BASH Programming - Introduction HOWTO

9. User interfaces

9.1 Using select to make simple menus

           #!/bin/bash
           OPTIONS="Hello Quit"
           select opt in $OPTIONS; do
               if [ "$opt" = "Quit" ]; then
                echo done
                exit
               elif [ "$opt" = "Hello" ]; then
                echo Hello World
               else
                clear
                echo bad option
               fi
           done
          

If you run this script you'll see that it is a programmer's dream for text based menus. You'll probably notice that it's very similar to the 'for' construction, only rather than looping for each 'word' in $OPTIONS, it prompts the user.

9.2 Using the command line

          #!/bin/bash        
          if [ -z "$1" ]; then 
              echo usage: $0 directory
              exit
          fi
          SRCD=$1
          TGTD="/var/backups/"
          OF=home-$(date +%Y%m%d).tgz
          tar -cZf $TGTD$OF $SRCD
         

What this script does should be clear to you. The expression in the first conditional tests if the program has received an argument ($1) and quits if it didn't, showing the user a little usage message. The rest of the script should be clear at this point.