Bash script to download files using Curl

Question

I am trying to bring down a small batch of script to upload files for which the URL is the first parameter and the local file name as the second parameter. In testing, I found out that it disconnects in space in the name of the output file, so I tried to use sed to avoid them, but it does not work.

#!/bin/bash clear echo Downloading $1 echo filename=`sed -e "s/ /\\\ /g" $2` echo $filename echo eval curl -# -C - -o $filename $1 

but i get a message

sed: outfile.txt: no such file or directory

which suggests trying to load the output file as input to sed instead of treating the output file name as a string literal.

What would be the correct syntax here?

Answer 1

quoting arguments correctly rather than converting them may be the best approach

It's pretty normal to expect that you need to quote spaces in the arguments for shell scripts

eg.

 #!/bin/bash clear echo Downloading $1 echo `curl -# -C - -o "${2}" "${1}"` 

called so

./myscript http://www.foo.com "my file"

alternatively, avoid spaces with the '\' character as you call them

 ./myscript http://www.example.com my\ other\ filename\ with\ spaces 

Answer 2

I agree with cms. Choosing the right input arguments is a much better style — what will you do with the next symbol of the problem? The following is much better.

 curl -# -C - -o "$2" $1 

However, I hate people not answering the question asked, so here is the answer :-)

 #!/bin/bash clear echo Downloading $1 echo filename=`echo $2 | sed -e "s/ /\\\ /g"` echo $filename echo eval curl -# -C - -o $filename $1 

Answer 3

 curl -# -C - -o "$2" $1 

Answer 4

if $2 is text input then try

  echo $ 2 |  sed 's:: \\\: g'

I generally avoid backslashes in sed delimiters, they are pretty confusing.