Difference between korn and bash shell [closed]

Question

I am completely new to Unix. Presently, I have been asked to learn about both KornShell (ksh) and Bash shell. Can some one please give me a short overview about the two?

Is the term "shell" synonymous to "terminal"?

I understand that I can read documents about both online. But I believe that an overview from an experienced Unix programmer will help me better understand.

Answer 1

Post from UNIX.COM

Shell features

This table below lists most features that I think would make you choose one shell over another. It is not intended to be a definitive list and does not include every single possible feature for every single possible shell. A feature is only considered to be in a shell if in the version that comes with the operating system, or if it is available as compiled directly from the standard distribution. In particular the C shell specified below is that available on SUNOS 4.*, a considerable number of vendors now ship either tcsh or their own enhanced C shell instead (they don't always make it obvious that they are shipping tcsh.

Code:

                                     sh   csh  ksh  bash tcsh zsh  rc   es
Job control                          N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    N    N
Aliases                              N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    N    N
Shell functions                      Y(1) N    Y    Y    N    Y    Y    Y
"Sensible" Input/Output redirection  Y    N    Y    Y    N    Y    Y    Y
Directory stack                      N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    F    F
Command history                      N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Command line editing                 N    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Vi Command line editing              N    N    Y    Y    Y(3) Y    L    L
Emacs Command line editing           N    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Rebindable Command line editing      N    N    N    Y    Y    Y    L    L
User name look up                    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Login/Logout watching                N    N    N    N    Y    Y    F    F
Filename completion                  N    Y(1) Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Username completion                  N    Y(2) Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Hostname completion                  N    Y(2) Y    Y    Y    Y    L    L
History completion                   N    N    N    Y    Y    Y    L    L
Fully programmable Completion        N    N    N    N    Y    Y    N    N
Mh Mailbox completion                N    N    N    N(4) N(6) N(6) N    N
Co Processes                         N    N    Y    N    N    Y    N    N
Builtin artithmetic evaluation       N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    N    N
Can follow symbolic links invisibly  N    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    N    N
Periodic command execution           N    N    N    N    Y    Y    N    N
Custom Prompt (easily)               N    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y
Sun Keyboard Hack                    N    N    N    N    N    Y    N    N
Spelling Correction                  N    N    N    N    Y    Y    N    N
Process Substitution                 N    N    N    Y(2) N    Y    Y    Y
Underlying Syntax                    sh   csh  sh   sh   csh  sh   rc   rc
Freely Available                     N    N    N(5) Y    Y    Y    Y    Y
Checks Mailbox                       N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    F    F
Tty Sanity Checking                  N    N    N    N    Y    Y    N    N
Can cope with large argument lists   Y    N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y
Has non-interactive startup file     N    Y    Y(7) Y(7) Y    Y    N    N
Has non-login startup file           N    Y    Y(7) Y    Y    Y    N    N
Can avoid user startup files         N    Y    N    Y    N    Y    Y    Y
Can specify startup file             N    N    Y    Y    N    N    N    N
Low level command redefinition       N    N    N    N    N    N    N    Y
Has anonymous functions              N    N    N    N    N    N    Y    Y
List Variables                       N    Y    Y    N    Y    Y    Y    Y
Full signal trap handling            Y    N    Y    Y    N    Y    Y    Y
File no clobber ability              N    Y    Y    Y    Y    Y    N    F
Local variables                      N    N    Y    Y    N    Y    Y    Y
Lexically scoped variables           N    N    N    N    N    N    N    Y
Exceptions                           N    N    N    N    N    N    N    Y

Key to the table above.

Y Feature can be done using this shell.

N Feature is not present in the shell.

F Feature can only be done by using the shells function mechanism.

L The readline library must be linked into the shell to enable this Feature.

Notes to the table above

1. This feature was not in the original version, but has since become
   almost standard.
2. This feature is fairly new and so is often not found on many
   versions of the shell, it is gradually making its way into
   standard distribution.
3. The Vi emulation of this shell is thought by many to be
   incomplete.
4. This feature is not standard but unofficial patches exist to
   perform this.
5. A version called 'pdksh' is freely available, but does not have
   the full functionality of the AT&T version.
6. This can be done via the shells programmable completion mechanism.
7. Only by specifying a file via the ENV environment variable.

Answer 2

There are open source versions of ksh. You can run it on Linux. There was an older ksh for OSS called pdksh that acted somewhat differently than the newer ksh and that may be why folks didn't like it.

There are several differences - bash has most of what ksh does and then some extra stuff. A script written to run in ksh would likely run in bash just fine. A lot of the differences deal with math, variables, arrays, functions etc... - bash just seems to have a hell of lot more of this than ksh

ksh is available on multiple platforms by default but bash would have to be specifically added. On the flip side though, most Linux distros come with bash and you have to add ksh if you want it.

The vi style editing that ksh used by default but not bash. However, you can type "set -o vi" in bash to get that same functionality.

one reason for using ksh for scripting is, this shell is available on nearly all existing flavours of *nix. Bash is not installed by default on all *nix.