Iterate Over Files in Variable Path (Bash)

Question

I was looking for the best way to find iterate over files in a variables path and came across this question.

However, this and every other solution I've found uses a literal path rather than a variable, and I believe this is my problem.

for file in "${path}/*"
do
     echo "INFO - Checking $file"
     [[ -e "$file" ]] || continue
done

Even though there are definitely files in the directory (and if i put one of the literal paths in place of ${path} I get the expected result), this always only iterates once, and the value of $file is always the literal value of ${path}/* without any globbing.

What am I doing wrong?

@anubhava that was it! If you want to post it as an answer I'll gladly accept. Globbing doesn't occur for variables within double quotes I'm guessing? — Jordan Mackie, Jun 26 '18 at 14:12

score 10 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 26 '18 at 14:15

10

Glob expansion doesn't happen inside quotes (both single and double) in shell.

You should be using this code:

for file in "$path"/*; do
     echo "INFO - Checking $file"
     [[ -e $file ]] || continue
done

answered Jun 26 '18 at 14:15

anubhava

761,203
64
569
643

1

See [this thread](https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/239772/bash-iterate-file-list-except-when-empty) for more tips on how to handle an empty directory when iterating with globs. – Antonin Décimo Jun 29 '21 at 09:52

Iterate Over Files in Variable Path (Bash)

1 Answers1