Re: tail bug?

[Jim Meyering]

Eric Blake wrote:
> $ echo abc | tail -c +1
> tail: cannot open `+1' for reading: No such file or directory
> $ echo abc | tail -c+1
> abc
> $ tail --version | head -n1
> tail (GNU coreutils) 7.6
>
> Shouldn't -c behave the same, whether or not there is a space before the
> count argument?

Thanks for the report.

However, it seems you have set _POSIX2_VERSION=199209 in your
environment, or you've built with older header files.

It works fine for me on GNU/linux (Fedora rawhide):

    $ echo abc | env -i ./tail -c+1
    abc
    $ echo abc | env -i ./tail -c +1
    abc

However, if I set that envvar, I see what you reported:

    $ echo abc | _POSIX2_VERSION=199209 ./tail -c +1
    ./tail: cannot open `+1' for reading: No such file or directory

You need at least the 200112 setting to get the more sensible behavior:

    $ echo abc | _POSIX2_VERSION=200112 ./tail -c +1
    abc