Why are “declare -f” and “declare -a” needed in bash scripts?

Question

Sorry for the innocent question - I\'m just trying to understand...

For example - I have:

$ cat test.sh
#!/bin/bash
declare -f testfunct

testfunct ()          


        

Answer 1

As far as I know, the -a option alone does not have any practical relevance, but I think it's a plus for readability when declaring arrays. It becomes more interesting when it is combined with other options to generate arrays of a special type.

For example:

# Declare an array of integers
declare -ai int_array

int_array=(1 2 3)

# Setting a string as array value fails
int_array[0]="I am a string"

# Convert array values to lower case (or upper case with -u)
declare -al lowercase_array

lowercase_array[0]="I AM A STRING"
lowercase_array[1]="ANOTHER STRING"

echo "${lowercase_array[0]}"
echo "${lowercase_array[1]}"

# Make a read only array
declare -ar readonly_array=(42 "A String")

# Setting a new value fails
readonly_array[0]=23