[bug #66363] "test" builtin command, -a arg not working as expected

[anonymous]

URL:
  <https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?66363>

                 Summary: "test" builtin command, -a arg not working as
expected
                   Group: The GNU Bourne-Again SHell
               Submitter: None
               Submitted: Mon 21 Oct 2024 10:18:53 AM UTC
                Category: None
                Severity: 3 - Normal
              Item Group: None
                  Status: None
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any


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Follow-up Comments:


-------------------------------------------------------
Date: Mon 21 Oct 2024 10:18:53 AM UTC By: Anonymous
$ test -n "" -a x -ge 4
bash: test: x: integer expression expected

In the above shown, output, bash correctly reports that "x" isn't right as it
expects an integer on the left hand side of the -ge arg. However, I do not
expect bash to evaluate the expression on the right side of the -a arg as the
left side of the -a arg should always evaluate to false (therefore the right
side expression should not be evaluated, IMO).

This issue came up in practice when I did something like this:
$ if test -n "$2" -a "$2" -ge 4; then 

I was making sure an 2nd argument was supplied to my script before doing any
integer comparisons on it.

I ended up working around the issue by changing the line to something like:
$ if test -n "$2" && test "$2" -ge 4; then

I think this is the second time I've been caught out by this unexpected
behavior of the test command.

Cheers







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