[NTLUG:Discuss] Shell script help

[Fred James]

Daniel
Two Unix/Linux commands to explore
    basename
    dirname
the first returns the filename, stripping off the path, and the second 
does the opposite.  Hope this helps
Regards
Fred James

. Daniel wrote:

>This should probably be real easy for someone with experience.  It'd be 
>pretty easy to write in C, so I'm a little embarassed that I find this so 
>challenging.  Here's the scenario:
>
>GNOME's Nautilus has user-scripts.  This, I thought, would be a terrific 
>vehicle for me to be able to create a "powertoy" (to borrow an expression 
>from Microsoft) that I once used frequently when I used Windows.  In this 
>case, the tool would let me right-click on a folder and "Launch Command 
>Prompt Here" where it would open a command shell window with the current 
>working directory was set to the location of the folder indicated.  So 
>that's what I want to do here.
>
>What I have to work with is the environment variable:
>$NAUTILUS_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS
>
>My script, as it is, kinda works.  It consists of two lines:
>
>#!/bin/sh
>cd $NAUTILUS_SCRIPT_SELECTED_FILE_PATHS
>gnome-terminal --geometry=132x25
>
>Since Nautilus does not determine whether the file indicated is a file or a 
>folder, the script is available always.  So I would like the behavior to 
>be:
>
>If it's a folder, change to that directory.  If it's a file, change to the 
>directory that file is in.
>
>In my mind, the logic would go something like:
>
>if filename is a file then
>  trim filename back to the last folder name
>endif
>chgdir filename
>
>The trouble is that I can't figure out a way to trim the filename off the 
>end of full path list.  
>
>So my request to any and all shell script wizards is "how do I trim a 
>filename off the end of a pathlist?"  e.g. make 
>"/home/username/pictures/dsc00054.jpg" into "/home/username/pictures"
>
>
>
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