Unable to set variables in bash script

Question

I am attempting to automate moving files from a folder to a new folder automatically every night using a bash script run from AppleScript on a schedule. I am attempting to write a bash script on Mac OSX, and it keeps failing. In short this is what I have (all my `echo`s are for error checking): ``` #!/bin/bash folder = "ABC" useracct = 'test' day = date "+%d" month = date "+%B" year = date "+%Y" folderToBeMoved = "/users/$useracct/Documents/Archive/Primetime.eyetv" newfoldername = "/Volumes/Media/Network/$folder/$month$day$year" ECHO "Network is $network" $network ECHO "day is $day" ECHO "Month is $month" ECHO "YEAR is $year" ECHO "source is $folderToBeMoved" ECHO "dest is $newfoldername" mkdir $newfoldername cp -R $folderToBeMoved $newfoldername if [-f $newfoldername/Primetime.eyetv]; then rm $folderToBeMoved; fi ``` Now my first problem is that I cannot set variables at all. Even literal ones where I just make it equal some literal. All my `echo`s come out blank. I cannot grab the d…

Accepted Answer

Assignment in bash scripts cannot have spaces around the `=` and you probably want your date commands enclosed in backticks `$()`:

```
#!/bin/bash
folder="ABC"
useracct='test'
day=$(date "+%d")
month=$(date "+%B")
year=$(date "+%Y")
folderToBeMoved="/users/$useracct/Documents/Archive/Primetime.eyetv"
newfoldername="/Volumes/Media/Network/$folder/$month$day$year"
ECHO "Network is $network" $network
ECHO "day is $day"
ECHO "Month is $month"
ECHO "YEAR is $year"
ECHO "source is $folderToBeMoved"
ECHO "dest is $newfoldername"
mkdir $newfoldername
cp -R $folderToBeMoved $newfoldername
if [-f $newfoldername/Primetime.eyetv]; then rm $folderToBeMoved; fi
```

With the last three lines commented out, for me this outputs:

```
Network is 
day is 16
Month is March
YEAR is 2010
source is /users/test/Documents/Archive/Primetime.eyetv
dest is /Volumes/Media/Network/ABC/March162010
```

Unable to set variables in bash script

Solution

Problem

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