Testing a bash shell script [duplicate]

Question

Can someone explain how to test for a bash shell script?

For example i've got a .sh file with this code in it...

#!/bin/sh

for file in *.txt; do
    mv "$file" "`basename $file .txt`.doc"
done

How do I write a test for it? Like in Java you've got unit testing where you write code like assertEquals to test the code gives the desired output.

Answer 1

Try this out: assert.sh

source "./assert.sh"

local expected actual
expected="Hello"
actual="World!"
assert_eq "$expected" "$actual" "not equivalent!"
# => x Hello == World :: not equivalent! 

Answer 2

You can do asserts in Bash. Check out this from the Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide:

http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/debugging.html#ASSERT

Answer 3

I'd add an echo in front of the mv to verify that the right commands are being created, for starters. (Always a good idea with commands that make possibly difficult to undo changes.)

Some possibly useful resources:

• shUnit2 — xUnit framework for script unit testing
• Bash IDE for Vim
• Bash debugger