Weird bash results using cut

Question

I am trying to run this command:

./smstocurl SLASH2.911325850268888.911325850268896

smstocurl script:

#SLASH2.911325850268888.911325850268896
model=$(echo \&model=$1 | cut -d'.' -f 1)
echo $model
imea1=$(echo \&simImea1=$1 | cut -d'.' -f 2)
echo $imea1
imea2=$(echo \&simImea2=$1 | cut -d'.' -f 3)
echo $imea2
echo $model$imea1$imea2

Result Received

&model=SLASH2911325850268888911325850268896

Result Expected

&model=SLASH2&simImea1=911325850268888&simImea2=911325850268896

What am I missing here ?

Answer 1

You are cutting based on the dot .. In the first case your desired string contains the first string, the one containing &model, so then it is printed.

However, in the other cases you get the 2nd and 3rd blocks (-f2, -f3), so that the imea text gets cutted off.

Instead, I would use something like this:

while IFS="." read -r model imea1 imea2
do
    printf "&model=%s&simImea1=%s&simImea2=%s\n" $model $imea1 $imea2
done <<< "$1"

Note the usage of printf and variables to have more control about what we are writing. Using a lot of escapes like in your echos can be risky.

Test

while IFS="." read -r model imea1 imea2; do printf "&model=%s&simImea1=%s&simImea2=%s\n" $model $imea1 $imea2
done <<< "SLASH2.911325850268888.911325850268896"

Returns:

&model=SLASH2&simImea1=911325850268888&simImea2=911325850268896

---

Alternatively, this sed makes it:

sed -r 's/^([^.]*)\.([^.]*)\.([^.]*)$/\&model=\1\&simImea1=\2\&simImea2=\3/' <<< "$1"

by catching each block of words separated by dots and printing back.