Today, I messed around with something pretty fun – making a little fortune-telling script using shell. It’s not going to predict your future accurately, but it’s a cool way to play with shell scripting and see what you can do with it.
Getting Started
First, I needed a place to store my “fortunes.” So, I created a simple text file. I just named it . Inside, I wrote a bunch of one-liner fortunes, you know, the kind you might find in a fortune cookie. Silly stuff, mostly.
- “You will find unexpected joy in a mundane task.”
- “A great opportunity is hiding in plain sight.”
- “Beware of squirrels bearing gifts.”
- “The stars are aligned… for someone else.”
I mean I add the fortunes manually into the file.
Building the Script
Next, I opened up my favorite text editor and started a new shell script. I usually call these things , just to be clear about what it does.
The core of the script is pretty simple. I used the shuf command, which is awesome for randomizing lines in a file. It’s like shuffling a deck of cards. I piped (that’s the symbol) the output of shuf to the head command. head just grabs the first few lines of a file, and in this case, I only wanted one line – one fortune.
So, the main part of the script looked like this:
shuf * head -n 1I added some extra stuff around it to make it look a little nicer. For instance, I used echo to print a little intro message before revealing the fortune. And I added some sleep time, just to make it dramatic like delay.
echo "Welcome to the Shell Divination!"
echo "Let's see what your future holds..."
sleep 2 #Dramatic Delay
shuf * head -n 1
Making it Executable
Once I was happy with the script, I saved it. Then, I needed to make it executable. This means I gave the script permission to run as a program. I did this with the chmod command:
chmod +x *Running the Show
Now for the fun part! I opened my terminal and typed to run the script. And there it was, my random fortune! Each time I run it, I get a different one. It is the result by using my script.
It’s a super simple project, but it’s a great way to get comfortable with basic shell commands like shuf, head, echo, and chmod. Plus, you can customize it however you want! Change the fortunes, add more messages, maybe even make it interactive. It’s all up to you.
