Re: unbalanced parenthesis not recognized

[Greg Wooledge]

On Thu, Nov 18, 2021 at 10:34:40AM +0100, Harald Dunkel wrote:
> Hi folks,
> 
> I am not sure, but shouldn't bash 5.1.4 complain about
> 
>       : ${SSLDIR}:="${JM_WORK}/ssl"}

There's no syntax error here.  It may be a bug, in the sense that it
doesn't do what you wanted it to do, but from the shell's point of
view, it's a valid command.

You've got ${SSLDIR} which is a parameter expansion, not quoted.
You've also got ${JM_WORK} which is another parameter expansion, this
time inside quotes.  In addition, you've got the literal character
strings := and /ssl and } which are just extra text.

The resulting command, after expansions, may look something like
this:

  : /foo/bar:=/home/jm/work/ssl}

This command has no effect.

> at least due to unbalanced parenthesis? The correct version
> would be
> 
>       : ${SSLDIR:="${JM_WORK}/ssl"}

That's a very different command indeed.  That one potentially modifies
the value of the SSLDIR variable.