Re: man bash-builtins

[Stephane Chazelas]

2021-02-12 19:33:33 -0700, ron:
> In the Synopsis section, the builtin `caller` is not included. Several
> keywords are listed as builtins: [, if, until and while.

You're probably refering to the bash-builtins.1 man page shipped
with Debian. If you look at the bottom, you'll see that man page
is from bash 2.05a.

If you look at the CHANGES file in bash-2.05b released in 2002,
you'll see:

> l.  Removed the reserved words from the `bash-builtins' manual
> page.

The doc/builtins.1 in current versions of bash doesn't have the
problem, though it's missing the "readarray" builtin (IMO, the
better name for the "mapfile" builtin) and lists "bash" itself
as a builtin.

"[" itself *is* a builtin, (an alias for "test") not a keyword.

You may want to raise the issue with Debian instead.

You'll notice that doc/builtins.1 is very short, just a header
and then .SO's the relevant section of the bash.1 man page.

That file could easily be automatically generated based on the
output of the "enable" builtin for instance.

Personally, to learn about a bash builtin, I just run

   info bash builtin

-- 
Stephane