the sort thing again -- kind of

[David T-G]

Hello, all --

I'm sure you're tired of hearing "why doesn't it sort?" questions, and I
thank Bob for his FAQ response to many, many, many users.  I'm glad I
pulled down the archives :-)

The summary: I want to know how to make it sort like I want by default.

I have a somewhat different situation, though, and so I brave being
branded as a dullard...  From my perusal of the ChangeLog I do not see
that this sort "stuff" was implemented between 4.0 and 4.1, and yet our
badly-installed-and-really-should-be-replaced copy of ls sorts as I would
expect.  To wit:

  bash-2.05a$ /appmnt/prod/IT/gnu/SunOS_5.8/gnu_13/bin/ls --version
  ls (GNU fileutils) 4.0
  bash-2.05a$ 
  bash-2.05a$ ls --version
  ls (fileutils) 4.1
  Written by Richard Stallman and David MacKenzie.

(with the copyright notice clipped for brevity; forgive me).

Interestingly enough, the two versions of ls display columns differently
for the same directory; it seems that 4.0 uses the whole width of the
screen while 4.1 thinks that it can't.  To wit:

  bash-2.05a$ /appmnt/prod/IT/gnu/SunOS_5.8/gnu_13/bin/ls
  00-Done               card--help              ctags-h          diff3--help
  00-GotIt              card--version           ctags-v          diff3--version
  00-WHAT               card-h                  cvs--help        diff3-h
  Esetroot--help        card-v                  cvs--version     diff3-v
  Esetroot--version     cc--help                cvs-h            dirname--help
  ...
  bash-2.05a$ ls
  00-Done              composeglyphs--version  dirname--version
  00-GotIt             composeglyphs-h         dirname-h
  00-WHAT              composeglyphs-v         dirname-v
  addftinfo--help      ctags--help             echo--help
  addftinfo--version   ctags--version          echo--version

As you can see, the 4.0 version sorts caps first but also uses a fourth
column -- and the columns are even shifted right by one compared to the
only three that 4.1 spits out.

The tricky thing is that I don't have $LAND or $LC_ALL set at all:

  bash-2.05a$ 
  bash-2.05a$ echo $LANG

  bash-2.05a$ echo $LC_ALL

  bash-2.05a$ 

So yet again I don't understand why sorting should be different.

Was there, in fact, a change in sort smarts between 4.0 and 4.1 that I
couldn't detect, or did the person who built the 4.0 stuff perhaps
perform some magic to set a default sort style so that the env variables
aren't needed for folks who want the "old" behavior?  If the latter, is
it common magic that you can impart to the novice :-) or was it code
hacking?


I've just subscribed to the list, so I expect that I'll see any
followups, but adding a cc: for me might be safest since I haven't yet
seen any posts.

TIA & HAND

:-D
-- 
David T-G                      * It's easier to fight for one's principles
(play) address@hidden * than to live up to them. -- fortune cookie
(work) address@hidden
http://www.justpickone.org/davidtg/    Shpx gur Pbzzhavpngvbaf Qrprapl Npg!

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