Get raw input from command line (ignore shell meta characters)

Question

Is there any way to read raw text from stdin before it is expanded or before the shell does anything to it? Say I wanted to run a script where a user enters a string which is then printed out, how can I get the following behavior:

$ sh test.sh
Please enter a string:
***<><><||&&*&$PATH

You entered:
***<><><||&&*&$PATH

Is there any way to implicitly surround the text with '' or escape all meta characters even if the user does not?

Solution

Try doing this :

$ read -r -p 'Please enter a string >>> ' var
$ printf '%q\n' "$var"
\*\*\*\<\>\<\>\<\|\|\&\&\*\&\$PATH

Comments

[l0b0]

The -r is the magic option; see help read.

[Gilles Quenot]

No, the magic is %q