Re: new module 'system-quote'

[Eli Zaretskii]

> From: Bruno Haible <address@hidden>
> Cc: address@hidden
> Date: Thu, 10 May 2012 11:29:17 +0200
> 
> > > If I recall it correctly, the
> > >   check_one (interpreter, prog, "*");
> > > case failed: Apparently, when you pass a single unquoted '*' argument
> > > to CreateProcess, it can fail with GetLastError() = ERROR_PATH_NOT_FOUND.
> > 
> > That is expected and reasonable: the first token in the argument is
> > the executable to invoke, so it cannot possibly include wildcards.
> 
> There's a misunderstanding. I know that the CreateProcess() does less
> processing on the first token than on the remaining ones (the arguments),
> therefore the code is made for the arguments, and the unit test also
> tests the arguments.

Sorry for my misunderstanding.  However, ...

> If you want to see what happens, just remove the '*' from
> SHELL_SPECIAL_CHARS and re-run the unit test.

I see this:

  for input = |*|: CreateProcess() command failed with status 3: 
.\test-system-quote-child.exe *

But IIUC that just means we hit this condition in the child:

  if (argc > 2)
    /* Expected one data argument, received more than one.  */
    return 3;

IOW, it got several arguments, where only one was expected.  This is
perfectly normal, since "*" (unquoted) will expand into the list of
all the files in the current directory.  If I hack
test-system-quote-child.c as follows:

--- test-system-quote-child.c~0 2012-05-09 19:50:17.000000000 +0300
+++ test-system-quote-child.c   2012-05-10 19:15:50.732750000 +0300
@@ -32,8 +32,13 @@ main (int argc, char *argv[])
     /* Expected one data argument, received none.  */
     return 2;
   if (argc > 2)
-    /* Expected one data argument, received more than one.  */
-    return 3;
+    {
+      /* Expected one data argument, received more than one.  */
+      int i;
+      for (i = 1; i < argc; i++)
+       fprintf (stderr, "%d: `%s'\n", i, argv[i]);
+      return 3;
+    }
   arg = argv[1];
 
   /* Read the contents of EXPECTED_DATA_FILE.  */

I see 305 argv[] elements printed to stderr.

So this is not a failure of CreateProcess, this is expected and
correct behavior.  Or am I again missing something?

If I'm not missing anything, I submit that '*' should be removed from
the list of special characters.  Leaving it there means that it will
be impossible to invoke programs with arguments that include
wildcards.

Thanks.