I am working with a bash script and I want to execute a function to print a return value:
function fun1(){
return 34
}
function fun2(){
local res=$(fun1)
echo $res
}
When I execute fun2
, it does not print "34". Why is this the case?
Although bash has a return
statement, the only thing you can specify with it is the function's own exit
status (a value between 0
and 255
, 0 meaning "success"). So return
is not what you want.
You might want to convert your return
statement to an echo
statement - that way your function output could be captured using $()
braces, which seems to be exactly what you want.
Here is an example:
function fun1(){
echo 34
}
function fun2(){
local res=$(fun1)
echo $res
}
Another way to get the return value (if you just want to return an integer 0-255) is $?
.
function fun1(){
return 34
}
function fun2(){
fun1
local res=$?
echo $res
}
Also, note that you can use the return value to use boolean logic like fun1 || fun2
will only run fun2
if fun1
returns a non-0
value. The default return value is the exit value of the last statement executed within the function.