How do I forward parameters to other command in bash script?

Use the shift built-in command to "eat" the arguments. Then call the child process and pass it the "$@" argument to include all remaining arguments. Notice the quotes, they should be kept, since they cause the expansion of the argument list to be properly quoted.


Bash supports subsetting parameters (see Subsets and substrings), so you can choose which parameters to process/pass like this.

  1. open new file and edit it: vim r.sh:

    echo "params only 2    : ${@:2:1}"
    echo "params 2 and 3   : ${@:2:2}"
    echo "params all from 2: ${@:2:99}"
    echo "params all from 2: ${@:2}"
    
  2. run it:

    $ chmod u+x r.sh
    $ ./r.sh 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
    
  3. the result is:

    params only 2    : 2
    params 2 and 3   : 2 3
    params all from 2: 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
    params all from 2: 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
    

bash uses the shift command:

e.g. shifttest.sh:

#!/bin/bash
echo $1
shift
echo $1 $2

shifttest.sh 1 2 3 produces

1
2 3