Find the element with the highest value (text or numeric)
USAGE: max arrayname
max()
{
local arrayname=${1:?Array name required} varname=${2:-var}
local IFS= string max e
Copy the array, $arrayname, to local array
eval "array=( \"\${$arrayname[@]}\" )"
eval "string=\"\${$arrayname[*]}\""
case $string in
*[!0-9]*)
Array contains non-numeric value, so use string comparison
for e in "${array[@]}"
do
[ "$e" \> "$max" ] && max=$e
done
;;
*) max=${array[0]}
for e in "${array[@]}"
do
Numeric comparison
[ "$e" -gt "$max" ] && max=$e
done
;;
esac
eval "$varname=\$max"
}