Special Characters with shell

ctrl-h.sh

#!/bin/bash
# Embedding Ctl-H in a string.

a="^H^H"                  # Two Ctl-H's -- backspaces
                          # ctl-V ctl-H, using vi/vim
echo "abcdef"             # abcdef
echo
echo -n "abcdef$a "       # abcd f
#  Space at end  ^              ^  Backspaces twice.
echo
echo -n "abcdef$a"        # abcdef
#  No space at end               ^ Doesn't backspace (why?).
                          # Results may not be quite as expected.
echo; echo

# Constantin Hagemeier suggests trying:
# a=$'\010\010'
# a=$'\b\b'
# a=$'\x08\x08'
# But, this does not change the results.

ctrl-m.sh

#!/bin/bash
# Thank you, Lee Maschmeyer, for this example.

read -n 1 -s -p \
$'Control-M leaves cursor at beginning of this line. Press Enter. \x0d'
           # Of course, '0d' is the hex equivalent of Control-M.
echo >&2   #  The '-s' makes anything typed silent,
           #+ so it is necessary to go to new line explicitly.

read -n 1 -s -p $'Control-J leaves cursor on next line. \x0a'
           #  '0a' is the hex equivalent of Control-J, linefeed.
echo >&2

###

read -n 1 -s -p $'And Control-K\x0bgoes straight down.'
echo >&2   #  Control-K is vertical tab.

# A better example of the effect of a vertical tab is:

var=$'\x0aThis is the bottom line\x0bThis is the top line\x0a'
echo "$var"
#  This works the same way as the above example. However:
echo "$var" | col
#  This causes the right end of the line to be higher than the left end.
#  It also explains why we started and ended with a line feed --
#+ to avoid a garbled screen.

# As Lee Maschmeyer explains:
# --------------------------
#  In the [first vertical tab example] . . . the vertical tab
#+ makes the printing go straight down without a carriage return.
#  This is true only on devices, such as the Linux console,
#+ that can't go "backward."
#  The real purpose of VT is to go straight UP, not down.
#  It can be used to print superscripts on a printer.
#  The col utility can be used to emulate the proper behavior of VT.

exit 0