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Right now I have this:

 echo "$run_test" | bash 2>&1 | prepend "r2g-test:" "yellow";

What this does is prepend "r2g-test:" to each line of the stdout/stderr. Because I am sending stderr to stdout, the prepend program doesn't know the difference because it's all stdin to it.

Is there some way I can send stderr to a different prepend instance, perhaps with tee?

Perhaps something like this?

 echo "$run_test" | bash 2> $(prepend 'r2g-test:' 'red') | prepend 'r2g-test:' 'yellow';

This might work, with process substitution:

bash 2> >(prepend 'r2g-test:' 'red')

But so far, the stderr never shows up in the terminal

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  • 1
    Possible duplicate of Can I configure my shell to print STDERR and STDOUT in different colors? Commented May 7, 2018 at 7:38
  • Nah this one is more specifically about pipelines, that is more general Commented May 7, 2018 at 7:41
  • No worries. I looked at what you seemed to be trying to achieve rather then the mechanics of one possible solution Commented May 7, 2018 at 8:37
  • Yeah this is pretty tricky stuff np Commented May 7, 2018 at 8:47

1 Answer 1

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3

First, let's create a program run_test which generates both stdout and stderr:

$ run_test() { while sleep 0.2; do echo "Out $((++c))"; echo "err$c">&2; done; }

Now, let's send the stdout and stderr to different filters. Since I don't have a prepend installed, I will use sed for the same purpose:

$ exec 3>&2; { run_test | sed 's/^/stdout: /'; } 2>&1 1>&3 | sed 's/^/stderr: /' stdout: Out 1 stderr: err1 stdout: Out 2 stderr: err2 stdout: Out 3 stderr: err3

How it works

  • exec 3>&2

    This creates file descriptor 3 as a duplicate of stderr.

  • run_test | sed 's/^/stdout: /'

    This runs run_test and prepends stdout: to the beginning of stdout.

  • { run_test | sed 's/^/stdout: /'; } 2>&1 1>&3

    2>& redirects stderr to stdout so that stderr will go into the next pipe. 1>&3 redirects stdout to stderr so that it appears on the terminal.

  • { run_test | sed 's/^/stdout: /'; } 2>&1 1>&3 | sed 's/^/stderr: /'

    The last pipe captures run_test's stderr, (which is now stdout) and prepends stderr: to it.

Using process substitution

$ run_test > >(sed 's/^/stdout: /') 2> >(stdbuf -oL sed 's/^/stderr: /' >&2) stdout: Out 1 stderr: err1 stdout: Out 2 stderr: err2 stdout: Out 3 stderr: err3

The above uses stdbuf which is standard on Linux. For other OS's, one will need to look for analogous commands.

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  • thanks! There must be a simpler way! I saw something like this using an intermediate fd, but I hoping for something less xrazy. What about this: echo "$run_test" | bash 2> >(prepend 'r2g-test:' 'red') | prepend 'r2g-test:' 'yellow'; ... why won't that work? Commented May 7, 2018 at 7:51
  • that uses process substitution, but the stderr never seems to show up in the terminal Commented May 7, 2018 at 7:52
  • 1
    @AlexanderMills I added a solution using process substitution. Note that anytime one one separates the two streams, output order is not guaranteed. Commented May 7, 2018 at 8:00
  • thanks, I asked a new question, because this one was a bit unclear: unix.stackexchange.com/questions/442250/… Commented May 7, 2018 at 8:07
  • nice sed prepending trick by the way, i didn't know that you could do that Commented May 7, 2018 at 8:08

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