Problem with Parameter Manipulation in Bash Script

[StunnerAlpha]

Ey guys I am making a simple script to tar files, the script takes two parameters a filename, and the files to be zipped. I currently have it working for taring a single file or folder but not multiple ones. I use this command in the script:



tar -czvf "$1".tar.gz "$@"


That works but it prints an ugly error message:


tar: test45: Cannot stat: No such file or directory
Small Test Folder/
Small Test Folder/Makefile
.
.
.
Small Test Folder2/lottery.c
tar: Error exit delayed from previous errors


When I echo $@ I get the filename in it as well as the files to be tarred, how do I go about removing the very first parameter from $@?

Thanks in advance!

[ghostdog74]

you can try putting your files to tar in file


-T, --files-from=F
get names to extract or create from file F

[StunnerAlpha]

you can try putting your files to tar in file
Eh? I would rather just be able to type bash zipper.h tarfile file1 file2 file3 and have them be tarred rather than putting them in a file. Thanks for the response.

[ghostdog74]

show examples of the parameter you are passing in from the command line. did you quote them properly? are there white spaces in your file names?

[StunnerAlpha]

show examples of the parameter you are passing in from the command line. did you quote them properly? are there white spaces in your file names?
Yes there are white spaces, but I am making the script to be able to handle spaces in filenames.

Here is the command:



bash zipper.sh test45 Small\ Test\ Folder Small\ Test\ Folder2

[sarang]

Try this:



#!/bin/bash
filename="$1"
shift
tar -czvf "$filename".tar.gz "$@"
exit 0


The key word here is 'shift'. Read more about it in the bash manual by running man bash if you are not familiar with it.

[StunnerAlpha]

Try this:



#!/bin/bash
filename="$1"
shift
tar -czvf "$filename".tar.gz "$@"
exit 0


The key word here is 'shift'. Read more about it in the bash manual by running man bash if you are not familiar with it.
Perfect! Just what I was looking for! Thanks!

[sarang]

And yes, you don't even have to type the whole 'bash zipper.sh' part. Edit your /home/USERNAME/.bashrc and at the very end add



zipper ()
{
filename="$1"
shift
tar -czvf "$filename".tar.gz "$@"
return 0
}


This will result in a custom 'zipper' command being created.

Another useful function to add to ~/.bashrc is:



#Extract compressed files. Thanks to urukrama, Ubuntuforums.org

myextract ()
{
if [ -f $1 ] ; then
echo "Working..."
case $1 in
*.tar.bz2) tar xjf $1 ;;
*.tar.gz) tar xzf $1 ;;
*.bz2) bunzip2 $1 ;;
*.rar) rar x $1 ;;
*.gz) gunzip $1 ;;
*.tar) tar xf $1 ;;
*.tbz2) tar xjf $1 ;;
*.tgz) tar xzf $1 ;;
*.zip) unzip $1 ;;
*.Z) uncompress $1 ;;
*.7z) 7z x $1 ;;
*) echo "Error: '$1' cannot be extracted via myextract()" ; return 1;
esac
else
echo "Error: '$1' is not a valid file"
return 99
fi
}