Use find command and if statement in a simple bash script

Hello,

I have a directory in /root/xml-test/ which contains .xml files and they are 99MB each. I'm using an if TEST statement to check if the size is larger than $a.

The problem is... the if statement always results in the A, larger than B - even if I choose a small number for A - such as 1.

here is the script and test yourself. There is a URL in the comments to create a file of anysize for your testing.

#!/bin/bash

#This will check the size of the XML files in /root/xml-test

# Script Test Procedures

# Create file of any size

#https://www.ostechnix.com/create-files-certain-size-linux/

xmlpath='/root/xml-test/.'

size=$(find $xmlpath -type f -name '*.xml' -exec du -c {} + | grep total$) ; total=$(echo $size | cut -c 1- | rev | cut -c 7- | rev)

b=$total

echo $total 'size in bytes' && echo "enter a second number";'

read a ;

echo "a=$a";

echo b=$total;

if [ $a > $b ];

then

echo "a is greater than b";

else

echo "b is greater than a";

fi;