Re: Local variables overriding global constants

[Pierre Gaston]

On Wed, Apr 3, 2013 at 11:21 AM, Pierre Gaston <pierre.gaston@gmail.com>wrote:

> On Wed, Apr 3, 2013 at 11:03 AM, Chris Down <chris@chrisdown.name> wrote:
>
>> On 2013-04-03 11:00, Nikolai Kondrashov wrote:
>> > >>>It doesn't work because you are trying to redefine an existing
>> > >>>readonly variable.
>> > >>
>> > >>Yes, but I'm explicitly redefining it locally, only for this function.
>> > >>And this works for variables previously defined in the calling
>> function.
>> > >
>> > >You're not redefining it locally, you are unsuccessfully trying to
>> override a
>> > >global.
>> >
>>
> Still Nikolai has a point.
> It's not clear why readonly variable can be overridden when the variable
> is declared readonly in the scope of an englobing function but not if it is
> declared readonly in the global scope.
>
> $ bash -c 'a() {  v=2;echo "$v"; }; b () { declare -r v=1; a; echo "$v";
> }; b'
> bash: v: readonly variable
>
> The variable is locale to b, but the readonly flag is preserved in a
>
> $ bash -c 'a() { declare -r v=2;echo "$v"; }; b () { declare -r v=1; a;
> echo "$v"; }; b'
> 2
> 1
>
> The variable is locale to b, but you can redeclare it  locale to a even if
> it has the readonly flag
>
> $ bash -c 'declare -r v=2; b () { declare -r v=1; echo "$v"; }; b'
> bash: line 0: declare: v: readonly variable
> 2
>
> it looks like the same as the first case except that the variable is
> declared readonly in the global scope.
>
> (Also readonly defers from declare -r:
>  bash -c 'a() { declare -r v=2;echo "$v"; }; b () { readonly v=1; a; echo
> "$v"; }; b; v=2'
> $ bash -c 'a() { declare -r v=2;echo "$v"; }; b () { readonly v=1; a; echo
> "$v"; }; b; v=2'
> bash: line 0: declare: v: readonly variable
> 1
> 1
> bash: v: readonly variable.
>
> I seem to recall this has been discussed on this list at some point)
>

 ok it has indeed been discussed, and this is a feature not a bug:

http://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bash/2012-04/msg00088.html