Re: new features to GNU Bash

[Chet Ramey]

On 6/14/10 6:45 AM, mika.p.makinen@webinfo.fi wrote:
> Hello, 
>   I suppose I have found a new feature to Bash.
> If user needs to rename a file and the file is in directory 
> /home/user/a/b/c/d/e/file,
> user needs to write command mv /home/user/a/b/c/d/e/file 
> /home/user/a/b/c/d/e/fileB.
> This command contains the directory written two times. so if Bash would 
> remember
> directory, it would be possible to retrieve directory from memory the second 
> time it is
> needed.
>   That way user does not need to rewrite the same long directory again. there 
> should
> be a key combination to retrieve the directory from memory to command line.

There is, but you have to save it yourself.  If you're using emacs editing
mode, you can use ^W to save the first pathname, and ^Y to retrieve it.

> I also have three other feature propositions.
> 
> a)
> 
> In Bash scripts (and more generally in any programming language), there could 
> be
> a feature, which, when user presses F1 in place of a source code line, would 
> tell
> in plain English what the source code line does. that would be useful for 
> those who
> are learning new programming language and need to know what a source code 
> does.
> also hard-to-find typos would be revealed this way.

There are tools that already do part of this -- syntax-directed editors,
for instance.  The command-to-English-explanation system is a really
daunting task.

The other two proposals don't belong in bash.

Chet

-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
                 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, ITS, CWRU    chet@case.edu    http://cnswww.cns.cwru.edu/~chet/