A method and apparatus for verifying shell scripts is provided. According to one aspect of the invention, prior to executing a shell script, one or more syntactic verification checks are performed on the shell script that verify conformance of the shell script to a set of syntactic guidelines. In addition, still prior to executing the shell script, one or more semantic verification checks are performed on the shell script that verify conformance of the shell script to a set of semantic guidelines. Still further, the method and apparatus may also include steps for, prior to executing the shell script, performing one or more coding organizational guideline verification checks that verify conformance of the shell script to a set of one or more coding organizational guidelines.