Re: Interactivity (-i) and non-interactivity

[Bob Proulx]

Peter D. wrote:
> Jan Engelhardt wrote:
> > by default, coreutils cp will overwrite a file. Hence I put in
> >     alias cp='/bin/cp -i'
> > into the system-wide profile.

I always find it very annoying when distros or local admins do that
kind of thing.  I causes me to need to undo all of that in my own
.profile et al files.  I end up having a rather full environment file
simply to clean out the trash!

Why is it scary that cp will overwrite a file?  rm removes files.  mv
moves files.  cp copies files.  ln links files.  tee writes files.  ed
edits files.  The shell's '>' redirects output to files.  If you never
reuse disk space then the bit bucket fills up.

> > However, users wishing to override the now-system-default of
> > interactivity cannot do so
>
> They can do so, by using the full path name of the command.  
> On my system, 
> 
>       /bin/cp fileA fileB
> 
> does what you want.  

By calling it /bin/cp you are avoiding the alias.  But it is a full
path and hard coding full paths into your finger memory is not a good
habit to get into because some commands move around.  (Such as grep
and basename for examples.)  The alias can also be avoided by:

  unalias cp
  command cp
  \cp
  'cp'
  "cp"
  env cp

All of those also avoid the alias.

Bob