and only files matching my_test_here would make it onto do_something. I love the while-read pattern, but it just doesn't feel right that there's no simpler, built-in, idiomatic way to write a function ...

Check if a file is really a file, whether a string contains anything, and whether you can run a program with these vital patterns.

Here are some basic skills to get started with bash, one of the best shells for preparing and using scripts on Linux. Scripting in Linux–putting commands into a file so you can run them as a group—is ...

Here are steps you can take to ensure that your bash scripts work as intended and are easy to update. Committing routine and even rarely required tasks to scripts is almost always a big win because ...

We often read (including in the book Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide by Mendel Cooper) that if we pass variable names as parameters to functions, they will be treated as string literals and cannot be ...

Elevate your Bash skills with three must-know patterns for robust error handling.

It is easy to dismiss bash — the typical Linux shell program — as just a command prompt that allows scripting. Bash, however, is a full-blown programming language. I wouldn’t presume to tell you that ...

When you think about it, it's surprising how many programming tasks don't require the use of floating point numbers. If you're an embedded systems programmer, you'd ...