From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Return-Path: Received: (qmail 5002 invoked from network); 24 May 1998 16:47:03 -0000 Received: from math.gatech.edu (list@130.207.146.50) by ns1.primenet.com.au with SMTP; 24 May 1998 16:47:03 -0000 Received: (from list@localhost) by math.gatech.edu (8.8.5/8.8.5) id MAA21363; Sun, 24 May 1998 12:42:23 -0400 (EDT) Resent-Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 12:42:23 -0400 (EDT) From: "Bart Schaefer" Message-Id: <980524094224.ZM7888@candle.brasslantern.com> Date: Sun, 24 May 1998 09:42:24 -0700 In-Reply-To: <199805240751.CAA21301@hzoli.home> Comments: In reply to Zoltan Hidvegi "Re: PWD parameter" (May 24, 2:51am) References: <199805240751.CAA21301@hzoli.home> X-Mailer: Z-Mail (4.0b.820 20aug96) To: Zoltan Hidvegi Subject: Re: PWD parameter Cc: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Resent-Message-ID: <"yj0Cu1.0.hD5.kt4Qr"@math> Resent-From: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu X-Mailing-List: archive/latest/3994 X-Loop: zsh-workers@math.gatech.edu Precedence: list Resent-Sender: zsh-workers-request@math.gatech.edu On May 24, 2:51am, Zoltan Hidvegi wrote: } Subject: Re: PWD parameter } } Why do you think that PWD is better be a special parameter? Because I like that it can't be *un*set. That means I can always rely on using it in zsh scripts, rather than having to do the silly tests for it being set and having to assign it from `pwd` to make sure it's there. } Scripts do set PWD and if we want to allow people to } use zsh as /bin/sh then we have to allow them to write PWD. } If PWD is special, assignments will write directly to the internal pwd Why is that necessary? PWD could be a special parameter without tying it to any C variable that zsh uses internally. That just happened to be the way it was done (prior to your patch). I don't so much care that it's read-only as I do that it's never unset. (Thinking about it, I might throw in "and always contains an absolute path to a directory that existed at the time the variable was assiged.") -- Bart Schaefer Brass Lantern Enterprises http://www.well.com/user/barts http://www.brasslantern.com