Echo : -n vs \c

As you may have noticed by now, when you use the echo statement, a newline is added at the end of the command. There is a fix for this ... well, more accurately, there are two fixes for this.

Some Unix systems use echo -n message to tell echo not to append a newline; others use echo message \c to do the same thing:

echo -n "Enter your name: "
read name
echo "Hello, $name"

This will work on some systems, and will look like this:

Enter your name: Steve
Hello, Steve

However, on other systems, you need to write the code like this:

echo "Enter your name: \c"
read name
echo "Hello, $name"

Which will provide the same results for those systems.

Well, that's a pain. Here's a workaround which will work on both:

         if [ "`echo -n`" = "-n" ]; then
	  	n=""
	  	c="\c"
         else
	  	n="-n"
	  	c=""
         fi

  echo $n Enter your name: $c
  read name
  echo "Hello, $name"

If echo -n wasn't interpreted properly, it would just echo out the text -n, in which case, $n is set to the empty string, and $c is set to \c. Otherwise, the opposite is done, so $n is set to -n, and $c is set to the empty string. Suggested books: Recommended Reading
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