On Thu, Nov 13, 2008 at 10:20 PM, Bob Proulx <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >> So if I ask in debian-devel: "What is the recommended way to view a >> file?", what will the answer be? > > However even if you do not like any of the recommendations it doesn't > change the fact that 'cat' isn't designed as a binary file browser. > Trying to make cat into a binary file browser isn't the right answer.
Note that I'm not looking for a binary file browser. I'm trying to view files that are mostly text, like MySQL query logs. Part of the query might be a short binary string, but that's quite different from your typical executable binary. > I observe that it is at these times, when the needs of the system does > not fit the needs of the user, that people develop the tools which > become the right tool for the job. This might be the perfect time to > *develop* a good tool for your problem. > Also changing the behavior of core programs has a very high > multiplier. (Colloquially we might say it has high leverage or has > high fanout.) Even if the likelihood of breakage for something is low > the risk from that breakage is very high. A very small number > multiplied by a very large number. The result has a large and > unpredictable risk. Like a surgical procedure with small and > questionable benefit. Ninety nine out of a hundred patients have no > side-effects. But one out of a hundred patients die from it. Would > you have the procedure? That's certainly a good point, yes. > No single straw breaks the camel's back. It is the sum accumulation > of so very many small straws that overloads the camel. Hmm, I'm not sure how that fits in. >> And what is your recommendation? I don't want paging. > > Others have suggested 'cat -v' (I personally don't like it for the > above reasons but, it has been around for a long time). I thought the > 'vis' and 'unvis' programs from 4.4BSD were the better choice. They > were invertible. For portability I would probably use 'sed'. (He > says portability and then uses a POSIX character class... :-) > > sed 's/[^[:print:]]/?/g' Hmm, I think cat -v is a bit easier to remember. ;) > Personally I use 'strings' for extracting printable strings from mixed > text and binary files. That's not really what I try to do. >> What is the major usage of tail? To the terminal or not to the terminal? > > Certainly not to the terminal. The 'tail' program is widely used in > scripts. Although it is also often used in a terminal I would think > that pagers would be more common for that purpose. Using the same applications / interfaces for both humans and scripts seems to lead to this kind of problems indeed. > Again, use of 'strings' here is probably what you want. > > tail -f /var/log/mysql/mysql-bin.* | strings That's not the query log... -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact [EMAIL PROTECTED]
