Question

Is it possible to run bash script in a temporary folder other than the one in which it actually resides ?

My script uses a lot of filenames .I am concerned that one of the many names may coincide with others in the folder . I have named the files according to the data contained , taking reusability into consideration .

Does mktemp -d and tempfile -d do the same ? If so , can someone please illustrate its usage with an example.

Thanks in advance for the replies .

Answer 1

You can switch directories in a running script easily. Bash has a notion of the present working directory, which you can change at any time. For example:

dir=$(mktemp -d)

cd "$dir"
echo "Current directory changed: $PWD"

cd "$OLDPWD"
echo "Back in the old directory: $PWD"