Comment by cdrt

Your example proves that not using arrays is worse. That loop will only run once and just print every element on one line. The array equivalent works as expected , _isn't_ affected by IFS, and can handle spaces in individual elements

    f='a b c d e'
    for i in "$f"; do echo $i; done
    # prints a b c d e

    f="a b c 'd e'"
    for i in $f; do echo $i; done
    # prints
    # a
    # b
    # c
    # 'd
    # e'

    f=(a b c 'd e')
    for i in "${f[@]}"; do echo $i; done
    # prints
    # a
    # b
    # c
    # d e