cat problem ???

[theorem_hunter]

hi all

i want to create scripts from the command line using cat... but...

dimitri@programming:~/SCRIPTS$ cat penguin.sh
cat: penguin.sh: No such file or directory

in all the example tutorials i have looked at cat is supposed to create the file for you if it does not exist :(
i have to use gedit each time, which is nice because it has syntax highlighting :)

I'd just like to know why cat doesn't create a file if it doesn't exist

( i have looked at man cat & info cat, but i couldn't find my solution there)

any thoughts?
thanks

[xtacocorex]

cat is just supposed to display file contents and do nothing else. Why it doesn't create a file if it doesn't exist, I don't know.

If you want to create a blank file you can use the touch command.
touch myfile.txt

You can always use a check in your bash script to figure out if the file exists.

if [-f $filename]; then
cat $filename
fi

[theorem_hunter]

thanks, that was quick :)

i am following this tutorial

http://tldp.org/LDP/Bash-Beginners-Guide/html/index.html

i thought touch was just supposed to update the time stamp of a new file, but thanks for pointing that out.

is there anyway to get the Gnome terminal to do syntax highlighting for scripts i type in it?

i am also considering retrying emacs or vi (cant remember if it is possible to run code in the programs, but im sure the do syntax highlighting)

thanks :)

[theorem_hunter]

well i just found this out

cat > filename will create a new file
cat >> filename will append to an existing file

[xtacocorex]

I don't think Gnome Terminal will do syntax highlighting, that's more of a function of an editor like emacs or vi.

[theorem_hunter]

ok thanks. but can vi or emacs execute scripts within the editor?

[fatsheep]

ok thanks. but can vi or emacs execute scripts within the editor?

Yep. For Vim you would issue a command like :!./scriptname (assuming you are in the right directory, use the :cd command to print the current directory and :cd <DIR> to move around. For emacs I don't know the command but I KNOW you can, you can even open a whole shell inside emacs if you want to.