[shell test] multiple conditions

Classic technique (escape metacharacters): if[ \( $g -eq 1-a "$c"="123" \) -o \( $g -eq 2-a "$c"="456" \) ]then echo abc else echo efg fi I tried various tricks with '[[ ... ]]' without success - even escaping the parentheses did not seem to work. Isn't it a classic question? I would have thought so. However, there is an alternative, namely: if[ $g -eq 1-a "$c"="123"]||[ $g -eq 2-a "$c"="456"]then echo abc else echo efg fi Indeed, if you read the 'portable shell' guidelines for the autoconf tool or related packages, this notation - using '||' and '&&' - is what they recommend. I suppose you could even go so far as: if[ $g -eq 1]&&["$c"="123"]then echo abc elif[ $g -eq 2]&&["$c"="456"]then echo abc else echo efg fi Where the actions are as trivial as echoing, this isn't bad. When the action block to be repeated is multiple lines, the repetition is too painful and one of the earlier versions is preferable.