Bash: how to extract longest directory paths from an array? - arrays

Question

I put the output of find command into array like this:
pathList=($(find /foo/bar/ -type d))
How to extract the longest paths found in the array if the array contains several equal-length longest paths?:
echo ${pathList[#]}
/foo/bar/raw/
/foo/bar/raw/2020/
/foo/bar/raw/2020/02/
/foo/bar/logs/
/foo/bar/logs/2020/
/foo/bar/logs/2020/02/
After extraction, I would like to assign /foo/bar/raw/2020/02/ and /foo/bar/logs/2020/02/ to another array.
Thank you

Answer 1

Could you please try following. This should print the longest array(could be multiple in numbers same maximum length ones), you could assign it to later an array to.
echo "${pathList[#]}" |
awk -F'/' '{max=max>NF?max:NF;a[NF]=(a[NF]?a[NF] ORS:"")$0} END{print a[max]}'
I just created a test array with values provided by you and tested it as follows:
arr1=($(printf '%s\n' "${pathList[#]}" |\
awk -F'/' '{max=max>NF?max:NF;a[NF]=(a[NF]?a[NF] ORS:"")$0} END{print a[max]}'))
When I see new array's contents they are as follows:
echo "${arr1[#]}"
/foo/bar/raw/2020/02/
/foo/bar/logs/2020/02/
Explanation of awk code: Adding detailed explanation for awk code.
awk -F'/' ' ##Starting awk program from here and setting field separator as / for all lines.
{
max=max>NF?max:NF ##Creating variable max and its checking condition if max is greater than NF then let it be same else set its value to current NF value.
a[NF]=(a[NF]?a[NF] ORS:"")$0 ##Creating an array a with index of value of NF and keep appending its value with new line to it.
}
END{ ##Starting END section of this program.
print a[max] ##Printing value of array a with index of variable max.
}'