2.12) How do I find the last argument in a Bourne shell script?

      Answer by:
        Martin Weitzel <@mikros.systemware.de:martin@mwtech.uucp>
        Maarten Litmaath <maart@nat.vu.nl>

      If you are sure the number of arguments is at most 9, you can use:

        eval last=\${$#}

      In POSIX-compatible shells it works for ANY number of arguments.
      The following works always too:

        for last
        do
                :
        done

      This can be generalized as follows:

        for i
        do
                third_last=$second_last
                second_last=$last
                last=$i
        done

      Now suppose you want to REMOVE the last argument from the list,
      or REVERSE the argument list, or ACCESS the N-th argument
      directly, whatever N may be.  Here is a basis of how to do it,
      using only built-in shell constructs, without creating subprocesses:

        t0= u0= rest='1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' argv=

        for h in '' $rest
        do
                for t in "$t0" $rest
                do
                        for u in $u0 $rest
                        do
                                case $# in
                                0)
                                        break 3
                                esac
                                eval argv$h$t$u=\$1
                                argv="$argv \"\$argv$h$t$u\""   # (1)
                                shift
                        done
                        u0=0
                done
                t0=0
        done

        # now restore the arguments
        eval set x "$argv"                                      # (2)
        shift

      This example works for the first 999 arguments.  Enough?
      Take a good look at the lines marked (1) and (2) and convince
      yourself that the original arguments are restored indeed, no
      matter what funny characters they contain!

      To find the N-th argument now you can use this:

        eval argN=\$argv$N

      To reverse the arguments the line marked (1) must be changed to:

        argv="\"\$argv$h$t$u\" $argv"

      How to remove the last argument is left as an exercise.

      If you allow subprocesses as well, possibly executing nonbuilt-in
      commands, the `argvN' variables can be set up more easily:

        N=1

        for i
        do
                eval argv$N=\$i
                N=`expr $N + 1`
        done

      To reverse the arguments there is still a simpler method, that
      even does not create subprocesses.  This approach can also be
      taken if you want to delete e.g. the last argument, but in that
      case you cannot refer directly to the N-th argument any more,
      because the `argvN' variables are set up in reverse order:

        argv=

        for i
        do
                eval argv$#=\$i
                argv="\"\$argv$#\" $argv"
                shift
        done

        eval set x "$argv"
        shift