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The bash built-ins 'true' and 'false' are undocumented in info and man p


From: Sebastian Carlos
Subject: The bash built-ins 'true' and 'false' are undocumented in info and man page.
Date: Wed, 3 May 2023 13:15:30 +0200

I guess there is not too much to say about the bash built-ins 'true' and
'false'.  Nonetheless, I suggest that the info pages should list these
built-ins individually like other built-ins. Currently, the only hint on
their
existence in the info or man page is in the node (or man page section)
called
"Shell Builtin Commands" saying that:

  The `:', `true', `false', and `test' builtins do not accept options and do
  not treat `--' specially.

I am aware that these builtins are documented in 'help true', 'help false',
'info coreutils true' and 'info coreutils false', but I suggest documenting
them in the info and man pages too for the following reasons:

- 'info bash' begins with "This text is a brief description of the features
  that are present in the Bash shell", it also says "This manual is meant
as a
  brief introduction to features found in Bash.  The Bash manual page
should be
  used as the definitive reference on shell behavior.", which would suggest
  that "man" or "info" (or both) should document these builtins.
- The commands 'true' and 'false' that are documented in 'info coreutils'
are
  different from the bash built-ins with the same names, so documenting
them in
  'info bash' wouldn't count as duplication.
- The built-ins 'true' and 'false' are the only ones that are missing from
the
  ‘info bash’ index, which makes them inaccessible to the commands 'info
bash
  true' and 'info bash false'.

Thanks for your attention.

Bash version: 5.2.11


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