bash is so fucking funny. the fact that [ is a command and if [ $a -eq $b ] is actually calling the command [ with args $a -eq $b ] and checking its exit code is so fucking hilarious
@astrid learning that was crucial to understand how shell scripting actually works. AlthoughTBF most shells have [ as an internal command.
(Recommend using command -v $yourcmd rather than which $yourcmd. It tells you exactly what $yourcmd will run, and e.g. command -v [ gives just [ because it uses the internal one.)
[ is a command and you can run it, but that's actually too slow, so it doesn't work like that in actual scripts. this is a great thing to remember if anyone tries to tell you that UNIX has an elegant design
@astrid on BSD (and macOS) the difference is subtle, but on a GNU system, like any Linux with GNU coreutils, running /usr/bin/[ --help will spit out a wall of text whereas [ --help does nothing. They can't help themselves
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