Re: Two different zsh sessions handle $* differently

[Phil Pennock <zsh-workers+phil.pennock@spodhuis.org>]

On 2017-08-22 at 20:22 +0300, Mikael Puhakka wrote:
>     (~) whence -f j
>     j () {
>         noglob journal.py "$*"
>     }

This is broken.  If you invoke >> j f* << then the argument list passed
to the function is already expanded.  In this case, you want an alias
instead.  Then you can either have `journal.py` do
  ' '.join(sys.argv[1:])
for you, or still use a function to join things and use an
alias/function combination.  In your shoes, I'd have Python join the
parameters and _just_ use an alias.

Aliases happen before glob expansion and dispatch.  Functions are
invoked after determining their parameter list, too late for `noglob`
inside the function to help.

    # python script looks in all sys.argv[1:] :
    alias j='command journal.py'
or:
    # python script just looks at argv[1] :
    function f_j { journal.py "$*"; }
    alias j='noglob f_j'

>     (~) head -n5 /home/progo/pika/journal.py
>     #!/usr/bin/env python3

Which python3 is used?  Is it the same one in both environments, or is
pyenv or equivalent using shell environment variables or .pyenv-version
files to dispatch to a different interpreter, with one having sys.argv
getting mangled in the start-up files?

Is os.environ[PYTHONSTARTUP] defined, causing logic to happen before
your code sees sys.argv?

Do you have any suffix or global aliases defined in the older zsh
instance?  `alias -s`, `alias -g`?

    % j() { print -l :${^*} }
    % j Test. ABC this is a test.
    :Test.
    :ABC
    :this
    :is
    :a
    :test.
    % alias -g ABC='#'
    % j Test. ABC this is a test.
    :Test.
    %

You can use `setopt xtrace` (or `set -x`) to have zsh emit diagnostics
of what it's doing, so if you do that before invoking `j` then you might
see something different in the two environments.

-Phil