Associative arrays are local by default

Question

Associative arrays seem to be local by default when declared inside a function body, where they should be global. The following code

#!/bin/bash

f() {
    decla         


        

Answer 1

You have already answered your own question with declare -g. The workaround on bash versions < 4.2 is to declare the array outside of the function.

f() {
   map[y] = foo
}

declare -A map
foo
echo "${map[y]}"