Moving sqlite output into bash array

Question

I am trying to load some sqlite3 output into an /n-delimited bash array. Seems like it should be a simple thing, but the read statement doesn't seem to produce any output. Echoing fqry just prior to the IFS statement confirms that the sqlite query is loading its output into a string correctly. But nothing appears to be getting into farray at all.

cmd="SELECT * FROM format"
fqry=`sqlite3 data.db "$cmd"`
IFS=$'\n' 
read -ra farray <<< "$fqry"
for f in "${farray[@]}"
do
echo "$f"
done

mata · Accepted Answer · 2016-07-08 05:52:03Z

4

Use compound array assignment to create an indexed array instead of read:

cmd="SELECT * FROM format"
IFS=$'\n'
fqry=(`sqlite3 data.db "$cmd"`)

for f in "${fqry[@]}"; do
    echo "$f"
done

answered Jul 8, 2016 at 5:52

mata

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4 Comments

kwksdy Over a year ago

Works perfectly. Thanks!

phil294 Over a year ago

what if the entries contain newlines?

mata Over a year ago

@Blauhirn then it gets complicated using bash. No matter what output line separator or IFS you use, you won't have any guarantee that it won't also appear in the db. Safest way would be to count the number of lines and then execute a query for each line (using LIMIT ...), but that has obvious drawbacks and is not atomic... I'd probably just use python instead.

phil294 Over a year ago

@mata ok thanks. I solved it using select replace(the_column, char(10), 'my_linebreak_replacement12321') from ... and handle it accordingly. not optimal, but enough for my case.

hflzh · Accepted Answer · 2016-07-08 06:27:50Z

2

You need to use the read -d option to define another delim, rather than the default newline character \n, to indicate the termination of the input line,

read -d '' -ra farray <<< "$fqry"

answered Jul 8, 2016 at 6:27

hflzh

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