I’ve been looking for better way of doing it recently. Associative array sounded like overkill for me. Look what I found:
suffix=bzz
declare prefix_$suffix=mystr
…and then…
varname=prefix_$suffix
echo ${!varname}
From the docs:
The ‘$’ character introduces parameter expansion, command substitution, or arithmetic expansion. …
The basic form of parameter expansion is ${parameter}. The value of parameter is substituted. …
If the first character of parameter is an exclamation point (!), and parameter is not a nameref, it introduces a level of indirection. Bash uses the value formed by expanding the rest of parameter as the new parameter; this is then expanded and that value is used in the rest of the expansion, rather than the expansion of the original parameter. This is known as indirect expansion. The value is subject to tilde expansion, parameter expansion, command substitution, and arithmetic expansion. …