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From: tjr@ihnet.UUCP (Tom Roberts)
Newsgroups: net.unix
Subject: cat arguments and wild-cards
Message-ID: <123@ihnet.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 18-Apr-84 12:04:23 EST
Article-I.D.: ihnet.123
Posted: Wed Apr 18 12:04:23 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 19-Apr-84 03:37:52 EST
Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL
Lines: 13

The shell is actually expanding the wild-card (*), NOT cat.

Note that if the shell expanded

	cat <x*

it would be possible to have multiple filenames match the "x*", AND THESE
EXTRA FILES WOULD BECOME ARGUMENTS TO CAT. This could easily cause very
strange behavior (for programs other than cat). The designer(s) of the
shell decided to simply NOT expand any wild-cards for stream-redirections.

	Tom Roberts
	ihnp4!ihnet!tjr