for loop giving an error

Asked Apr 08 '21 at 22:21

Active Apr 08 '21 at 22:39

Viewed 37 times

Current working directory is PATH2

ARG2=3

$ for i in {1..$ARG2}
  do
    cd FIXBILL_$i
    cp output.txt $PATH1
    cd $PATH1
    mv output.txt output_$i.txt
    cd $PATH2
 done

sh[3]: FIXBILL_{1..3}:  not found.
cp: cannot access output.txt: No such file or directory
mv: output.txt: cannot access: No such file or directory

it should take FIXBILL_1 , FIXBILL_2 & FIXBILL_3 but instead its taking FIXBILL_{1..3}. Please help.

edited Apr 08 '21 at 22:39

asked Apr 08 '21 at 22:21

jazz

2

Expansions only work with constants – Chris Davies Apr 08 '21 at 22:25
3

Replace for i in {1..$ARG2} with for i in $(seq 1 "$ARG2") (beware of *, for example). – Apr 08 '21 at 22:37
3

Note that the error message was produced by sh, a simpler shell that does not understand the {1..3} expansion, so it treats the characters as filename components. The bash shell supports {1..3}. – waltinator Apr 08 '21 at 22:45
1

but the bash shell does not support {1..$var} – glenn jackman Apr 09 '21 at 02:29

0 Answers0