Question

I have a function

foo_bar()
{
  echo "foo_bar"
  read -p "enter option" option
  echo $option
}


option=$(foo_bar)
echo $option

It returns

enter option
and then in one line
foo_bar [option]

What I am expecting is the execution follows the order I write it..
i.e like

foo_bar
enter option

[option]

How do i do this in shell script

Answer 1

You are capturing the output of foo_bar in the variable option. That output includes the text that foo_bar echos. (That is, you are assigning the string foo_bar\n$option to the variable option, and echo is replacing the newline with a space) However, read -p prints its prompt to stderr. If you want “foo_bar” to print to the same place that read prints its prompt, do so explicitly:

foo_bar()
{
  echo "foo_bar" >&2
  read -p "enter option" option
  echo $option
}


option=$(foo_bar)
echo $option