bug#27240: inconsistent and confusing output from 'ln' vs. 'cp': can this be fixed?

[Pádraig Brady]

On 04/06/17 22:07, Paul Eggert wrote:
> Pádraig Brady wrote:
>> Well => is for hardlinks, and both -> and => were used
>> to distinguish the operations (in v5.92-191-g24ce72f)
> 
> As I understand it, part of the motivation is consistency with 'ls':
> 
> $ ln -sv a b
> 'b' -> 'a'
> $ ls -l b
> lrwxrwxrwx 1 eggert eggert 1 Jun  4 21:59 b -> a
> 
> With that in mind, if we were to change the format of 'ln' so that the order 
> was 
> the same as the command line, presumably it would look like this:
> 
> $ ln -sv a b
> 'a' <- 'b'
> $ ln -v c d
> 'c' <= 'd'
> 
> An advantage of this format (over what we're using) is that it's easier to 
> distinguish 'cp -v' from 'ln -v' output in a log. I'm not sure that's enough 
> advantage to change, though. Besides, 'cp -v' vs 'mv -v' output is already 
> ambiguous.

I do like that change for ln.
Whether the improvement might break compatibility is a concern,
though I think that's unlikely.

cheers,
Pádraig