How to get arguments with flags in Bash

Question

I know that I can easily get positioned parameters like this in bash:

$0 or $1

I want to be able to use flag options like this to s

Answer 1

This is the idiom I usually use:

while test $# -gt 0; do
  case "$1" in
    -h|--help)
      echo "$package - attempt to capture frames"
      echo " "
      echo "$package [options] application [arguments]"
      echo " "
      echo "options:"
      echo "-h, --help                show brief help"
      echo "-a, --action=ACTION       specify an action to use"
      echo "-o, --output-dir=DIR      specify a directory to store output in"
      exit 0
      ;;
    -a)
      shift
      if test $# -gt 0; then
        export PROCESS=$1
      else
        echo "no process specified"
        exit 1
      fi
      shift
      ;;
    --action*)
      export PROCESS=`echo $1 | sed -e 's/^[^=]*=//g'`
      shift
      ;;
    -o)
      shift
      if test $# -gt 0; then
        export OUTPUT=$1
      else
        echo "no output dir specified"
        exit 1
      fi
      shift
      ;;
    --output-dir*)
      export OUTPUT=`echo $1 | sed -e 's/^[^=]*=//g'`
      shift
      ;;
    *)
      break
      ;;
  esac
done

Key points are:

• $# is the number of arguments
• while loop looks at all the arguments supplied, matching on their values inside a case statement
• shift takes the first one away. You can shift multiple times inside of a case statement to take multiple values.

Answer 2

If you're familiar with Python argparse, and don't mind calling python to parse bash arguments, there is a piece of code I found really helpful and super easy to use called argparse-bash https://github.com/nhoffman/argparse-bash

Example take from their example.sh script:

#!/bin/bash

source $(dirname $0)/argparse.bash || exit 1
argparse "$@" <<EOF || exit 1
parser.add_argument('infile')
parser.add_argument('outfile')
parser.add_argument('-a', '--the-answer', default=42, type=int,
                    help='Pick a number [default %(default)s]')
parser.add_argument('-d', '--do-the-thing', action='store_true',
                    default=False, help='store a boolean [default %(default)s]')
parser.add_argument('-m', '--multiple', nargs='+',
                    help='multiple values allowed')
EOF

echo required infile: "$INFILE"
echo required outfile: "$OUTFILE"
echo the answer: "$THE_ANSWER"
echo -n do the thing?
if [[ $DO_THE_THING ]]; then
    echo " yes, do it"
else
    echo " no, do not do it"
fi
echo -n "arg with multiple values: "
for a in "${MULTIPLE[@]}"; do
    echo -n "[$a] "
done
echo

Answer 3

#!/bin/bash

if getopts "n:" arg; then
  echo "Welcome $OPTARG"
fi

Save it as sample.sh and try running

sh sample.sh -n John

in your terminal.

Answer 4

This example uses Bash's built-in getopts command and is from the Google Shell Style Guide:

a_flag=''
b_flag=''
files=''
verbose='false'

print_usage() {
  printf "Usage: ..."
}

while getopts 'abf:v' flag; do
  case "${flag}" in
    a) a_flag='true' ;;
    b) b_flag='true' ;;
    f) files="${OPTARG}" ;;
    v) verbose='true' ;;
    *) print_usage
       exit 1 ;;
  esac
done

Note: If a character is followed by a colon (e.g. f:), that option is expected to have an argument.

Example usage: ./script -v -a -b -f filename

Using getopts has several advantages over the accepted answer:

• the while condition is a lot more readable and shows what the accepted options are
• cleaner code; no counting the number of parameters and shifting
• you can join options (e.g. -a -b -c → -abc)

However, a big disadvantage is that it doesn't support long options, only single-character options.

Answer 5

I propose a simple TLDR:; example for the un-initiated.

Create a bash script called helloworld.sh

#!/bin/bash

while getopts "n:" arg; do
  case $arg in
    n) Name=$OPTARG;;
  esac
done

echo "Hello $Name!"

You can then pass an optional parameter -n when executing the script.

Execute the script as such:

$ bash helloworld.sh -n 'World'

Output

$ Hello World!

Notes

If you'd like to use multiple parameters:

1. extend while getops "n:" arg: do with more paramaters such as while getops "n:o:p:" arg: do
2. extend the case switch with extra variable assignments. Such as o) Option=$OPTARG and p) Parameter=$OPTARG