Re: Inner Command Lists fail in Bash 5.2.15

[Kerin Millar]

On Thu, 31 Aug 2023 12:05:21 -0400 (EDT)
dkroot2@gmail.com wrote:

> Configuration Information [Automatically generated, do not change]:
> Machine: x86_64
> OS: darwin20.6.0
> Compiler: clang
> Compilation CFLAGS: -DSSH_SOURCE_BASHRC
> uname output: Darwin San-Francisco-iMac.local 20.6.0 Darwin Kernel Version 
> 20.6.0: Thu Jul  6 22:12:47 PDT 2023; 
> root:xnu-7195.141.49.702.12~1/RELEASE_X86_64 x86_64
> Machine Type: x86_64-apple-darwin20.6.0
> 
> Bash Version: 5.2
> Patch Level: 15
> Release Status: release
> 
> Description:
>       I've run into a regression in one of my scripts after upgrading Bash 
> from 5.1.16 to 5.2.15 via HomeBrew on a Mac.
> I was able to narrow it down to the Bash upgrade itself. The problem seems to 
> be a pretty serious one that can affect a lot of scripts.
> 
> Repeat-By:
> 
> # Bash 5.1.16: success
> # Bash 5.2.15: syntax error near unexpected token `}'
> var2=$(time { echo foo; echo bar; })

This looks like a casualty of the changes made for 5.2 that have it validate 
syntax recursively. The error message suggests that "time" is not considered to 
be a keyword there, even though it is. In any case, here is a temporary 
workaround for this regression.

$ declare -- BASH_VERSION="5.2.15(1)-release"
$ var2=$(:; time { echo foo; echo bar; })

real    0m0.000s
user    0m0.000s
sys     0m0.000s

-- 
Kerin Millar