TEST

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NAME

test - test a logical condition

SYNOPSIS

test expression [ ] ]

DESCRIPTION

The test program tests a logical condition. If that condition is true, it exits with a value of EXIT_SUCCESS, and with EXIT_FAILURE otherwise. An optional ] at the end of teh expression is swallowed. This makes it easy to install test with a link from [, so that certain incompatibly written shell files work. test understands the following expressions:

num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and are equal
num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and are not equal
num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and num1 is numerically greater than or equal to num2
num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and num1 is numerically greater than num2
num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and num1 is numerically less than or equal to num2
num1: True if num1 and num2 are both numbers and num1 is numerically less than num2
str1: True if str1 and str2 are equal strings
str1: True if str1 and str2 are unequal strings
str1: True if str1 and str2 are equal or if str1 comes lexicographically after str2, in the machine's native character set ordering
str1: True if str1 comes lexicographically after str2, in the machine's native character set ordering
str1: True if str1 and str2 are equal or if str1 comes lexicographically before str2, in the machine's native character set ordering
str1: True if str1 comes lexicographically before str2, in the machine's native character set ordering
-e: True if file exists
-f: True if file exists and is a regular file
-d: True if file exists and is a directory
-b: True if file exists and is a block special file
-c: True if file exists and is a character special file
-l: True if file exists and is a symbolic link
-F: True if file exists and is a fifo
-r: True if file exists and is readable by the caller
-w: True if file exists and is writable by the caller
-x: True if file exists and is executable by the caller

FILES

The file

COPYING: Tells the copying conditions for this program.

BUGS

For the moment, there is no way to make better string comparisons, for example, by looking at the locale, or offering options to compare strings as case-insensitive etc.

AUTHOR

test was written by Stephan Neuhaus (neuhaus@informatik.uni-kl.de), and last modified on 2 May, 1992.

COPYRIGHT

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 1, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU General Public License (contained in the file COPYING) for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 675 Mass Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139, USA.

This document was created by man2html, using the manual pages.
Time: 17:10:38 GMT, January 31, 2023