How can I retrieve the absolute filename in a shell script on Mac OS X?

Solution 1:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
scriptDir="$(cd "$(dirname "$0")" && pwd -P)"

Solution 2:

I cheat and use perl for this very thing:

#!/bin/bash
dirname=`perl -e 'use Cwd "abs_path";print abs_path(shift)' $0`
echo $dirname

You'd think I'd just write the entire script in perl, and often I do, but not always.