Re: [Gnu-arch-users] arch's file naming scheme is shell unfriendly

[Mikhael Goikhman]

On 17 Oct 2004 10:51:46 -0400, Miles Bader wrote:
> 
> On Sun, Oct 17, 2004 at 01:52:23PM +0000, Mikhael Goikhman wrote:
> > The current arch's naming scheme is pretty inconvenient. You may get used
> > to it, but you can't claim it is shell friendly (whether your shell is
> > bash, tcsh or zsh).
> 
> I don't think anybody is claiming that it's especially "shell friendly",
> merely that the claims that it's shell-_unfriendly_ are vastly overstated,
> that in practice it just doesn't matter all that much, and that the
> advantages of using such conventions more than compensate for the occasional
> inconvenience.
> 
> I use bash, so I know this is true for it; perhaps the case is
> different with csh/tcsh.

The "csh/tcsh" argument is bogus, please try to be accurate here.
All main shells (bash, tcsh, zsh) have comparable number of annoyances.
It is reasonable thus to call such conventions shell-unfriendly.

The situation with tcsh is not worse than with zsh.  tcsh can't run
unquoted {arch} at all (+1 serious problem), but it also has no problems
with =files that zsh and bash have (-1 problem).  This same thread lists
all problems with bash/zsh and +files, =files, ,files and {files}.

I don't agree these annoyances are minor for shell users willing to be
effective, and are compensated by any possible advantages.  I would
not force questionable file name conventions on all managed projects,
and rather see arch as standard and transparent as possible.

Regards,
Mikhael.