Re: Student contribution

[Eduardo Bustamante]

On Wed, May 10, 2017 at 6:06 PM, Desirée Zahradnicek
<address@hidden> wrote:
> It's true that this functionality can be achieved very easily with a
> simple script, but the point is that it being so useful it's a letdown
> that it isn't incorporated already, and so people that needs it have
> to go creating/googling a solution. I know it's much more work to have
> it built in, and that as with all modifications there's always the
> risk of breaking something, but on the plus side I'll be the one doing
> the work, and as it adds an optional functionality it's not expected
> to cause trouble if not used.

Consider software bloat. If you can fulfill the requirement with a
2-line script, then perhaps it's not something that *needs* to be
implemented in the tail utility.

"Write programs that do one thing and do it well. Write programs to
work together. Write programs to handle text streams, because that is
a universal interface." -- Doug McIlroy