Learning Linux Shell Scripting

Pipes

We have already used pipes in many earlier sessions. It is a tool for inter-process communication.

$ command_1 | command_2

In this case, the output of command_1 will be send as an input to command_2. The limitation is that the communication is half duplex. This means the data can flow in only one direction. Normally for inter-process communication, you need to open files then get the file descriptor. This will be used to write to the pipe file. Again, we need to create a Fifo file by special commands. The preceding technique simplifies all this process. We only need to insert "|" in between the two processes. The operating system creates one intermediate buffer. This buffer is used for storing the data from one command and will be used again ...