Re: ls -d link/

[Markus Werle]

Bob Proulx wrote:

> This matches what I expect to see.

Ah, this is what I wanted to know.

>  What do you expect to see here?

The information "demo is a link to a directory",
but obviously my way of thinking and
POSIX's way are different things ;-)

> You have symbolically linked demo to your /home/markus.  Then you
> asked ls to list it in long format but not to recurse down.

Yes.

>  You added a trailing slash

Yes.

> which says to resolve the symlink to destination first.

Oh! really?
So why ain't the destination showed by its name in the output?
Even if it seeems to be POSIX-conformant, I have to say:
It is a little bit strange for the unaware (and who isn't even after long years
on that system with a few thousand evolving exectutables in /usr/bin).

>  The destination of demo is /home/markus.  So it listed that.

No. it did not mention "/home/markus" at all. This is what I zing.

# ll -d demo/
drwxr-xr-x   45 markus   users        4153 Mar 12 12:00 demo/

For me the name "demo" is a representation of a symbolic link.
Thinking that "demo/" is something completely different is
a _decision_ taken by special people who live in a special world: UNIX.

Mixing attributes from the destination with the name of the link
in the output is worth a rethink.

I would have taken an other decision, but who cares ...
I can live with that.

<KIDDING>
In MARKUSIX it would have been forbidden.
Maybe it is time to fork another UNIX derivate
and to undermine POSIX again (snickle) ...
</KIDDING>

> > Is there any good reason to keep that behaviour?
>
> Keep what behavior?

The unexpected behaviour ;-)

> You never said what you expected to see

I never expected that You (and POSIX) find the as-is-behaviour expectable.
Now I learned it is the other way round:
You never expected me not to expect the behaviour as it is.
Therefore I cannot expect others to understand my expectations.
This is what mailing lists are good for: To get rid of wrong expectations.

> and us folks reading the bug list can't read your mind,

Obviously my mind is not POSIXLY_CORRECT.
What a pity.

>  you have to come right out and say it.

"it".

Thank You for teaching me POSIX.

A decision is a decision. I respect it. I do not want to change it,
unless there is no war on earth anymore. But I find it at least improvable
and therefore my comments. If You disagree: peace to You anyway.


Markus