Bash – ny way to determine the signal that was caught from inside a bash trap function

You can use bash trap ERR to make your script quit if any command returns status greater than zero and execute your function on exiting.

Something like:

myfunc() {
  echo 'Error raised. Exiting!'
}

trap 'myfunc' ERR

# file does not exist, causing error
ls asd
echo 123

Note that bash trap ERR does implicit set -o errexit or set -e and is not POSIX.

And the ERR trap is not executed if the failed command is part of the command list immediately following until or while keyword, part of the test following the if or elif reserved words, part of a command executed in && or || list, or if the command’s return status is being inverted using !.

fn(){ printf %s\\n "${v-not set}"; }
v=value; fn; unset v; fn

value
not set

A shell function is a literal string stored in the shell's memory. At define time it is parsed, but is not evaluated for expansions (other than shell aliases) or redirections. These are only evaluated at call time.

In fact, and somewhat related, in this way it is possible to get a function to define its own input with a new temporary file at each invocation.

fn(){ ls -l /dev/fd/0; cat; } <<INFILE
$@
INFILE
fn some args; fn other args

#in dash
lr-x------ 1 mikeserv mikeserv 64 Nov 16 12:50 /dev/fd/0 -> pipe:[4076148]
some args
lr-x------ 1 mikeserv mikeserv 64 Nov 16 12:50 /dev/fd/0 -> pipe:[4077081]
other args
#bash
lr-x------ 1 mikeserv mikeserv 64 Nov 16 12:51 /dev/fd/0 -> /tmp/sh-thd-1036060995 (deleted)
some args
lr-x------ 1 mikeserv mikeserv 64 Nov 16 12:51 /dev/fd/0 -> /tmp/sh-thd-531856742 (deleted)
other args