The ubiquity of POSIX-compliant shell interpreters makes shell scripts the most convenient and obvious tool of choice for automating tasks. The wide availability of existing recipes and how-tos on the Internet has lowered the barrier of entry even more.

In spite of the standard, a number of subtle but crucial details have eluded many shell programmers - details which make it extremely difficult to write scripts that can securely handle potentially malicious input or behave correctly in an environment vastly different from the programmers’.

You’ll agree with me after reading the Rich’s sh (POSIX shell) tricks. For me, the article has demystefied a number of shell oddities that have tripped me up in the past.