Re: Query regarding ${parameter:-word} usage

[Mun]

Hi,

Thanks for your replies.
Please see my comments below.

On Wed, Dec 23, 2009 at 05:30 PM PST, Matthew wrote:
MW> 
MW> 
MW> Mun wrote:
MW> > I am moving from ksh93 to bash and have a question regarding the usage
MW> > of ${parameter:-word} parameter expansion.
MW> >
MW> > In ksh, I use ${*:-.} as an argument to commands.  For example:
MW> >
MW> >     function ll
MW> >     {
MW> >        ls --color -Flv ${*:-.}
MW> >     }
MW> >
MW> > This technique passes '.' as an arg to 'ls' if I didn't pass any args on
MW> > the command line (as I'm sure you all already know).  But this does not
MW> > work with bash; nor have I been able to come up with a technique that
MW> > accomplishes the same thing.  My only workaround so far is to put an
MW> > 'if' loop around the 'ls' that tests $# and takes the appropriate branch
MW> > depending on the number of args (i.e., 0 or non-zero).
MW> >
MW> > Any suggestions would be welcomed.  Thanks in advance.
MW> 
MW> Not sure why the above doesn't work, though you probably mean to use
MW> "$@" and not $* (presence/absence of ""s is intentional). This seems to
MW> work for me:
MW> 
MW> function ll
MW> {
MW> ls --color -Flv "${@:-.}"
MW> }

I tried the above and got the following error:

bash: $@: unbound variable

Note that I am running the following version:
GNU bash, version 4.0.0(1)-release (x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu)

and my options are set as shown below.

Keep in mind that I'm porting my ksh environment to bash, so perhaps I
have something messed up in my environment.  If the above is supposed to
work, then I'll try some additional experiments after the holidays and
see if I can narrow down the issue.

allexport       on
braceexpand     on
emacs           off
errexit         off
errtrace        off
functrace       off
hashall         on
histexpand      on
history         on
ignoreeof       on
interactive-comments    on
keyword         off
monitor         on
noclobber       on
noexec          off
noglob          off
nolog           off
notify          off
nounset         on
onecmd          off
physical        off
pipefail        off
posix           off
privileged      off
verbose         off
vi              on
xtrace          off

Happy Holidays,

-- 
Mun