ref: b502a62da2ec6058923db94f87ecc2d29db2fa77
dir: /man/1/sh-string/
.TH SH-STRING 1
.SH NAME
prefix, in, splitl, splitr, drop, take, splitstrl, splitstrr, tolower, toupper, len, alen, slice \- shell script string manipulation
.SH SYNOPSIS
.B load string
.B prefix
.I pre s
.br
.B in
.I c cl
.br
.B ${splitl
.IB "s cl" }
.br
.B ${splitr
.IB "s cl" }
.br
.B ${splitstrl
.IB "s t" }
.br
.B ${splitstrr
.IB "s t" }
.br
.B ${take
.IB "s cl" }
.br
.B ${tolower
.IB s }
.br
.B ${toupper
.IB s }
.br
.B ${len
.IB s }
.br
.B ${alen
.IB s }
.br
.B ${slice
.IB "start end s" }
.br
.B ${fields
.IB "cl s" }
.br
.B ${padl
.I n
[
.IR s ...
.RB ] }
.br
.B ${padr
.I n
[
.IR s ...
.RB ] }
.br
.SH DESCRIPTION
.I String
is a loadable module for
.IR sh (1)
that provides a shell-script interface to the string
manipulation commands found in
.IR string (2),
with a couple of other facilities thrown in for good
measure. Each of the substitution builtins
.BR splitl ,
.BR splitr ,
.BR drop ,
.BR take ,
.BR splitstrl ,
.BR splitstrr ,
.BR tolower ,
and
.BR toupper
implements the same functionality as that provided by
the function of the same name in
.IR string (2).
Where a function in the
.IR string (2)
module returns a tuple, the equivalent builtin yields
a two-element list; the others yield a list with a single
element.
.PP
In all
.I string
commands, the number of arguments provided must
be exactly that required by the command so, for instance,
giving an undefined variable (a zero element list) as
an argument will cause a
.B usage
exception to be generated.
.PP
The two builtins
.B prefix
and
.B in
are again similar to their
.IR string (2)
counterparts - their return value is true (an empty string)
if the equivalent
.IR string (2)
function would be non-zero.
.PP
.B Len
returns the length of its argument
.IR s .
.B Alen
returns the length of its argument
.IR s
when converted to a byte-array. (This will be
different from the result of
.B len
when
.I s
contains non-ASCII characters).
.B Slice
is similar to the string-slicing operator in Limbo;
it returns the section of
.I s
starting at index
.I start
and ending just before index
.IR end .
.I End
may be the literal string
.BR end ,
in which
.BI "${slice " start " end}"
is the same as
.BI "${slice " start " ${len " s "}}"\fR.\fP
Unlike in Limbo, nothing untoward happens if
an out-of-range slice is taken: any out of
range indices are trimmed to within the bounds
of
.IR s .
.PP
.B Fields
is similar to
.B ${split}
in
.IR sh (1),
but does not merge field separator characters.
It splits
.I s
into fields separated by characters in class
.IR cl ;
if there are
.I n
characters matching
.I cl
inside
.IR s ,
.B fields
will yield
.IR n +1
items in its result.
.PP
.B Padl
and
.B padr
widen the string
.I s
to
.I n
characters, padding it with spaces on the
right (for
.BR padl )
or the left (for
.BR padr )
as necessary.
If
.I s
is already at least
.I n
characters wide, it is left unchanged.
If several arguments are given, they
are concatenated, separated with spaces, before
padding takes place.
.SH SOURCE
.B /appl/cmd/sh/string.b
.SH SEE ALSO
.IR string (2),
.IR sh (1),
.IR sh-std (1),
.IR sh-expr (1)