Re: Minor bug declaring arrays of integers: dcl -ai=>broken, dcl -ia=>ok

[Linda Walsh]

Dan Douglas wrote:
> On Sunday, July 21, 2013 08:39:29 PM Linda Walsh wrote:
>> I don't think so.   Not from the above.
>>
>> The first sets up an array outside the function composed of integers,
>> so the 2nd time I execute  the same, it gets put through the "integer 
>> strainer".
>>
>> The bug is that the "-i" isn't applied until after the array assignment
>> is done.. which isn't the case for scalars:
>>
> 
> That's exactly what I'm saying. This has been discussed on the list before 
> and 
> I'm pretty sure Chet knows about it. I wrote about this here over a year ago: 
> http://wiki.bash-hackers.org/syntax/arrays#integer_arrays
> 
> I think I even have some code that relies upon this effect.

Chet said he knew about it and that it would be fixed -- or have you
not been getting his emails?

it is documented that the "-i" attribute given to a variable will force 
expressions
assigned to it to be integers (0 if the rval is a non-integer).


"declare -i myint=expr" will only store an integer or 0 for something that 
doesn't
evaluate as an integer.

It's also documented that the -a attribute creates an indexed array variable.

The same should works for hashes -- i.e.
either -a|A should b combinable with -i|l|u to get an array or hash that also 
have
the data-type attribute.

I don't understand -- could you explain the rational for why integer array
shouldn't
function the same way integer scalars would w/regards to converting args to
integers?
Maybe you could point at another language that does this and it would become
more clear?