Bash script error. Syntax error near unexpected token

Question

I'm trying to work through a script to email me a notification if the load is too high on our server. I found a good one but it's giving me and error when I run it, and I can't see why.

Running the code below gives the error:

line 13: syntax error near unexpected token `fi'

I thought I had to laid out correctly though. Thanks!

#!/bin/bash
THR=10
MAIL="[email protected]"
VAR=`uptime|awk -F, '{print 4ドル}'|awk '{print 3ドル}'`
OUT=`echo "$VAR $THR" | awk '{if (1ドル > 2ドル) print "yes"; else print "no"}'`
if [ "$VAR" == "" ]
then
 # it's within the first 24 hours of uptime
 VAR=`uptime|awk -F, '{print 3ドル}'|awk '{print 3ドル}'`
 OUT=`echo "$VAR $THR" | awk '{if (1ドル > 2ドル) print "yes"; else print "no"}'`
fi
if [ "$OUT" == "yes" ]
then
 echo "The current load $VAR is greater than the threshold $THR" | mail $MAIL
 -s "Server Load Alert"
 echo "Alert generated because $VAR is greater than $THR"
else
 echo "No alert as $VAR > $THR"
fi
echo "load = $VAR"

• Vijay: execute with the flag -vx in your shebang line and check exactly what the error is! #!/bin/bash -vx
• Adam: Hmm the whitespace was giving me an error so I've removed that. Now I'm getting an unexpected end of file
• manav m-n: Trying running it in debug mode, #/bin/bash --debug --verbose file.sh
• Adam: Same error, is this supposed to put the contents of the error into a file?

Answer 1

Sorry, no offence, but your bash style is terrible!

Here's a better version:

#!/bin/bash
thr=10
mail="[email protected]"
read var _ < /proc/loadavg
if (( $(bc -l <<< "$var>$thr") )); then
 echo "The current load $var is greater than the threshold $thr" | mail "$mail" -s "Server Load Alert"
 echo "Alert generated because $var is greater than $thr"
else
 echo "No alert as $var <= $thr"
fi
echo "load = $var"

The changes are the following:

• Use lower case variable names, as upper case variable names are considered bad bash practice.
• Don't parse the output of the command uptime using millions of pipes, subshells and awks because it's inefficient, the same information is obtained directly from the file /proc/loadavg, with a read builtin.
• Don't use awk to test for inequalities, use bc, it's more efficient (and you don't need a variable $OUT at all).
• No backticks! Use the $(...) construct instead (easier to read, to nest, and better bash practice).

I haven't tested the script, just corrected yours as I read it. Please tell me if it works for you.

• Adam: I got the following output when running. root@server[~]# bash /scripts/load_check.sh : command not foundcheck.sh: line 2: : command not foundcheck.sh: line 5: : No such file or directory: line 6: /proc/loadavg : command not foundcheck.sh: line 7: /scripts/load_check.sh: line 15: syntax error: unexpected end of file
• gniourf_gniourf: @AdamG What are the scripts load_check.sh and foundcheck.sh? Could you edit your OP and include them there?
• Adam: load_check.sh is this script that I'm excuting. I have no idea what foundcheck.sh is. I've got plenty of other scripts running on the server, I'm not sure why this one is causing such a headache.
• gniourf_gniourf: @AdamG Ah it's about the script check.sh, not foundcheck.sh... Could you please check that the file /proc/loadavg exists by issuing cat /proc/loadavg. Could you also check that you have bash installed and check its version by issuing bash --version.
• Adam: There is definitely no script called check.sh and I'm not running a command for that. cat /proc/loadavg gives me 0.32 0.29 0.27 1/235 14795 which looks correct? Lastly it's Bash 3.2.25(1)-release.

Answer 2

#!/bin/bash
THR=10
MAIL="[email protected]"
VAR=`uptime|awk -F, '{print 4ドル}'|awk '{print 3ドル}'`
OUT=`echo "$VAR $THR" | awk '{if (1ドル > 2ドル) print "yes"; else print "no"}'`
if [ "$VAR" == "" ]
then
# it's within the first 24 hours of uptime
VAR=`uptime|awk -F, '{print 3ドル}'|awk '{print 3ドル}'`
OUT=`echo "$VAR $THR" | awk '{if (1ドル > 2ドル) print "yes"; else print "no"}'`
fi
if [ "$OUT" == "yes" ]
then
echo "The current load $VAR is greater than the threshold $THR" | mail $MAIL -s "Server Load Alert"
echo "Alert generated because $VAR is greater than $THR"
else
echo "No alert as $VAR > $THR"
fi
echo "load = $VAR"

This works for me. I changed so that "mail $MAIL" and -s "Server Load Alert" keeps on the same row.

• Adam: I'm still getting an Unexpected end of file. Are there any changes I need to make on the server for it to be more forgiving?
• Arnestig: Execute the script but swap #!/bin/bash with #!/bin/bash -x and post the output
• Adam: I got the following output when running. root@server[~]# bash /scripts/load_check.sh : command not foundcheck.sh: line 2: : command not foundcheck.sh: line 5: line 22: syntax error: unexpected end of file