Function return codes

In a bash function, return will return the status code of the previous command. For many years, I thought it returned the default status, i.e. 0, but it does not.

foo() {
  ls /does/not/exist
  return
}

foo || {
  printf "Function 'foo' failed" 
}

So if you want foo to return 0/success even when the ls /does/not/exist fails, you must be explicit:

foo() {
  ls /does/not/exist
  return 0
}

Wish I'd learned about this sooner (took me around 22 years of bash coding).

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