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exit 256 could lead to catastrophic failures of missile systems, etc.


From: Dan Jacobson
Subject: exit 256 could lead to catastrophic failures of missile systems, etc.
Date: 22 Nov 2001 12:03:28 +0800
User-agent: Gnus/5.0808 (Gnus v5.8.8) Emacs/20.7

[Original title: "exit beyond 0-255 not mentioned"], now switched for
more eye-catching one.

$ help exit
exit: exit [n]
    Exit the shell with a status of N.  If N is omitted, the exit status
    is that of the last command executed.

I thought you said n, not N.

$ man bash
       exit [n]
              Cause the shell to exit with a status of n.   If  n
              is  omitted,  the  exit  status is that of the last
              command executed.

That's more like it, but wait,

$ exit 555
exit

Process shell<1> exited abnormally with code 43

Well, I think there's some explaining to do on the man page about why
one can't exit with their favourite number in some cases.

mention that you'll get the same as
$ echo $((255&555)) $((255&-555))
43 213
etc.

Indeed, warn that
$ exit 256
and its multiples return like
$ true
and thus could lead to catastrophic failures of missile systems,
etc. [if one was doing
$ launch_check && launch
]
bash version 2.05.0(1)
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