I’ve been struggling with a rather complex shell script, and it’s becoming apparent that Bash might not be the best choice for this particular task. While I usually gravitate towards statically typed languages like Go or Rust, I’ve noticed that many people recommend alternative languages such as Lua or Python for scripting tasks.

I’m curious to know your opinions and experiences with scripting languages for larger or more intricate shell scripts. Have you ever encountered a situation where Bash just didn’t cut it, and if so, which scripting languages did you turn to for a more effective solution? Are there any specific languages you found particularly suitable for debugging, testing, or handling complex logic in your shell scripts?

  • lxkota@lemmy.ml
    2·
    1 year ago

    I personally don’t have any real experience with Go. Lots of smart folks I work with love it. In general, most of what I have read suggests that Rust is better suited to CLI tooling. For my use case it came down to:

    • Rust’s cargo system
    • The clap crate (which supports building out bash shell completion scrips via a Rust build script. Basically means I can generate a completion script at compile time and include this in the package I distribute to users)
    • Rust’s out of the box performance
    • The heavy lifting done by the borrow checker in bringing safety