Pass options to AWK script bypassing AWK

Question

Can I get arguments that happen to be AWK options passed directly to a pure AWK script?

Example script:

#!/usr/bin/env -S awk -f
BEGIN { if (ARGV[1] == "-h") print "whoop" }

I want ./myscript -h to print whoop. But AWK gets the -h first and prints its usage instead.

Running ./myscript -- -h works but I can't get -- working in the shebang because of the -f.

I know I could use a shell script with AWK in instead.

Answer 1

For the sake of the challenge, it could be done with the FreeBSD env or with GNU env >= 8.30 (already assumed by the OP) in a shebang:

#! /usr/bin/env -S sh -c 'exec awk -f "$0" -- "$@"'
BEGIN { for(i = 1; i < ARGC; i++) print ARGV[i] }

./myscript -h 1 2 3
-h
1
2
3

It doesn't mean that it's a good idea, though.

You could try this, instead:

#! /bin/sh
BEGIN { 2>"/dev/null"
        exec awk -f "$0" "--" "$@"
}
BEGIN { for(i = 1; i < ARGC; i++) print ARGV[i] }

This assumes that you don't have a BEGIN command in your PATH.

Answer 2

If you have GNU awk you can use this

#!/usr/bin/gawk --exec
BEGIN { print "==>",ARGV[1],"<==" }

Sample use

./a -h
 ==> -h <==

I haven't tested it, but the mawk variant appears to use -W exec instead of --exec. GNU gawk claims to support this too, but it doesn't work with #!.