Phil Endecott wrote:
> Dear Bash and Readline Experts,
>
> I have a simple shell script that reads user commands in a loop using
> "read -e". -e enables readline, but not its history feature. Is there
> any way to get readline history with bash's read builtin?
Sure. You can do it entirely with bash builtins and shell variables.
> I wouldn't want to get the user's regular bash history; rather, this
> program would need its own history file in the user's home directory.
> For example:
>
> read -e --historyfile=~/.myprogname_history CMD
HISTFILE=~/.myprogram_history
history -r
(The `history -r' is needed if you'd like history to persist across
program invocations.)
To save the lines read to the history list, use `history -s':
read -e CMD
[ -n "$CMD" ] && history -s "$CMD"
If at the end of the script you'd like to save the history to the
history file, use `history -w' or `history -a'.
Chet
--
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
Live Strong. No day but today.
Chet Ramey, ITS, CWRU [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/
