Paste clipboard content into a variable in bash using xclip

Question

I know this command will paste the clipboard contents into a file:

xclip -out -selection clipboard >> file.txt

If I want to paste clipboard content into a variable like a string what do I do?

Shophar

Answer 1

To assign the output of a command to a variable, you can use command substitution:

myvar=$( command )
echo "$myvar"

Lyons

Answer 2

You can output by echo your clipboard contents using xclip:

clipboard_content=`xclip -o -selection clipboard`
echo "$clipboard_content"

Yod

Answer 3

You can output echo your clipboard by xsel also:

myvar=$( xsel -ob )
echo "$myvar"

Yod

Answer 4

I am currently using

#!/bin/bash
# collect contents of clipboard
ln=$(xsel -ob)
#
# manipulate contents of the variable ln
#
# "post result back to clipboard, -n without newline at end
echo -n $ln | xclip -sel c

xsel and xclip were installed using Synaptic

Putsch