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Date: Wed, 26 Dec 2012 08:44:27 -0800
From: Ray Andrews <rayandrews@eastlink.ca>
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To: zsh-users@zsh.org
Subject: Re: priority problem of ":|" and ":*"
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 <20121225231133.GA8145@localhost.localdomain>
 <121226011019.ZM32249@torch.brasslantern.com>
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On 26/12/12 01:10 AM, Bart Schaefer wrote:
> } For the ":*", we have this result:
> }
> }     % a1=(a b c);a2=(a b c);print "${#a1:*a2}"
> }     3
>
> This is consistent with the above.
>
> I admit that this is not intuitive when applying operations to the members
> of the array, but it's the way #, ##, %, %%, and :# have always worked, so
> it's a bit late to change it and arguably worse to make it different for
> :| and :*.  (My sympathies if anyone's mail reader is too clever by half
> and renders a lot of that as emoticons.)
>
I think it's astonishing that all this syntax hasn't imploded under it's 
own weight ;-)