Re: Bash file to variable string problem -- must be simple. What am I missing?

[Roberto C. Sánchez <roberto@debian.org>]

On Sat, Mar 02, 2019 at 07:56:58PM -0500, deb wrote:
>    This has to be simple and I'm just missing it.
> 
>    If I pull a filename from a temp file into a variable, I can ls it fine.
> 
>    If I cut off the extension, and tack on my own SAME EXT, ls no longer
>    works.
> 
>    (The actual script is more elaborate, loading vlc , etc -- but this
>    summarizes & shows my issue)
> 
>    # mp4file.txt holds just 'long file with spaces.mp4'
> 
>    fname=$(<mp4file.txt)
> 
>    # echo $fname shows the right filename.mp4 string
> 
>    # works
>    ls -al "$fname"
> 
>    # Cut off the extension.
>    fname=`echo $fname | rev | cut -d. -f2 | rev`
> 
>    # echo $fname shows the filename sans '.mp4'
> 
>    # THIS LS FAILS, WITH FILE NOT FOUND (but actually reports the exact
>    string that worked above, but not being found here).
> 
>    ls -al "$fname".mp4
> 
>    ls: cannot access 'long file with spaces.mp4': No such file or directory
> 
I cannot replicate the behavior you describe.  Here is how it looks for
me:

root@chroot:~# touch "long file with spaces.mp4"
root@chroot:~# echo "long file with spaces.mp4" >mp4file.txt
root@chroot:~# cat mp4file.txt 
long file with spaces.mp4
root@chroot:~# ls -l
total 4
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root  0 Mar  3 01:02 long file with spaces.mp4
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 26 Mar  3 01:02 mp4file.txt
root@chroot:~# fname=$(<mp4file.txt)
root@chroot:~# ls -al "$fname"
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 Mar  3 01:02 long file with spaces.mp4
root@chroot:~# fname=`echo $fname | rev | cut -d. -f2 | rev`
root@chroot:~# ls -al "$fname".mp4
-rw-r--r-- 1 root root 0 Mar  3 01:02 long file with spaces.mp4

What version of bash are you using?

>    ------------------------------------------------------
> 
>    It is not:
> 
>    * a special character thing,
> 
>    * a carriage return thing,
> 
>    * a character case thing,
> 
>    * not helped with './' or '~/' added in front of the filename.
> 
>    * It's the same string in both spots.
> 
>    Any thoughts folks?
> 
I am not sure about the overall problem, but I can say I would replace
this:

fname=`echo $fname | rev | cut -d. -f2 | rev`

with this:

fname=$(basename "$fname" .mp4)

Regards,

-Roberto

-- 
Roberto C. Sánchez