Package: coreutils Version: 5.96-3 Followup-For: Bug #339085 I want to add emphasis and additional justification to Josh Triplett's request that the old (POSIX-1992) command line syntax continue to work.
On this issue, I speak primarily as a (semi-retired) GCC maintainer. Every other month or so for the past few years - ever since upstream coreutils dropped the old syntax - someone has tried to build GCC on top of a hand-built coreutils, found that the configure script relies on the old syntax, and complained to the mailing list. We then would have to explain to this person that the configure script cannot be updated to the new syntax. Yes, I said *can not* be updated. You see, GCC still supports systems other than bleeding edge GNU... in particular, it still supports systems where the coreutils equivalent had its functionality *frozen*, in every detail, as of POSIX-1992. I know for a fact that this is the case for releases of Solaris up to and including (2.)8, and I strongly suspect it is still true even for the most recent releases. It has also been reported to be the case for various releases of HP-UX and AIX. On these systems, POSIX-2001 syntax like "tail -n 1" simply *does not work*. Now, personally I would be quite happy to see all such obsolete proprietary Unixes die the death, but that's not the world we live in today, and I doubt it will happen - not for at least another decade. Therefore, people writing portable shell scripts have to keep using the old syntax, and that means GNU coreutils needs to keep supporting it. In the default mode, and without any diagnostics. I am cranky about this because I've explained it over and bloody over again to the aforementioned people who are confused why they can't build GCC, and I've also explained it over and over to coreutils upstream, who just do not seem to understand why they are wrong to hew to the letter of POSIX-2001. See http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc-patches/2006-05/msg00102.html for my most recent go-round with coreutils upstream -- I disagree with some of the things he says in response but did not have time to continue the argument; in particular, he says "yabbut +n syntax isn't portable either" when he could make it be so by ceasing this silly insistence on removing it. I advise in the strongest possible terms that Debian just plain ignore upstream on this issue, and leave POSIX-1992 the default, ideally forever. And, moreover, please stop advocating that people change their scripts, because some of us can't, and we're tired of the nagging. zw -- System Information: Debian Release: testing/unstable APT prefers unstable APT policy: (500, 'unstable'), (500, 'testing') Architecture: i386 (i686) Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash Kernel: Linux 2.6.16-1-686-smp Locale: LANG=C, LC_CTYPE=C (charmap=ANSI_X3.4-1968) Versions of packages coreutils depends on: ii libacl1 2.2.37-1 Access control list shared library ii libc6 2.3.6-9 GNU C Library: Shared libraries ii libselinux1 1.30-1 SELinux shared libraries coreutils recommends no packages. -- no debconf information -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
