=${#arr[@]}-1
        key="${arr[$last]}"
        return 0
      fi
    done
  done
  return 1
}

# Get input parameters in short or long notation, with no dependencies beyond bash
# usage:
#     # First, set your defaults
#     param_help=false
#     param_path="."
#     param_file=false
#     param_image=false
#     param_image_lossy=true
#     # Define allowed parameters
#     allowed_params="h|?|help p|path f|file i|image image-lossy"
#     # Get parameters from the arguments provided
#     _get_params $*
#
# Parameters will be converted into safe variable names like:
#     param_help,
#     param_path,
#     param_file,
#     param_image,
#     param_image_lossy
#
# Parameters without a value like "-h" or "--help" will be treated as
# boolean, and will be set as param_help=true
#
# Parameters can accept values in the various typical ways:
#     -i "path/goes/here"
#     --image "path/goes/here"
#     --image="path/goes/here"
#     --image=path/goes/here
# These would all result in effectively the same thing:
#     param_image="path/goes/here"
#
# Concatinated short parameters (boolean) are also supported
#     -vhm is the same as -v -h -m
_get_params(){

  local param_pair
  local key
  local value
  local shift_count

  while : ; do
    # Ensure we have a valid param. Allows this to work even in -u mode.
    if [[ $# == 0 || -z $1 ]] ; then
      break
    fi

    # Split the argument if it contains "="
    param_pair=(${1//=/ })
    # Remove preceeding dashes
    key="${param_pair[0]#--}"

    # Check for concatinated boolean short parameters.
    local nodash="${key#-}"
    local breakout=false
    if [[ "$nodash" != "$key" && ${#nodash} -gt 1 ]]; then
      # Extrapolate multiple boolean keys in single dash notation. ie. "-vmh" should translate to: "-v -m -h"
      local short_param_count=${#nodash}
      let new_arg_count=$#+$short_param_count-1
      local new_args=""
      # $str_pos is the current position in the short param string $nodash
      for (( str_pos=0; str_pos&2
    fi
    shift $shift_count
  done
}

And use it like so:

# Assign defaults for parameters
param_help=false
param_path=$(pwd)
param_file=false
param_image=true
param_image_lossy=true
param_image_lossy_quality=85

# Define the params we will allow
allowed_params="h|?|help p|path f|file i|image image-lossy image-lossy-quality"

# Get the params from arguments provided
_get_params $*