🖥️ Creating and Running Your First Bash Script

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If you’ve been exploring Linux and repeating the same commands over and over, here’s a pro tip: you don’t have to. That’s what Bash scripts are for.

In this post, I’ll walk you through creating and running your first Bash script — using simple, real-world examples. If you’ve ever used echo, ls, or uptimeYou're more ready for this than you think.

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What’s a Bash Script?

A Bash script is just a text file that contains a list of Linux commands.

Instead of typing commands manually every time, you can put them in a script and run them all at once, like clicking a “Run” button for your terminal.

You can use Bash scripts to:

• Automate backups

• Clean up old log files

• Run multiple tasks at once

• Save time and reduce mistakes

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Step 1: Create a New Script File

Let’s start small.

Open your terminal and create a file:

bash

touch hello.sh

Then open it in your favorite editor:

bash

nano hello.sh

Or use VS Code, Vim — whatever you prefer.

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Step 2: Add the Shebang

At the very top of the file, add this line:

bash

#!/bin/bash

This is called the shebang. It tells your system that this file should be run using the Bash shell.

Think of it like declaring the language for your script.

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Step 3: Write Some Commands

Now, let’s add some basic commands:

bash

#!/bin/bash

echo "Hello, world!"
date
uptime

What this does:

• Prints a friendly message

• Shows the current date and time

• Tells you how long your system has been running

Save the file. (If you’re using nano, it’s Ctrl + O → Enter → Ctrl + X.)

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Step 4: Make It Executable

Before you can run the script, you need to permit it:

bash

chmod +x hello.sh

This makes it runnable like a program.

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Step 5: Run Your Script

Now execute it:

bash

./hello.sh

You should see something like this:

yaml

Hello, world!
Mon Jul 1 10:17:12 IST 2025
 10:17:12 up 2 days,  5:12,  2 users,  load average: 0.18, 0.24, 0.17

That’s it. You’ve just written and run your first Bash script!

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Bonus: A Real-World Example

Let’s say you want to automatically clean up log files older than 7 days from a directory.

Here’s a script for that:

bash

#!/bin/bash

LOG_DIR="/var/log/myapp"

echo "Cleaning up old log files in $LOG_DIR..."
find $LOG_DIR -type f -name "*.log" -mtime +7 -exec rm {} \;

echo "Done!"

You could schedule this script using cron to run every night, and never worry about overflowing logs again.