Re: [PATCH 0/2] First steps in making autoconf ensure a POSIX shell

[Stefano Lattarini]

On 11/10/2012 03:39 PM, Adrian Bunk wrote:
>
> [BIG SNIP]
>
>> Stefano Lattarini wrote:
>>>
>> Please understand I'm not proposing to reject a shell just because it has
>> a bug in some tricky corner case...  Otherwise, we should reject Bash and
>> dash as well :-)
> 
>      Also, `pdksh' 5.2.14 mishandles some WORD forms.  For example if
>      `$1' is `a/b' and `$2' is `a', then `${1#$2}' should yield `/b',
>      but with `pdksh' it yields the empty string.
>
First of all (and I think you'll agree), we have to see how relevant this
bug still is "in the wild".  In addition, chasing the origin of this
reference "git blame", I found this:

  <http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/libtool-patches/2005-01/msg00157.html>

which shows the bug, albeit annoying, has an easy work around.  (And BTW:
thanks Paul for always adding careful pointers in your commit messages!).
So this bug wouldn't be a valid reason for rejecting a shell.  OTOH, not
supporting the ${var#pattern} expansion would be a perfectly valid reason
to do so.

Regards,
  Stefano