Question

I have one shell script opening a perl script. This perl script should be opened in a terminal. I am able to open the terminal but I’m unable to call a cd to reach the perl script’s location

    $PROJECT_DIR = "$PROJECT_DIR";

    echo "$PROJECT_DIR" > "$PROJECT_DIR/Testing/buildProductPathHello.txt"

osascript -e 'tell app "Terminal"
    do script "pwd"
    do script "cd $PROJECT_DIR" in window 1
    do script "ls" in window 1
    do script "./RunTests.pl" in window 1
end tell'

The variable $PROJECT_DIR contains the path, I am verifying this by writing the path into a file. Ultimately, it’s the command cd $PROJECT_DIR is the one that does not work. Does not do cd on the content of the variable.

PS: this is on a mac with a bash shell

Answer 1

Environment variables are specific to each process, too.

The way you’re invoking osascript, with a single-quoted string, tells the original instance of bash not to substitute for variable names. It actually sends "cd $PROJECT_DIR" to osascript, which sends cd $PROJECT_DIR to Terminal.

But $PROJECT_DIR is not set in the receiving bash process – the one running inside your Terminal window. You can verify that by adding a line like do script "set" in window 1 or do script "echo $PROJECT_DIR" in window 1.

If you enclose the part of the script with the variable name in double quotes, the original bash process will substitute the value of $PROJECT_DIR instead:

osascript -e 'tell app "Terminal"
    do script "pwd"
    do script "cd '"$PROJECT_DIR"'" in window 1
    do script "ls" in window 1
    do script "./RunTests.pl" in window 1
end tell'

(syntax suggested by CharlesDuffy)