I would like to store a command to use at a later period in a variable not the output of the command but the command itself I have a simple script as follows command ls echo Command command Output is Command ls b command echo b Output is public html REV test command worked successfully However when I try something a bit more complicated it fails For example if I make command ls grep -c The output is Command ls grep -c ls cannot access No such file or directory ls cannot access grep No such file or directory ls cannot access No such file or directory Any idea how I could store such a command with pipes multiple commands in a variable for later use

How to store a command in a variable in a shell script?

Use eval:

x="ls | wc"
eval "$x"
y=$(eval "$x")
echo "$y"

~ Answered on 2011-04-11 00:38:21