Xref: utzoo comp.lang.c:9143 comp.unix.wizards:7699
Path: utzoo!utgpu!utcsri!flaps
From: flaps@utcsri.UUCP (Alan J Rosenthal)
Newsgroups: comp.lang.c,comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: command line options
Message-ID: <5982@utcsri.UUCP>
Date: 11 Apr 88 06:09:32 GMT
Article-I.D.: utcsri.5982
Posted: Mon Apr 11 02:09:32 1988
References: <2414@zyx.UUCP> <8039@elsie.UUCP> <7628@brl-smoke.ARPA> <143@gsg.UUCP> <7634@brl-smoke.ARPA> <21370@bu-cs.BU.EDU> <7639@brl-smoke.ARPA> <21419@bu-cs.BU.EDU>
Reply-To: flaps@dgp.toronto.edu (Alan J Rosenthal)
Distribution: world
Organization: University of Toronto
Lines: 26
Summary: 


Suppose you have a command, and it has a -h option which takes a
filename argument, as in "command -h file".  This is certainly
reasonable.

Suppose you have a file in your current directory named `elp'.
This is not a weird file name.

Suppose you therefore invoke the command as "command -h elp" or
"command -help".  Amusing, but syntactically correct.

In article <21419@bu-cs.BU.EDU> bzs@bu-cs.BU.EDU (Barry Shein) writes:
>What's wrong with using "-help" as a special case?

This.  The above command, although it worked fine for files `ela'
through `elo', doesn't work for `elp'.

In general, unix options are too terse to be likely to have a syntactic
hole large enough to put a whole word through.  We should be grateful
that the implementation of getopt() guarantees (accidently, I'm sure)
that "command '-?'" works.

ajr

--
"Don't put things you find on the street into your mouth."