Amusing
Peter Junger and Ian Goldberg had the following exchange about the "false" program on dvd-discuss:
In article <200106151833.OAA01441@samsara.law.cwru.edu>, Peter D. Junger <dvd-discuss@eon.law.harvard.edu> wrote: >You might want to contrast that with the GNU version of ``false'': > > > >File: sh-utils.info, Node: false invocation, Next: true invocation, >Up: Cond\itions > >`false': Do nothing, unsuccessfully >=================================== > > `false' does nothing except return an exit status of 1, meaning >"failure". It can be used as a place holder in shell scripts where an >unsuccessful command is needed. > > `false' ignores _all_ command line arguments, even `--help' and >`--version', since to do otherwise would change expected behavior that >some programmers may be relying on. > > This version of `false' is implemented as a C program, and is thus >more secure and faster than a shell script implementation, and may >safely be used as a dummy shell for the purpose of disabling accounts. Not the version I've got: $ false --help Usage: false [ignored command line arguments] or: false OPTION Exit with a status code indicating failure. These option names may not be abbreviated. --help display this help and exit --version output version information and exit Report bugs to <bug-sh-utils@gnu.org>. $ false --version false (GNU sh-utils) 2.0 Written by no one. Copyright (C) 1999 Free Software Foundation, Inc. This is free software; see the source for copying conditions. There is NO warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
To which Richard Hartman replied:
> -----Original Message----- > From: iang@abraham.cs.berkeley.edu ... > $ false --version > false (GNU sh-utils) 2.0 > Written by no one. > > Copyright (C) 1999 Free Software Foundation, Inc. > This is free software; see the source for copying conditions. > There is NO > warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A > PARTICULAR PURPOSE. > You mean if "false" _doesn't_ fail, it's not their fault? ;-)
