Question

I have the following two chunks of code, I am not so sure what $? and $# stand for. Please help.

CODE ONE

 #!/bin/bashUSERID="$1" 
 /bin/id $USERID 2>/dev/null
[ $? -eq 0 ] && echo "User found" || echo "User not found"

/bin/id -g $USERID 2>/dev/null
[ $? -eq 0 ] && echo "Group found" || echo "Group not found"    `


$ cat > mtable

CODE TWO

#!/bin/sh
#
#Script to test for loop
#
#
if [ $# -eq 0 ]
then
echo "Error - Number missing form command line argument"
echo "Syntax : $0 number"
echo "Use to print multiplication table for given number"
exit 1
fi
n=$1
for i in 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
do
echo "$n * $i = `expr $i \* $n`"
done

Thank you

Answer 1

Have a look at the man page for bash:

$# Expands to the number of positional parameters in decimal

$? Expands to the status of the most recently executed foreground pipeline.