You can use various options of the read command to obtain different results, as shown in the following steps:
- The following statement will read n characters from input into the variable_name variable:
read -n number_of_chars variable_name
Consider this example:
$ read -n 2 var
$ echo $var
- Read a password in the non-echoed mode:
read -s var
- Display a message with read using the following command:
read -p "Enter input:" var
- Read the input after a timeout:
read -t timeout var
Consider the following example:
$ read -t 2 var
# Read the string that is typed within 2 seconds into
variable var.
- Use a delimiter character to end the input line:
read -d delim_char var
Consider this example:
$ read -d ":" var
hello:#var is set to hello