What can we do with the drunken libc?

[DervishD <raul@pleyades.net>]

    Hi all :))

    Excuse the subject, it's just that I'm starting to be pissed off
by GNUisms... Let's go to the matter. In the GNU libc 'ldd' script,
we can see something like:

    echo $"Usage: ldd [OPTION]... FILE..."

    Obviously, zsh prints '$Usage: ....', but bash prints just
'Usage: ...'. Why? Well, because as the bash documentation says, a
doubled quoted string preceeded by a dollar sign, will cause the
string to be translated according to the current locale. There are a
couple of shell variables involved, too, TEXTDOMAIN and TEXTDOMAINDIR.

    Well. What can we, zsh users, do? First thing is to use bash as
our '/bin/sh' so all that crappy GNUist scripts work as expected
(there are more bashisms). Other thing is making zsh support those
bashist features. And the most difficult, trying to convince the GNU
people to write portable shell scripts that work with any POSIX or
SUSv3 compatible shell...

    In the interim, GNU people gives me the freedom to use bash, bash
or even bash as my /bin/sh if I run GNU libc. That's freedom.

    Just my 0.02 EUR

    Raúl