Question

I tried running a script file using bash but it showed an error

bash-3.2$ example.sh : command not found

I also tried
ls -l example.sh

I found that it was not executable, so I used
sudo chmod 777 example.sh

I again tried running it but same error was coming. I double checked that I am in the same folder as the file using ls. But still I am not able to execute the script file.

I finally tried making a dummy script file and running it , and found the same error

I think there is some problem with BASH. Can some one help me with what is the problem?

I am working on redhat, bash was already installed in my system

Since I am newbie on linux any help would be appreciated

Answer 1

bash search for commands in your $PATH. Apparently the current directory, ., is not in your $PATH. (This is a good thing; having . in your $PATH is insecure.)

You’ll need to specify a directory name. Just type:

./example.sh

Incidentally, doing:

sudo chmod 777 example.sh

is two kinds of overkill. First, you don’t need to use sudo; use sudo only when you actually need to. Presumably your personal account owns the file, so you can just use chmod directly.

Second, 777 is way too permissive. It allows anyone on the system to read, execute, or modify example.sh. (If you’re the only person on the system it may not matter much, but it’s still a bad habit.) Typically you should use 755 for directories and for files that need to be executable, and 644 for files that don’t need to be executable.

Or just use

chmod +x example.sh

to set execute permission (your umask will prevent that from setting the permissions too loosely).