bash - not finding value present in an array

Question

I have an array of empty subdirectories and when I loop through all of the subdirectories I want to do something different depending on if it is in the array of empty subdirectories or not.

My issue is that I don't think my script is picking up on if a value is in the empty directories array. When I loop through the arrays and echo their values I can see that some values are in both arrays so I don't know why they aren't being picked up.

Code:

readarray empty_dirs < <(find /local/documents/guests/* -maxdepth 0 -empty)
for f in "${empty_dirs[@]}"
do
    echo $f
    echo "------------------------"
done


guest_path=/local/documents/guests/guest*
guest_arr=( $guest_path )
for dir in "${guest_arr[@]}"
do
    echo "$dir"
    if [[ " ${empty_dirs[@]} " =~ " ${dir} " ]];then
        echo "--- $dir found ---"
    fi
done

Output:

/local/documents/guests/guest10
------------------------
/local/documents/guests/guest12
------------------------
/local/documents/guests/guest15
------------------------
/local/documents/guests/guest18
------------------------
/local/documents/guests/guest20
------------------------

/local/documents/guests/guest1
/local/documents/guests/guest10
/local/documents/guests/guest11
/local/documents/guests/guest12
/local/documents/guests/guest13
/local/documents/guests/guest14
/local/documents/guests/guest15
/local/documents/guests/guest16
/local/documents/guests/guest17
/local/documents/guests/guest18
/local/documents/guests/guest19
/local/documents/guests/guest2
/local/documents/guests/guest20
/local/documents/guests/guest21
/local/documents/guests/guest22
/local/documents/guests/guest23
/local/documents/guests/guest24
/local/documents/guests/guest25
/local/documents/guests/guest3
/local/documents/guests/guest4
/local/documents/guests/guest5
/local/documents/guests/guest6
/local/documents/guests/guest7
/local/documents/guests/guest8
/local/documents/guests/guest9

please update the question with the output from typeset -p empty_dirs guest_arr; also add a section showing the (correct) expected output — markp-fuso
– markp-fuso, Commented Feb 14, 2022 at 15:30

choroba · Accepted Answer · 2022-02-14 15:41:41Z

1

The problem is ${empty_dirs[@]} contains the names including trailing newlines.

You can stop storing them using the -t option of readarray, or remove them before running the final loop:

empty_dirs=${empty_dirs[@]%$'\n'}

edited Feb 14, 2022 at 15:41

answered Feb 14, 2022 at 15:24

choroba

245k27 gold badges221 silver badges304 bronze badges

Sign up to request clarification or add additional context in comments.

1 Comment

markp-fuso Over a year ago

or readarray -t to remove the newline at the point where the array is built/populated

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

bash - not finding value present in an array

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Hot Network Questions

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

1 Answer 1

1 Comment

Your Answer

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest

Related