basename "$0" not working

Question

I have this command:

 base_name="$(basename "$0")";

and I am getting this error:

basename: illegal option -- b

usage: basename string [suffix] basename [-a] [-s suffix] string [...]

anyone know what's going on with that?

@jeffschaller has a good answer, but what is your actual goal, to learn the name of the shell? https://askubuntu.com/questions/590899/how-do-i-check-which-shell-i-am-using/1022440#1022440 — Evan Benn, Aug 30 '19 at 01:44

score 7 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 29 '19 at 16:49

7

My lucky guess would be that $0 contains the string -bash and so your command becomes:

basename -bash

which basename interprets as a single-character option "b". Change that to:

base_name="$(basename -- "$0")";

... so that basename is told to stop looking for options.

answered Aug 29 '19 at 16:49

Jeff Schaller

is this the case for non-OSX as well? – Alexander Mills Aug 29 '19 at 16:50
4

@AlexanderMills Any Unix. – Kusalananda Aug 29 '19 at 16:52
coreutil's basename gets confused without it; AIX's handles it, but also honors `--` as end-of-options. I can't speak to others off-hand. – Jeff Schaller Aug 29 '19 at 16:52

1 Answers1