Re: PATCH: zsh-3.1.5-pws-7: "$a[@]" with $a unset

[Peter Stephenson <pws@ibmth.df.unipi.it>]

> } Sven Wischnowsky wrote:
> } >   % foo() { echo $# }
> } >   % unset a
> } >   % foo $a[@]
> } >   0                    # fine
> } >   % foo "$a[@]"
> } >   1                    # oops
> 
> That's not an "oops".  That's the way it's supposed to work.  Try the
> equivalent code in bash.

Bash doesn't even have arrays, apart from "$@", of course.  Try it in
ksh, and remember you need "${f[@]}" because the bracing rules are
more strict, and you'll find it elides the whole thing as with the
patch.

Taking a @ subscript was never a well-defined thing to do on a scalar,
whether or not it happens to be so with a zsh extension; its essential
purpose is to provide word splitting for arrays in strings, so zero
elements gives zero words.  (And if it leaves a null argument on the
line for an empty scalar, I would argue that's inconsistently
implemented.)

> I don't think we want this patch.

It seems pretty clear to me the shell is just plain broken without it.

-- 
Peter Stephenson <pws@ibmth.df.unipi.it>       Tel: +39 050 844536
WWW:  http://www.ifh.de/~pws/
Dipartimento di Fisica, Via Buonarroti 2, 56127 Pisa, Italy