Re: view the exit status from command line

[Håkon Alstadheim <hakon@alstadheim.priv.no>]

Ken Irving wrote:
> On Wed, Aug 15, 2007 at 04:21:17PM +0200, Sven Joachim wrote:
>   
> > Kamaraju S Kusumanchi <kamaraju@bluebottle.com> writes:
> >
> >     
> > > > > I want to know if the command exited with status zero or non-zero. Can
> > > > > this be done in a simple way?
> > > > >           
> > > > $test -x debian/rules; echo $?
> > > >
> > > >         
> > > Thanks. Exactly what I am after!
> > >       
> > Here's a $0.02 recipe from my ~/.bashrc:
> >
> > if [ "$PS1" ]; then
> >    PROMPT_COMMAND='echo -n "$? "'
> > fi
> >
> > This way, an interactive bash will print the exit status of the last
> > command before its prompt, so you can _always_ see it.  Very handy,
> > IMO. :-)
> >     
>
> Thanks for this great idea!
>
>   

You don't need a command (at least with the versions of bash I've used 
the last 10 years), just make sure the variable does not get expanded 
before it is assigned to PS1. Like so: PS1='$?\$ '. now try executing 
/bin/true and /bin/false.