Dynamic Runtime - Comment handling BASH for Debugging purpose

[Sangal-Arun]

Hi All,

I need to write a script, where shell can do the following:

Lets suppose, I have a shell script "arun.sh" containing 2-3 lines (just below):
a=$$
#echo "ARUN IS TRYING TO SET DEBUG PARAMETER"
echo $a

NOTE: The above code is an example, showing hard coded '#' comment used at line no. 2. Means, we don't want to print this line.

Now, what I want is that: Is it possible for BASH to recognize "#" (used for commenting) at run time(dynamically) and it will not print a line if it finds "#" in a variable (which I will place at first) and print whatever is there, if it finds that variable="" (BLANK). A snapshot of this is as below: (Here, I have just added a comment variable to store a "#" or blank "", this should be set by a user before calling the script or can be passed at run time as 1st argument to arun.sh script (In this case, I should use: comment_variable=$1).

comment_variable=#

a=$$
$comment_variable echo "ARUN IS TRYING TO SET DEBUG PARAMETER"
echo $$
echo $a

Now, I want the shell script to check (at run time), if $comment_variable is having '#' as its value, then it should not print the line:
"ARUN IS TRYING TO SET DEBUG PARAMETER"

ELSE it should treat that line just a simple echo statement and print it.

*** NOTE *** I don't want to use if, else, fi for checking $comment_variable's value (especially in this script) or any other types of checks for doing this.

I hope, I clarified what I want. If not, give me a shout at ak.sangal@interglobetechnologies.com

/Arun Sangal

[drl]

Hi, Arun Sangal.

Perhaps this is similar to what you are looking for. Run it a few times interchanging the settings for variable debug:

#!/bin/sh

# @(#)  s1      Demonstrate use of colon, :, as a null command.

debug="echo"
debug=":"

i=0
while [ $i -lt 5 ]
do
        $debug "The value of i is $i"
        i=$(( i+1))
done

echo "The final value of i is $i."

cheers, drl

[mpsc_sela]

Hi Arun. did it solve ur problem ? becoz i dont think this is wat u had asked for .., I am also looking for something similar.