Check if bash variable equals 0 [duplicate]

Solution 1:

Looks like your depth variable is unset. This means that the expression [ $depth -eq $zero ] becomes [ -eq 0 ] after bash substitutes the values of the variables into the expression. The problem here is that the -eq operator is incorrectly used as an operator with only one argument (the zero), but it requires two arguments. That is why you get the unary operator error message.

EDIT: As Doktor J mentioned in his comment to this answer, a safe way to avoid problems with unset variables in checks is to enclose the variables in "". See his comment for the explanation.

if [ "$depth" -eq "0" ]; then
   echo "false";
   exit;
fi

An unset variable used with the [ command appears empty to bash. You can verify this using the below tests which all evaluate to true because xyz is either empty or unset:

• if [ -z ] ; then echo "true"; else echo "false"; fi
• xyz=""; if [ -z "$xyz" ] ; then echo "true"; else echo "false"; fi
• unset xyz; if [ -z "$xyz" ] ; then echo "true"; else echo "false"; fi

Solution 2:

Double parenthesis (( ... )) is used for arithmetic operations.

Double square brackets [[ ... ]] can be used to compare and examine numbers (only integers are supported), with the following operators:

· NUM1 -eq NUM2 returns true if NUM1 and NUM2 are numerically equal.

· NUM1 -ne NUM2 returns true if NUM1 and NUM2 are not numerically equal.

· NUM1 -gt NUM2 returns true if NUM1 is greater than NUM2.

· NUM1 -ge NUM2 returns true if NUM1 is greater than or equal to NUM2.

· NUM1 -lt NUM2 returns true if NUM1 is less than NUM2.

· NUM1 -le NUM2 returns true if NUM1 is less than or equal to NUM2.

For example

if [[ $age > 21 ]] # bad, > is a string comparison operator

if [ $age > 21 ] # bad, > is a redirection operator

if [[ $age -gt 21 ]] # okay, but fails if $age is not numeric

if (( $age > 21 )) # best, $ on age is optional