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Re: comment on RFE: 'shift'' [N] ARRAYNAME
From: |
Greg Wooledge |
Subject: |
Re: comment on RFE: 'shift'' [N] ARRAYNAME |
Date: |
Thu, 27 Sep 2018 08:35:51 -0400 |
User-agent: |
NeoMutt/20170113 (1.7.2) |
On Tue, Sep 25, 2018 at 05:17:27PM -0700, L A Walsh wrote:
> It struck me as it might be convenient if 'shift' could take an optional
> arrayname as an argument. Would that be possible or would it cause some
> incompatibility?
The biggest issue here is how you specify the arguments.
Shift already takes one optional argument: the number of items to shift
from the argv list. Adding a second optional argument leads to a quagmire.
Do you put the optional list name first, or do you put the optional number
first? If only one argument is given, is it a list name, or is it a number?
(OK, granted, in bash it is not permitted to create an array whose name
is strictly digits, but still.)
If you wish to write an array-shifting builtin, it would be better to give
it a new name. Don't blindly copy perl. It's not always the best example
of language design.