Say I have the following in Bash:

FOO=/a/c*/d/
echo PATH=${FOO}:${PATH} >> .env

When I inspect the contents of the file .env the path still contains the wildcard. How can I ensure that the wildcard is expanded to the path, assuming there is only one match, so that the wildcard does not exist in the file when echoed?

CodePudding user response：

Make it an array assignment, and then use the first element of the array (to hold with the "assuming only one match"):

foo=( /a/c*/d/ )
echo "PATH=${foo[0]}:$PATH" >>.env

By contrast, if you don't specifically want the assumption, you can use ${array[*]} after setting : as the first character in IFS to expand correctly even in the case where there were multiple matches:

foo=( /a/c*/d/ )
IFS=:
echo "PATH=${foo[*]}:$PATH" >>.env

CodePudding user response：

Perhaps also

foo=( /a/c*/d/ )
echo "PATH=$(IFS=:; echo "${foo[*]}"):$PATH" >> .env

so you don't have to restore IFS