From: Bart Schaefer <schaefer@brasslantern.com>
To: zsh-workers@zsh.org
Subject: Re: Builtin test and parsing of conditionals
Date: Wed, 04 Sep 2013 10:39:40 -0700 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <130904103940.ZM28454@torch.brasslantern.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20130904173159.19c55cd1@pwslap01u.europe.root.pri>
On Sep 4, 5:31pm, Peter Stephenson wrote:
} Subject: Re: Builtin test and parsing of conditionals
}
} On Wed, 04 Sep 2013 09:15:03 -0700
} Bart Schaefer <schaefer@brasslantern.com> wrote:
} > According to some discussion on the austin-group (POSIX) mailing list,
} > the following:
} >
} > test ! -a !
} > test ! -o !
} > test ! = !
} >
} > should all be parsed as comparing the string "!" to the string "!", but
} > zsh gets this right only in the last case.
}
} I don't understand that. -a means "and" and -o means "or", unless
} they're being interpreted as strings, but I don't see how that could be
} if ! is supposed to be interpreted as a string.
Sorry, perhaps I should have been clearer: "! -a !" means to compare the
truth value "!" to the truth value of "!". But "truth value" in "test"
is the same as "non-empty string" (true) and "empty string" (false) [not
0 or 1 as numeric values], so the -a operator is still comparing two
strings.
The point being that "!" should be parsed as a string, not as a negation
operator, in the three-argument case.
} So where does the
} implicit comparison come from? If -a were taken as high precedence you
} might read it as
}
} test -n ! -a n !
} test -n ! -a n !
Presuming you mean -a -n there, this is exactly how the austin-group
thread claims it should be interpreted, and is reportedly how ksh and
bash and GNU /usr/bin/test all interpret it.
} (Outside our control, but I imagine people aren't daft enough to rely on
} this sort of behaviour in new scripts...?)
I would hope so, but ...
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2013-09-04 17:39 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 7+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2013-09-04 16:15 Bart Schaefer
2013-09-04 16:31 ` Peter Stephenson
2013-09-04 17:39 ` Bart Schaefer [this message]
2013-09-04 19:09 ` Peter Stephenson
2013-09-05 14:25 ` Bart Schaefer
2013-09-06 19:20 ` Peter Stephenson
2013-09-04 20:15 ` Chet Ramey
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