Run text file as commands in Bash

Question

If I have a text file with a separate command on each line how would I make terminal run each line as a command? I just don\'t want to have to copy and paste 1 line at a tim

Answer 1

You can use something like this:

for i in `cat foo.txt`
do
    sudo $i
done

Though if the commands have arguments (i.e. there is whitespace in the lines) you may have to monkey around with that a bit to protect the whitepace so that the whole string is seen by sudo as a command. But it gives you an idea on how to start.

Answer 2

you can make a shell script with those commands, and then chmod +x <scriptname.sh>, and then just run it by

./scriptname.sh

Its very simple to write a bash script

Mockup sh file:

#!/bin/sh
sudo command1
sudo command2 
.
.
.
sudo commandn

Answer 3

you can also just run it with a shell, for example:

bash example.txt

sh example.txt

Answer 4

Execute

. example.txt

That does exactly what you ask for, without setting an executable flag on the file or running an extra bash instance.

For a detailed explanation see e.g. https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/43882/what-is-the-difference-between-sourcing-or-source-and-executing-a-file-i