[ This is just a pointer to a document, which you might find helpful] Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide A complete guide to shell scripting, using Bash Mendel Cooper - Brindlesoft thegrendel@theriver.com This tutorial assumes no previous knowledge of scripting or programming, but progresses rapidly toward an intermediate/advanced level of instruction (...all the while sneaking in little snippets of UNIX wisdom and lore). It serves as a textbook, a manual for self-study, and a reference and source of knowledge on shell scripting techniques. The exercises and heavily- commented examples invite active reader participation, under the premise that the only way to really learn scripting is to write scripts. The guide is availabe at http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ The latest update of this document, as an archived "tarball" including both the SGML source and rendered HTML, may be downloaded from the author's home site (http://personal.riverusers.com/~thegrendel/abs-guide-2.1.tar.bz2). See the change log for a revision history (http://personal.riverusers.com/~thegrendel/Change.log).