How-To get root directory of given path in bash?

bash, directory, dirname, path

Solution

I've found a solution:

    #/usr/bin/env bash
    DIRECTORY="/home/user/example/foo/bar"
    BASE_DIRECTORY=$(echo "$DIRECTORY" | cut -d "/" -f2)
    echo "#$BASE_DIRECTORY#";

This returns always the first directory. In this example it would return following:

    #home#

Thanks to @condorwasabi for his idea with awk! :)

Problem

My script: ``` #!/usr/bin/env bash PATH=/home/user/example/foo/bar mkdir -p /tmp/backup$PATH ``` And now I want to get first folder of "$PATH": /home/ ``` cd /tmp/backup rm -rf ./home/ cd - > /dev/null ``` How can I always detect the first folder like the example above? "dirname $PATH" just returns "/home/user/example/foo/". Thanks in advance! :)

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