Giving Input in a script

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

Hi,

I am a newbie to scripting. I want to know something..Is there any way that I can do this?

Here is the thing.. there are so many printer queues in which i need to change a certain option.. am using the hppi utility and i need to modify the printer configuration individually going to each printer and change ...
What I am doing right now is :
hppi, then entering option 1, then entering option 3 to modify the settings, giving the printer queue name and then changing the parameter.

What i want to know is :
Is there any way that I can enter the values 1 and 3 and the printer name in a script?? Then I would select the setting, change it ??

Thanks in advance ... :slight_smile:

2

You can programatically answer program prompts, in a script this is called a here document:
I have not used hppi, so I don't know what you mean by select. Once you start a here doc, ALL of the answers have to be pre-programmed. I'll create something for you to work with - YOU need to change it.

#!/bin/ksh
# set_pr.sh
# $1 == printer name
# $2 == printer setting to select  
hppi << EOF
1
3
"$1"
"$2"
EOF

execute

chmod +x set_pr.sh

so you can run the script

usage: ./set_pr.sh printer34 OptionA

If you need help with changing the script let us know.

1 Like
3

Thanks Jim..that worked :slight_smile:
Have another problem here... As i said, there are a lot of inputs that we need to give..if it doesn't get an input it seems to going into an infinite loop..is there any way to stop it??

4

hi.. try this...

if [ $# != 2 ]
then
        echo "incorrect number of arguments. Exitting !!!"
        exit 1;
fi

$# = the number of arguments that you are passing in the script.
here i have considered that i have only 2 arguments passing..
If there are say 5 arguments, the condition will look like -

if [ $# != 5 ]
then
        echo "incorrect number of arguments. Exitting !!!"
        exit 1;
fi

so the final code will be as follows :

 
#!/bin/ksh
# set_pr.sh
# $1 == printer name
# $2 == printer setting to select  
if [ $# != 5 ]
then
        echo "incorrect number of arguments. Exitting !!!"
        exit 1;
fi
hppi << EOF
1
3
"$1"
"$2"
EOF

If the desired number of arguments are not entered, the shell will quit stating this error:

sh set_pr.sh
incorrect number of arguments. Exitting !!!

Regards,
A!

1 Like