Re: Localization based problem with sort

[James Youngman]

On Tue, Jan 17, 2006 at 08:44:30AM +0100, Dirk Stoecker wrote:

> b) Even advanced users do not know of LC_COLLATE. I myself use UNIX 
>    operating systems for more than 10 years and it is the very first time 
>    I get in contact with this special environment variable. It is very 
>    unintuitive to set environment variables, whereas a program option is
>    the normal way. Having both ways does no harm.

I disagree; adding the option means that there are now two ways to do
the same thing:

        - one portable way (with LC_COLLATE)

        - one non-portable way

Hence people will be using a non-portable alternative whena perfectly
portable mechanism already existed.  I see this as a retrograde step.
Adding another couple of options also increases the maintenance
burden.  While there is no clear benefit to the change it seems
inadvisable to make the software more complex to maintain.

Also, just as you didn't know about the LC_COLLATE option, the rest of
the world will not know about the new options, either, so these don't
seem to present much of an advantage.

James.