Re: Cursor Bug when Compiling

[Bob Proulx]

Neil Kolojeski wrote:
> Sirs,  In SuSE 9.0 one could compile in the console without a problem, 
> but in SuSE 9.2 sometimes  compiling would change the cursor (in the KDE 
> Konsole) into -s

Wow.  That is very strange to hear.  In fact it is so strange that I
am in disbelief in how that can happen or even be related.

What do you mean by "-s"?  Usually the terminal cursor is an block or
an underscore.  But a "-s" sounds like something completely different.
Can you describe this in a little more detail?

I can only think that there are some escape sequences being emited by
the compilation which is being interpreted by the terminal.

> and to change the -s back into a cursor one would have to reboot.

Does restarting the terminal fix the problem?  Rebooting seems much to
harsh for this.  If the terminal is changing cursors then starting a
new terminal should restart using the original cursor.

> This mysterious bug is set off by the newer version of 
> Coreutils found on SuSE 9.2.   I hope the foregoing information will 
> help you find out what causes the bug and fix it if you have not already 
> done so.         Confidentially yours,  Anon.

Unfortunately there is not enough information to deduce the root cause
of this problem.  There is no way to reproduce it.  In particular what
version of coreutils are you trying to compile?

Try this.  Compile and redirect all output to a log file.  If my guess
that it is an escape sequence being emitted that is causing the
problem then this will prevent it from going to the terminal.

  ./configure
  make > make.out 2>&1

If that works to avoid this problem then we know it is a character
sequence in the compile output.  Then we can divide the problem up
further and get to the specific cause.

Bob