Shell-quoting future me, printf -v "%q" is what you're looking for

Sam Graham — Fri, 15 Jun 2012 12:59:00 GMT

Note to future me: Are you trying to remember how to shell-quote/escape the contents of a variable to avoid going utterly insane from the nested double-quotes and backslashing?

printf -v escaped_var "%q" "$var" is the command that you can never remember, and never find the documentation for until you've wasted a morning of your life.

Don't forget it next time. Or at least, remember that you wrote this note, kthxbai.

Sam's Blog > Note-to-future-me

Shell-quoting future me, printf -v "%q" is what you're looking for