Dealing with case sensitive pattern

Words can differ in meaning based on differing use of uppercase and lowercase letters. Linux allow a file to have more than one name. For example, Sample.txt, SAMPLE.txt, and SAMPLE.TXT all are three different file names. The case sensitive problem also applies to the case statement. For example, our backup script can be executed as follows:

./allinonebackup.sh tar

However, the following example will not work, as patterns are case sensitive. You must use command line argument tar and not TAR, Tar, TaR etc:

./allinonebackup.sh TAR

However, you can get around this problem using any one of the following solution.

Solution # 1: Convert pattern to lowercase

You can convert a pattern to lowercase using the tr command and here strings as follows:

echo "TeSt" | tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]'
var="TesT"
tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]' <<<"$var"

You can update the script as follows:

#!/bin/bash
# A shell script to backup mysql, webserver and files to tape
# allinonebackup.sh version 2.0
# -------------------------------------------------------
# covert all passed arguments to lowercase using
# tr command and here strings
opt=$( tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]' <<<"$1" )
case $opt in
        sql)
                echo "Running mysql backup using mysqldump tool..."
                ;;
        sync)
                echo "Running backup using rsync tool..."
                ;;
        tar)
                echo "Running tape backup using tar tool..."
                ;;
        *)
        	    echo "Backup shell script utility"
                echo "Usage: $0 {sql|sync|tar}"
                echo "	sql  : Run mySQL backup utility."
                echo "	sync : Run web server backup utility."	
                echo "	tar  : Run tape backup utility."	;;
esac

Run it as follows:

./allinonebackup.sh TAR
./allinonebackup.sh TaR

Solution # 2: Use regex with case patterns

Case command pattern supports regular expressions, which provide a concise and flexible means for identifying words, or patterns of characters. For example, you can match tar pattern using the following syntax:

[Tt][Aa][Rr]

• The above is called a bracket expression.
• It matches a single character that is contained within the brackets.
  • For example, [tom] matches "t", "o", or "m".
  • [a-z] specifies a range which matches any lowercase letter from "a" to "z".
  • [Aa] matches "A", or "a".
  • [Tt][Aa][Rr] matches "tar", "TAR", "taR", "TaR", etc
• With regex you can avoid the external tr command.
• Here is the update version of the same script:

#!/bin/bash
# A shell script to backup mysql, webserver and files to tape
opt=$1
 
#########################################################
# Use regex to match all command line arguments         #
# [Tt][Aa][Rr] matches "tar", "TAR", "taR", "TaR", etc  #
# [Ss][Qq][Ll] matches "sql", "SQL", "SQl", "SqL", etc  #
#########################################################
case $opt in
        [Ss][Qq][Ll])
                echo "Running mysql backup using mysqldump tool..."
                ;;
        [Ss][Yy][Nn][Cc])
                echo "Running backup using rsync tool..."
                ;;
        [Tt][Aa][Rr])
                echo "Running tape backup using tar tool..."
                ;;
        *)
        	    echo "Backup shell script utility"
                echo "Usage: $0 {sql|sync|tar}"
                echo "	sql  : Run mySQL backup utility."
                echo "	sync : Run web server backup utility."	
                echo "	tar  : Run tape backup utilty."	;;
esac

Solution # 3: Turn on nocasematch

If you turn on nocasematch option, shell matches patterns in a case-insensitive fashion when performing matching while executing case or [[ conditional commands.

How do I turn on nocasematch option?

Type the following command:

shopt -s nocasematch

How do I turn off nocasematch option?

Type the following command:

shopt -u nocasematch

Here is an updated version of the same:

#!/bin/bash
# A shell script to backup mysql, webserver and files to tape
opt=$1
# Turn on a case-insensitive matching (-s set nocasematch)
shopt -s nocasematch
case $opt in
        sql)
                echo "Running mysql backup using mysqldump tool..."
                ;;
        sync)
                echo "Running backup using rsync tool..."
                ;;
        tar)
                echo "Running tape backup using tar tool..."
                ;;
        *)
        	    echo "Backup shell script utility"
                echo "Usage: $0 {sql|sync|tar}"
                echo "	sql  : Run mySQL backup utility."
                echo "	sync : Run web server backup utility."	
                echo "	tar  : Run tape backup utilty."	;;
esac
 
# Turn off a case-insensitive matching (-u unset nocasematch)
shopt -u nocasematch

See also

• set command
• shopt command