Compare date to variables in bash

[benjamines]

Hello all! I am new to linux and I am trying to learn bash scripts. I would like to be able to ask the user for their birthday and then compare that to the system date. I would like it to display a message if it's their birthday, and a different one if it's not. It doesn't have to be this exactly, it's just something I was trying, so something similar would work, too. Basically, I just wanna compare user inputs to the date.

Also, is there a way to insert a pause between messages? ie, echo 1, [pause 1 second], echo 2, etc.

In case it matters, I'm running SLES 10. Thanks in advance!

[charlie205]

Also, is there a way to insert a pause between messages? ie, echo 1, [pause 1 second], echo 2, etc.

In case it matters, I'm running SLES 10. Thanks in advance!

sleep 5

This will cause your script to pause for 5 seconds before proceeding. Read 'man sleep'.

As to your first question, there are literally thousands of ways to do this. Search google for a shell scripting tutorial.

[rishab]

#------------------
b=`date +%D`
echo -e "Enter your birthday (format mm/dd/yy 06/04/09 ) \c"
read a
if [ "$a" = "$b" ]
then
# do whatever you like
echo "happy birthday"
else
#code block
echo "Better wait for a few more days "
fi