Re: [PATCH] ls --group-directories-first: symlinks to dirs are dirs too

[Bert Wesarg]

Jim Meyering wrote:
> Bert Wesarg <address@hidden> wrote:
> > With the --group-directories-first option, ls shows directories on top of all
> > non directory entries, but IMHO symlinks to directories should be handle as
> > directories as well.
>
> Thanks for the patch, but a change in behavior like that
> requires some serious justification.
I read the thread in the mail archive. Eric Blake questioned the symlink 
behavior in the first reply (still in the patch tracker):

> Your patch does not take into account what behavior should be used
> with symlinks to dirs - are they grouped with directories, or with
> files, or does it depend on other options (such as -L)?

And indeed a -L with --group-directories-first does sort symlinks to 
directories like directories. But they don't look like symlinks anymore.

Anyway, this fact was not really discussed, Francesco decided that symlinks to 
directories are non-directories and no one objected.

Currently there is no test for this option, even Francesco has posted one which 
also consider symlinks, and the documentation for this options doesn't mention 
symlinks too. So, IMHO there is no change in documented behavior with this 
patch.

Therefor I change this to an RFC, to further discuss this question.

Regards
Bert