xstrtol-error: Use quote() before print command line arguments.

[Collin Funk]

Hi all,

I noticed the following inconsistent error message in GNU coreutils:

    $ od -S $'\t'
    od: invalid -S argument '   '

For clarity, would would usually escape that, e.g., like this:

    $ uname $'\t'
    uname: extra operand ‘\t’
    Try 'uname --help' for more information.

The cause of this inconsistency is the xstrtol-error module, which does
not use quote().

I am proposing the attached patch to fix this inconsistency. However,
since it affects other packages, I felt it would be rude to make this
change without asking for approval. Here is the list of affected
packages from the lists in maint-tools.git:

    $ git grep -F 'xstrtol-error' used-modules/
    used-modules/coreutils:  xstrtol-error
    used-modules/datamash:    xstrtol-error
    used-modules/findutils:    xstrtol-error

I beleive findutils and datamash already use quote() so I think (and
hope) this change is uncontroversial.

Collin


>From 30253a70c047b2b62845a7683c8c7c7ac59e6aa4 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
Message-ID: <30253a70c047b2b62845a7683c8c7c7ac59e6aa4.1781224205.git.collin.fu...@gmail.com>
From: Collin Funk <collin.fu...@gmail.com>
Date: Thu, 11 Jun 2026 17:23:50 -0700
Subject: [PATCH] xstrtol-error: Use quote() before print command line
 arguments.

* lib/xstrtol-error.c: Include quote.h.
(xstrtol_error): Adjust the format strings and call quote() before
printing the argument.
---
 ChangeLog             | 7 +++++++
 lib/xstrtol-error.c   | 9 +++++----
 modules/xstrtol-error | 1 +
 3 files changed, 13 insertions(+), 4 deletions(-)

diff --git a/ChangeLog b/ChangeLog
index 63f2d8b50a..5f255d0aff 100644
--- a/ChangeLog
+++ b/ChangeLog
@@ -1,3 +1,10 @@
+2026-06-11  Collin Funk  <collin.fu...@gmail.com>
+
+	xstrtol-error: Use quote() before print command line arguments.
+	* lib/xstrtol-error.c: Include quote.h.
+	(xstrtol_error): Adjust the format strings and call quote() before
+	printing the argument.
+
 2026-06-08  Bruno Haible  <br...@clisp.org>
 
 	strerror: Detect invalid writes to the returned string in some cases.
diff --git a/lib/xstrtol-error.c b/lib/xstrtol-error.c
index 94c6a016d2..765340a5a6 100644
--- a/lib/xstrtol-error.c
+++ b/lib/xstrtol-error.c
@@ -24,6 +24,7 @@
 #include <error.h>
 #include "exitfail.h"
 #include "gettext.h"
+#include "quote.h"
 
 #define _(msgid) dgettext (GNULIB_TEXT_DOMAIN, msgid)
 #define N_(msgid) msgid
@@ -57,16 +58,16 @@ xstrtol_error (enum strtol_error err,
       abort ();
 
     case LONGINT_INVALID:
-      msgid = N_("invalid %s%s argument '%s'");
+      msgid = N_("invalid %s%s argument %s");
       break;
 
     case LONGINT_INVALID_SUFFIX_CHAR:
     case LONGINT_INVALID_SUFFIX_CHAR_WITH_OVERFLOW:
-      msgid = N_("invalid suffix in %s%s argument '%s'");
+      msgid = N_("invalid suffix in %s%s argument %s");
       break;
 
     case LONGINT_OVERFLOW:
-      msgid = N_("%s%s argument '%s' too large");
+      msgid = N_("%s%s argument %s too large");
       break;
     }
 
@@ -84,7 +85,7 @@ xstrtol_error (enum strtol_error err,
     option = long_options[opt_idx].name;
 
   error (exit_status, 0, dgettext (GNULIB_TEXT_DOMAIN, msgid),
-         hyphens, option, arg);
+         hyphens, option, quote (arg));
 }
 
 /* Like xstrtol_error, except exit with a failure status.  */
diff --git a/modules/xstrtol-error b/modules/xstrtol-error
index 674e2f7290..3fa70933fe 100644
--- a/modules/xstrtol-error
+++ b/modules/xstrtol-error
@@ -12,6 +12,7 @@ exitfail
 getopt-gnu
 gettext-h
 gnulib-i18n
+quote
 
 configure.ac:
 
-- 
2.54.0