Re: [Monotone-devel] Re: New commands (for mtn, in lua)

[Chad Walstrom]

Stephen Leake <address@hidden> wrote:
> It probably would not hurt to restrict the code to POSIX sh. I think
> you can tell Gnu bash to do that with a flag.

I have a soft-spot in my heart for GNU BASH, but such fodness only goes
so far when trying to write POSIX compatible script.  BASH's commandline
--posix flag isn't fool-proof.  In fact, even dash, the strictly
POSIX-compliant shell, complete with its specification bugs, isn't
fool-proof.  Shell writing is more of an art than a science.  You simply
cannot guarantee that the behavior expected is what you're going to get
in all cases.  Keep it simple, and you're likely to get a high
percentage of success on all platforms; it's never 100%.

Writing your aliases or scripting in a single language that is already
required for the application, such as lua, WILL guarantee that wherever
monotone can run successfully, so can its helper-scripts.

I like shell scripts, I do.  Sometimes they're not the answer.

Chad