How to use zenity file selection

Question

I am new to zenity and I am trying to make a simple script for loading a file using zenity --file-selection and the wc command to get the word count of that file. I have successfully made a form which can be used to browse the file but I am unable to get any output. Can you please tell me where I am making the mistake?

My current script is:

#creates a box

if zenity --entry \
--title="Word count" \
--text="Enter file location" \
--entry-text "File path"

  then
#Zenity file selection code for browsing and selecting files

FILE=`zenity --file-selection --title="Select a File"`
case $? in
         0)
                echo "\"$FILE\" selected.";;
         1)
                echo "No file selected.";;
        -1)
                echo "An unexpected error has occurred.";;
esac

# To show the location in the text box

if zenity --entry \
--title="Word count" \
--text="Enter file location" \
--entry-text "$FILE"
then

#word counting code

word_count='wc $FILE'
zenity --info --title="Word Counted" --text="Counted words $word_count"
fi
fi

How is it that you ran `FILE=\`zenity ...`, yet `wordcount='wc..`? — muru, Mar 22 '15 at 12:22
@muru i just copy pasted that code from a website and modified according to my script :) — Eka, Mar 22 '15 at 12:46
case -1 is never reached as a return code cannot be negative — user3728501, Apr 17 '19 at 00:20

score 9 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 22 '15 at 12:21

9

In order to save the output of a command in a variable, you must enclose the command in backtics (`command`) or, better, in $() ($(command)). You are using single quotes which means that you are saving the string wc $FILE and not actually running wc:

$ foo='wc /etc/fstab' ## WRONG
$ echo $foo
wc /etc/fstab

$ foo=`wc /etc/fstab`  ## RIGHT
$ echo $foo 
23 96 994 /etc/fstab

$ foo=$(wc /etc/fstab)   ## RIGHT
$ echo $foo 
23 96 994 /etc/fstab

In addition, in order to get only the words and not the number of characters and lines, use the -w option:

$ foo=$(wc -w /etc/fstab)   
$ echo $foo 
96 /etc/fstab

Finally, to get the number alone, with no file name, you can use:

$ foo $(wc -w /etc/fstab | cut -d ' ' -f 1 )
$ echo $foo
96

answered Mar 22 '15 at 12:21

terdon

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Hey thanks for solving this problem..i was stuck in this error for some time. Can i ask one more question. how can i add an additional button to my form – Eka Mar 22 '15 at 12:29
@Eka I don't know zenity but in any case, please ask new questions by posting a new Question. – terdon Mar 22 '15 at 12:38
1

@Eka my last example shows how to get the number of words alone. If you want all the info just without the filename, the simplest is to pass it to `wc` as an input stream instead of a file name: `wc < "$FILE"` – terdon Mar 22 '15 at 12:41

0x2b3bfa0 · Answer 2 · 2015-03-23T08:54:42.223

I think that the correct code may be this:

#!/bin/bash

function count() {
  word_count=$(wc -w < "$FILE")
  zenity --info --title="Word Counted" --text="Counted words $word_count"
}

function choose() {
  FILE="$(zenity --file-selection --title='Select a File')"
  case $? in
           0)
                  count;;
           1)
                  zenity --question \
                         --title="Word counter" \
                         --text="No file selected. Do you want to select one?" \
                         && choose || exit;;
          -1)
                  echo "An unexpected error has occurred."; exit;;
  esac
}

choose

`FILE="$(zenity --file-selection --title="Select a File")"` I think this is a syntax error. — Ismael Miguel, Mar 23 '15 at 00:46

How to use zenity file selection

2 Answers2