Introduction

This is a simple bash script creation automation script. The script “nbs” is an acronym for “new bash script”, which allows for easy automation while creating other bash scripts with a command: nbs newscript.sh.

Why?

In my work flow, the creation of bash script for my system usually contains a few steps, mainly:

• Checking if script exists
  • Edit the existing script OR
  • Create a new script
• Typing out long commands to make a new script
  • vim $HOME/.local/bin/script
• Adding shebang
  • #!/bin/bash
• Making the script executable
  • chmod +x $HOME/.local/bin/script
• Adding a short description of the code

A bash script would be able to automate these steps by using a single command.

Dependencies

These dependencies should already be installed in your system.

• Unix Shell (Bash/ZSH)
• Editor (Vim/Nano/etc.)

Code

Introduction

This scripts assumes that you have a linux file structure. There will be 2 files: bash_template and nbs, both stored in $HOME/.local/share/template/ and $HOME/.local/bin/ respectively.

Template

Create the folder, this is where we will store the templates for new scripts

1

mkdir $HOME/.local/share/template

Create and edit a new template

1

vim $HOME/.local/share/template/bash_template

1
2
3
4
5

#!/bin/bash

# Done By: Devoalda
# Comment

This is my template for creating new bash scripts. It contains the shebang, author details and a comment section to allow for a short description of the script.

Script

Create and edit the script

1

vim $HOME/.local/bin/nbs

You can copy the template to the new script

1
2
3
4
5

#!/bin/bash

# Done By: Devoalda
# Comment

The first line of this script will check for the name of the newly created script as an argument.

1
2

# Get Filename
[ -z "$1" ] && echo "Error: Please Give a filename!" && exit 1 || filename="$HOME/.local/bin/$1"

The next line will allow for editing the file, if the file exists

1
2

# Edit File if File exists
[  -f $filename ] && nvim $filename 

The last line will create a new file - Copy the template, make the file executable and edit the new file

1
2

# Create File if file does not exist
[ ! -f $filename ] && touch $filename && chmod +x $filename && cp $HOME/.local/share/template/bash_template $filename && nvim $filename

Summary

In 3 lines, this script is able to do conditional checking, copying of template and editing the script. This shows the ability of bash scripts. The full code will be listed below, do check it out if you have problems.

With this script, you will be able to create a new bash script from your terminal

1

$ nbs newscript

Full Code

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12

#!/bin/bash
# Create New Bash Script with template

# Get Filename
[ -z "$1" ] && echo "Error: Please Give a filename!" && exit 1 || filename="$HOME/.local/bin/$1"

# Edit File if File exists
[  -f $filename ] && nvim $filename 

# Create File if file does not exist
[ ! -f $filename ] && touch $filename && chmod +x $filename && cp $HOME/.local/share/template/bash_template $filename && nvim $filename

1
2
3
4
5

#!/bin/bash

# Done By: Devoalda
# Comment

Fixing Errors

$PATH

Ensure that $HOME/.local/bin/ is in your $PATH. If unsure, add the following lines to your ~/.bashrc or ~/.zshrc

1
2
3
4
5
6
7

# Adds `~/.local/bin` and containing folders to $PATH
export PATH="$PATH:$(du "$HOME/.local/bin/" | cut -f2 | paste -sd ':')"
for file in $HOME/.local/bin/; do
	if [ -d "$file" ]; then
		export PATH="$PATH:$file"
	fi
done

This recursively adds $HOME/.local/bin and containing folders to $PATH.

Permissions

Ensure that nbs is executable

1

$ chmod +x $HOME/.local/bin/nbs

Script Improvements

There are certain improvements that may allow the script to be modular. For example, in the script nbs, there could be a configuration section which allows users to configure the script path, template path or default editor.

This is how the script could look like after improvements

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18

#!/bin/bash
# Create New Bash Script with template

##############################
# Configurations             #
##############################
EDITOR=${EDITOR-nano}	# Editor is defined in .bashrc/.zshrc or use nano
SCRIPT_PATH=$HOME/.local/bin/
TEMPLATE=$HOME/.local/share/template/bash_template

# Get Filename
[ -z "$1" ] && echo "Error: Please Give a filename!" && exit 1 || filename="$SCRIPT_PATH$1"

# Edit File if File exists
[  -f $filename ] && $EDITOR $filename 

# Create File if file does not exist
[ ! -f $filename ] && touch $filename && chmod +x $filename && cp $TEMPLATE $filename && $EDITOR $filename

You could make further modifications for your use cases or use the same format to automate the creations of scripts for other languages.