Multi-dimensional arrays in Bash

Question

I am planning a script to manage some pieces of my Linux systems and am at the point of deciding if I want to use bash or python.

I would prefer to do this as a Bash script simply because the commands are easier, but the real deciding factor is configuration. I need to be able to store a multi-dimensional array in the configuration file to tell the script what to do with itself. Storing simple key=value pairs in config files is easy enough with bash, but the only way I can think of to do a multi-dimensional array is a two layer parsing engine, something like

array=&d1|v1;v2;v3&d2|v1;v2;v3

but the marshall/unmarshall code could get to be a bear and its far from user friendly for the next poor sap that has to administer this. If i can't do this easily in bash i will simply write the configs to an xml file and write the script in python.

Is there an easy way to do this in bash?

thanks everyone.

Answer 1

Bash does not support multidimensional arrays, nor hashes, and it seems that you want a hash that values are arrays. This solution is not very beautiful, a solution with an xml file should be better :

array=('d1=(v1 v2 v3)' 'd2=(v1 v2 v3)')
for elt in "${array[@]}";do eval $elt;done
echo "d1 ${#d1[@]} ${d1[@]}"
echo "d2 ${#d2[@]} ${d2[@]}"

EDIT: this answer is quite old, since since bash 4 supports hash tables, see also this answer for a solution without eval.