Exiting a shell script with nested loops

Your problem is not nested loops, per se. It's that one or more of your inner loops is running in a subshell.

This works:

#!/bin/bash

for i in $(seq 1 100); do
        echo i $i
        for j in $(seq 1 10) ; do
                echo j $j
                sleep 1
                [[ $j = 3 ]] && { echo "I've had enough!" 1>&2; exit 1; }
        done
        echo "After the j loop."
done
echo "After all the loops."

output:

i 1
j 1
j 2
j 3
I've had enough!

This presents the problem you have described:

#!/bin/bash

for i in $(seq 1 100); do
        echo i $i
        cat /etc/passwd | while read line; do
                echo LINE $line
                sleep 1
                [[ "$line" = "daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin" ]] && { echo "I've had enough!" 1>&2; exit 1; }
        done
        echo "After the j loop."
done    
echo "After all the loops."

output:

i 1
LINE root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
LINE bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/sbin/nologin
LINE daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin
I've had enough!
After the j loop.
i 2
LINE root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
LINE bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/sbin/nologin
LINE daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin
I've had enough!
After the j loop.
i 3
LINE root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
(...etc...)

Here is the solution; you have to test the return value of inner loops that run in subshells:

#!/bin/bash

for i in $(seq 1 100); do
        echo i $i
        cat /etc/passwd | while read line; do
                echo LINE $line
                sleep 1
                [[ "$line" = "daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin" ]] && { echo "I've had enough!" 1>&2; exit 1; }
        done
        err=$?; [[ $err != 0 ]] && exit $err
        echo "After the j loop."
done
echo "After all the loops."

Note the test: [[ $? != 0 ]] && exit $?

output:

i 1
LINE root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
LINE bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/sbin/nologin
LINE daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin
I've had enough!

Edit: To verify what subshell you're in, modify the "answer" script to tell you what the process ID of your current shell is. NOTE: This only works in bash 4:

#!/bin/bash

for i in $(seq 1 100); do
        echo pid $BASHPID i $i
        cat /etc/passwd | while read line; do
                echo pid $BASHPID LINE $line
                sleep 1
                [[ "$line" = "daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin" ]] && { echo "I've had enough!" 1>&2; exit 1; }
        done
        err=$?; [[ $err != 0 ]] && echo pid $BASHPID && exit $err
        echo "After the j loop."
done
echo "After all the loops."

output:

pid 31793 i 1
pid 31796 LINE root:x:0:0:root:/root:/bin/bash
pid 31796 LINE bin:x:1:1:bin:/bin:/sbin/nologin
pid 31796 LINE daemon:x:2:2:daemon:/sbin:/sbin/nologin
I've had enough!
pid 31793

The variables "i" and "j" brought to you courtesy of Fortran. Have a nice day. :-)

An earlier answer suggests using [[ $? != 0 ]] && exit $? however this won't quite work as expected, because the [[ $? != 0 ]] test will reset $? back to zero, which means that although the script will early-exit as expected, it'll always exit with code 0 (as not expected). Also, it'd be better to use the -ne numeric comparison test, rather than the != string comparison test. So therefore IMHO a better solution is to use:

err=$?; [[ $err -ne 0 ]] && exit $err

as that'll ensure that the actual exit code is set correctly.