Get the current directory in a Bash script

When scripting together a bash script you might need to know your current working directory at some point.

The current working directory is conveniently stored in the variable $PWD which is available in all POSIX compliant shells. Another option to get the current working directory is by using the pwd command. That pwd command is a shell builtin and available in all POSIX compliant shells as well.

#!/bin/bash

# Option 1
cd /home/koen
echo $PWD

# Option 2
cd /home/koen/Test
CWD=$(pwd)
echo $CWD

When we run this script it produced the following output. The first output being the value of $PWD. The second line being the output of $(pwd).

$ bash print_cwd
/home/koen
/home/koen/Test

What about symlinks?

The example shown before doesn't take into account symlinks. So if you run pwd or $PWD in a folder that is symlinked it doesn't show you the physical location but the location of the symlink.

If you need the actual physical location of the directory in your script you can use the -P option on the pwd command.

That /home/koen/Test folder was actually a symlink to another location. Lets alter the script to take symlinks into account.

#!/bin/bash

# In a symlinked folder
cd /home/koen/Test
CWD=$(pwd)
echo $CWD

# Also in a symlinked folder
cd /home/koen/Test
CWD=$(pwd -P)
echo $CWD

And lets run it.

$ bash print_cwd
/home/koen/Test
/home/koen/Documents/Test

Now as you see, the pwd -P command outputs the physical location of the Test folder.

Learning more

The best way to learn more is to use Bash. A lot. Don't forget that Google is your friend.

In case you learn well from books I would recommend these.