Array of arrays in bash

Question

I\'m attempting to read an input file line by line which contains fields delimited by periods. I want to put them into an array of arrays so I can loop through them later on

Answer 1

Knowing that you can split string into "array". You could creat a list of lists. Like for example a list of databases in DB servers.

dbServersList=('db001:app001,app002,app003' 'db002:app004,app005' 'dbcentral:central')

# Loop over DB servers
for someDbServer in ${dbServersList[@]}
do
    # delete previous array/list (this is crucial!)
    unset dbNamesList
    # split sub-list if available
    if [[ $someDbServer == *":"* ]]
    then
        # split server name from sub-list
        tmpServerArray=(${someDbServer//:/ })
        someDbServer=${tmpServerArray[0]}
        dbNamesList=${tmpServerArray[1]}
        # make array from simple string
        dbNamesList=(${dbNamesList//,/ })
    fi

    # Info
    echo -e "\n----\n$someDbServer\n--"

    # Loop over databases
    for someDB in ${dbNamesList[@]}
    do
        echo $someDB
    done
done

Output of above would be:

----
db001
--
app001
app002
app003

----
db002
--
app004
app005

----
dbcentral
--
central