Searching a string, output it to an array then delete it based on user input

[fr0s7y]

Hey,

So I'm developing a simple Address book and its going well.
It uses a singular text file to store all its information.

At the minute i can search the file for a specific string, not a problem.

I'm pretty sure i can get it to delete a string based on a users input, thats kind of easy but i thought for extra snazziness it would be
a neat idea if I could grab the output of the search term - a multi-line output say - and store each new line into an array, each assigned a number.
From there the user could specify they would like to delete the line based on their input.

So far this is the 'delete' script:

ADDRESSBOOK=~/Documents/Address-Book/add_data.txt

export ADDRESSBOOK

echo "=============================== Delete a Record ==============================="
echo "==============================================================================="
echo "============ Search A Record, then delete it! Type 'exit' to exit =============

"

exit=0
search(){
while [ $exit -ne 1 ]
        do
        
        echo "Find something for me to delete"
        echo -n "-----------------------> "

        read searchTerm
    if [ "$searchTerm" = "exit" ]
    then 
        exit=1
    else

        searchOutput=$(grep $searchTerm*.$ $ADDRESSBOOK | sort)

        echo "$searchOutput"
    fi
    done

exit 0
}

search

The address book automatically adds each record with /n so it displays each record on a new line anyway.

Is it possible to take the $searchRecord variable and pass that to an array?

And before I go wrapping my head around arrays, is this even the best approach to take for what I'm trying to do?

[schragge]

Something like

while
  read -p 'Find something for me to delete> ' searchTerm
  [[ $searchTerm != 'exit' ]]
do
  ifs=$IFS; IFS=$'\n'; searchOutput=( $(grep "$searchTerm" "$ADDRESSBOOK"| sort) ); IFS=$ifs
  if ((${#searchOutput[@]}>1)); then
    PS3="Select line to delete: "
    select line in "${searchOutput[@]}"; do
      [[ -z $line ]] && break
      echo Deleting $line
    done
  else
    echo Deleting $searchOutput
  fi
done

[Vaphell]

arrays are very useful, so it's not like you waste your time even if they won't help here (though they should, as they eliminate the need of parsing strings by hand on every turn)

example

$ array=()
$ while read -r line; do   array+=( "$line" ); done < <( echo $'wut\nomg\na bc\ndef\ng h\ni' | sort )
$ printf "'%s'\n" "${array[@]}"
'a bc'
'def'
'g h'
'i'
'omg'
'wut'
$ select s in "${array[@]}"; do echo "selected: '$s'"; break; done
1) a bc
2) def
3) g h
4) i
5) omg
6) wut
#? 5
selected: 'omg'

example is one-linerish because it was typed directly in terminal, obviously in script this should have nice indentation
echo is an equivalent of your grep

removing element from array can be done with unset array[n] so you need to loop over the array, find proper index and parametrize unset

array=( "ab" "c d" "e" )
search="e"
$ for(( i=0; i<${#array[@]}; i++ )); do [ "$search" = "${array[$i]}" ] && echo $i && break; done
2
$ unset array[$i]
$ printf "'%s'\n" "${array[@]}"
'ab'
'c d'

[fr0s7y]

ok so, there were a few syntax bits, unexpected '(' and the like as i integrated the statement into the existing code.

Here is the code at the minute:

while [ $exit -ne 1 ]
        do
        
        echo "Find something for me to delete"
        echo -n "-----------------------> "

        read searchTerm
        ifs=$IFS; IFS=$'\n'; searchOutput=$(grep $searchTerm*.$ $ADDRESSBOOK | sort); IFS=$ifs
        if [[ ${#searchOutput[@]} gt 1 ]]; then
         PS3="Select line to delete: "
         select line in "${searchOutput[@]}";
           [[ -z $line ]] && break
           echo Deleting $line

        else
              echo Deleting $searchOutput
        fi
    done

exit 0

which is giving me:

Find something for me to delete
-----------------------> a
grep: /home/fr0s7y/Docume: No such file or directory
grep: ts/Address-Book/add_data.txt: No such file or directory
./delete.sh: 30: ./delete.sh: [[: not found
Deleting

strange how grep is cutting off the last couple of digits from documents, also I dont understand where the file path for 'ts/' is being declared :/

[schragge]

I've updated my post, it now includes the full while loop. BTW are you using bash? Looks like you're trying to execute it with /bin/sh

[fr0s7y]

is the first line array=() intended to be an empty array? all examples like to populate it with array=(num1, num2, num3) etc.

bash is telling me that '(' is unexpected on that line

[fr0s7y]

I've updated my post, it's now includes the full while loop. BTW are you using bash? Looks like you're trying to execute it with /bin/sh

sorry yeah, its a .sh script, would that be why theres an error in the file path?

[Vaphell]

yes, it's empty because i want to populate it with += operator (add elem(s)) inside while read loop for each line. I updated my previous post with how to remove elements from array

$ array=()
$ printf "%s\n" "${array[@]}"

$ array+=( 'a' )
$ printf "%s\n" "${array[@]}"
a
$ array+=( 'b' 'c' 'd' )
$ printf "%s\n" "${array[@]}"
a
b
c
d

array is a bash feature so you either need to run the script with bash script or explicitly declare bash in the very first line of the script: #!/bin/bash and run with ./script

[schragge]

No matter what the extension is, it depends on the shebang line:

!#/bin/bash

[fr0s7y]

yeah the shebang is included at the top of the file like so :

#!/bin/bash -       
#title           :delete.sh
#description :This script will delete an entry in  the Address Book
#date          :April 2013
#version      :1.0
#==============================================================================

the script is part of a larger program as in i have a run.sh that handles the main menu etc. with different .sh files for different parts of the application, add, search, print etc.

all .sh files are in the same directory, the address book is stored in the users documents.