Reading a file with while into variable and using in another process

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

I would appreciate some help, please.

I have a file cutshellb.txt, which contains four report names (but it could be any number from 1 to x. The report suffix is not necessarily consecutive:

report3785
report3786
report3787
report3788

I have a shell script which attempts to read the names and use them as a parameter in another script to run a mail package:

#!/bin/ksh
for line in `/usr/bin/cat /u1/cutshellb.txt`; do
 /u1/sendreportmail.sh MYPRT=$(`echo "$line"`) 1>sendmail.log 2>&1
done

The script contains:

cd /u1/mail/bin/
./mailsend -i -vvvv   -tany_person@mailaddress.uk -s "Mail report " 
 -a/u1/$MYPRT.pdf "  "

I would appreciate some pointers - even if it is just that this is not possible.

I found this format MYPRT=$(`echo "$line"`) on a website which suggested that there are difficulties with passing variables between parent and child processes with pipes especially within ifs and whiles.

2

how about somethign like this:

#!/bin/ksh
for line in `/usr/bin/cat /u1/cutshellb.txt`; do
 /u1/sendreportmail.sh "$line" 1>sendmail.log 2>&1
done

and in the script have:

cd /u1/mail/bin/
./mailsend -i -vvvv   -tany_person@mailaddress.uk -s "Mail report " 
 -a/u1/$1.pdf "  "

But why not simply incorporate the mailsend command into the orriginal script ?
like:

#!/bin/ksh
for line in `/usr/bin/cat /u1/cutshellb.txt`; do
 /u1/mail/bin/mailsend -i -vvvv   -tany_person@mailaddress.uk -s "Mail report " 
 -a/u1/$line.pdf "  " 1>sendmail.log 2>&1
3 
bash: /usr/bin/cat: No such file or directory

More accurate would be:

for word in `/usr/bin/cat /u1/cutshellb.txt`; do

You are reading a word, not a line, into the variable.

The correct way to read a file line by line is:

while IFS= read -r line
do
  : do whatever
done < /u1/cutshellb.txt

In bash4, you can read a file into an array with mapfile:

mapfile -t array < /u1/cutshellb.txt
4

Just a quick thank-you both for your help.
Have now incorporated into the one process and am using 'for word in...' and the alternative 'while IFS' successfully