URL:
<http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?44221>
Summary: Spurious warning about non-option arguments is
spurious
Project: findutils
Submitted by: None
Submitted on: Tue 10 Feb 2015 01:45:22 PM UTC
Category: find
Severity: 3 - Normal
Item Group: Wrong result
Status: None
Privacy: Public
Assigned to: None
Originator Name: Andrew McGill
Originator Email: list2...@lunch.za.net
Open/Closed: Open
Discussion Lock: Any
Release: 4.4.2
Fixed Release: None
_______________________________________________________
Details:
When you specify multiple options which must all apply (AND-logic) then for
-maxdepth n and -mindepth n, find lately displays a warning, explaining that
there are fine points of the order of operations at work -- as if find is
using a special form of logic which is something less than boolean. This
warning makes no sense at all. For a file to be 'found', ALL of the
conditions have to apply. Why would anyone care which one fails first?
Specifying multiple AND-conditions for find is the most common use case, and
for this use case, without a single OR-condition, the warning is most rudely
displayed. Other GNU utilities allow arguments (additional conditions) to be
added at the end of the command line, but find has this feature / regression
by which it does not do so.
It seems that `find' is trying to warn the uer about the global nature of
-maxdepth and -mindepth -- but this warning is entirely unnecessary when the
entire find command consists of AND-conditions. All conditions must apply, so
none of them apply first.
This spurious warning is a good and proper bug, as evidenced by the slew of
bug reports in all sorts of projects since 2006
To reproduce this bug:
find -type f -maxdepth 1 -mindepth 1
Expected behaviour:
print a list of files in the current directory, without spurious warnings.
Incorrect behaviour:
Spurious warnings are printed.
find: warning: you have specified the -mindepth option after a non-option
argument -type, but options are not positional (-mindepth affects tests
specified before it as well as those specified after it). Please specify
options before other arguments.
find: warning: you have specified the -maxdepth option after a non-option
argument -type, but options are not positional (-maxdepth affects tests
specified before it as well as those specified after it). Please specify
options before other arguments.
Proposed fix 1:
Only display this warning when it may indicate a logic bug, e.g. OR-logic is
included. (I can't improve this suggestion, since I don't understand
circumstances where one would benefit from this warning.)
Proposed fix 2:
Remove this warning as per attached patch :P
(How about this: no warning is showed for "find -maxdepth 1 -print -type d"
where "-type d" has no effect ... this is a real error ... unless it was
"-type d $ACTION" where $ACTION is null ...)
_______________________________________________________
File Attachments:
-------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue 10 Feb 2015 01:45:22 PM UTC Name:
findutils.positional-warnings-considered-harmful.diff Size: 1kB By: None
<http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/download.php?file_id=33046>
_______________________________________________________
Reply to this item at:
<http://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?44221>
_______________________________________________
Message sent via/by Savannah
http://savannah.gnu.org/
