reassigning a variable

Hi,

I have the following code:
a1="welcome"
a2=a1
echo $a1 --> prints welcome
echo $a2 -> prints a1

echo $$a2 <---- In this line i am expecting to print 'welcome'...
But i am getting the output as "ksh: 21271a2: not found ".

Please help.

Thanks,
Yugandra

My wild guess:

Hi,

I am expecting something like echo $$a2 - one statement which should execute and print the value of a1.

thanks,
---yugandra

Use "eval". There might be a better way, but something like

eval "echo $"$a2

will print "welcome".

$$ is a special parameter that most shells interpret as the process ID of the shell. You should be able to see this by typing echo $$ on the command line and noting the number. Then try ps - one of the shells listed (perhaps the only shell, depending on your OS) should have the same process ID.

I am a little surprised at you getting a "not found" message on an echo statement - it should have just echoed 21271a2 (the process ID with "a2" concatenated).

Hi,

eval "echo $"$a2

It works

Thankyou,
Yugandra