12.7. Functions
Functions were introduced to the Bourne shell in AT&T's UNIX SystemVR2 and have been enhanced in the Bourne Again shell. A function is a name for a command or group of commands. Functions are used to modularize your program and make it more efficient. They are executed in context of the current shell. In other words, a child process is not spawned as it is when running an executable program such as ls. You may even store functions in another file and load them into your script when you are ready to use them.
Here is a review of some of the important rules about using functions.
The shell determines whether you are using an alias, a function, a built-in command, or an executable program (or script) found on the disk. It looks for ...
Get UNIX® Shells by Example, Third Edition now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
