Matching regex in bash

Question

I'm trying to match the parameters of a bash script with a regex

mykill.bash [-l] [-s SIGNO] pattern1 pattern2

I'm using this expression:

regex = ^(-l)?(\s-s\s[0-9]+)?(\s[a-zA-Z0-9]+){1,2}$ <br>
if [[ $@ =~ $regex ]]; then echo 'cool'

for example ./mykill.bash -l -s 33 abc gives $@='-l -s 33 abc' which passes the debuggex.com tests (see image but it doesn't work in my script

Answer 1

You have bash problems, not a regex problem.

When assigning variables in bash: no space around the = please. Then if you want to preserve backslashes and whitespace in the regex, use single quotes around it, otherwise bash eats them for breakfast. You don't need to quote cool. And close the if with a fi.

regex='^(-l)?(\s-s\s[0-9]+)?(\s[a-zA-Z0-9]+){1,2}$ <br>'
if [[ $@ =~ $regex ]]; then echo cool; fi

Or use the simpler form of the conditional:

[[ $@ =~ $regex ]] && echo cool