You can over-rely on "set -e" however: #!/usr/bin/env bash set -e fail() { false ; echo hello; } if ! fail; then :; fi That outputs "hello" and exits

You can over-rely on "set -e" however: #!/usr/bin/env bash set -e fail() { false ; echo hello; } if ! fail; then :; fi That outputs "hello" and exits with 0.