How to execute a java script with jshell?

Question

Given that Java 9 is upon us and we can finally have a java REPL with jshell I was hoping there was a way to add a shebang to a script and have jshell interpret it.

I tried creating test.jsh:

#!/usr/bin/env jshell -s
System.out.println("Hello World")
/exit

However that gives:

⚡ ./test.jsh
|  Error:
|  illegal character: '#'
|  #!/usr/bin/env jshell -s
|  ^
|  Error:
|  illegal start of expression
|  #!/usr/bin/env jshell -s
|    ^
Hello World

It turns out there is an enhancement request for this in OpenJDK https://bugs.openjdk.java.net/browse/JDK-8167440.

Is there any other way to do this?

Answer 1

Use

//usr/bin/env jshell --show-version --execution local "$0" "$@"; exit $?

as the first line of test.jsh. The test.jsh script could look like:

//usr/bin/env jshell --show-version "$0" "$@"; exit $?
System.out.println("Hello World")
/exit

The command line option --show-version is optional, of course, but gives immediate feedback that tool is running

The extra command line option --execution local prevents jshell to spawn another VM. This speeds up launch time and if an exception is thrown by your script code, the local VM will exit.

Consult the output of jshell --help and jshell --help-extra for more options.

Answer 2

It turns out that with a bit of trickery there is a way, although I haven't fully managed to suppress the interpreted commands but pretty close to what I want.

Change test.jsh to:

#!/usr/bin/env sh
tail -n +4 "$0" | jshell -s "$@"
exit $?
System.out.println("Hello World")
/exit

Which gives us:

⚡ ./test.jsh
-> System.out.println("Hello World")
Hello World
-> /exit

Answer 3

Inspired by steiny answer, I came up with a more generic solution

https://gist.github.com/ffissore/012d7e32a096fde5266f49038c93dcaf

In essence: jshell-wrapper will strip the first line of the script (which is supposed to be the shebang) and will add a /exit at the end of the script