>>>>> "GK" == Georges Khaznadar <georges.khazna...@free.fr> writes:
GK> Hello Dan,
GK> I would like to get more information about your intent, for this bug
GK> report.
Looking at the crontab(5) man page,
everything lines up very pretty:
17 * * * * root cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.hourly
25 6 * * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.daily )
47 6 * * 7 root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.weekly )
52 6 1 * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.monthly )
But that is because the author picked 6 hours for each.
Let's see what would happen otherwise:
17 * * * * root cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.hourly
25 16 * * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.daily )
47 6 * * 7 root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.weekly )
52 6 1 * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.monthly )
Oh darn, that looks ugly.
The question that crosses users minds is: "Can I rewrite it
17 * * * * root cd / && run-parts --report /etc/cron.hourly
25 16 * * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.daily )
47 06 * * 7 root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.weekly )
52 06 1 * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.monthly )
or will that be taken as octal (even if octal 6 is just 6), or illegal?
Please don't force me to test to find the answer."
I'm just saying the man page needs to state clearly what will happen.
Sure, one could just add spaces instead of zeros to make the columns
line up. But that would just be avoiding the issue.
GK> Should leading zeroes be supported for the sake of making columns line
GK> up, or should leading zeroes be used to introduce octal constants, in
GK> your opinion?
Nobody wants octal. I'm just trying to make columns line up.
GK> As far as I understand the code of the file entry.c, numbers are parsed
GK> by the function atoi:
GK> -------------8<- file entry.c's excerpt --
GK> if (all_digits) {
GK> *numptr = atoi(temp);
GK> return ch;
GK> }
GK> -------------8<---------------------------
GK> ... which means that numbers prefixed by zeroes are considered as
GK> decimal.
OK that's great. Please mention so on crontab(5). Thanks.
In fact perhaps add an example saying one can use spaces and zeros to make the
columns line up:
25 16 * * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.daily )
47 06 * * 7 root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.weekly )
52 4 1 * * root test -x /usr/sbin/anacron || ( cd / && run-parts
--report /etc/cron.monthly )
