NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell • Hacker News Board

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#41

Post by lolidaisuki » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:25 PM UTC

andrey_utkin wrote: post #14

So, this project starts about shell, then I see it also aims to implement full-blown terminal emulator and a lot of new very ambitious features, and then it invites terminal-based apps to use new capabilities of it, so it would be best usable only if the whole ecosystem of compatible apps appear. Unfortulately, I'm pessimistic. Also, would like to comment on project's README. Not meaning to be harsh. > The shells nev…

>> some rw, some ro > Seems lacking in tmux at the moment, but possible to implement on its own, without reinventing everything else.

I wonder if this coul be done by having two users and only allowing read access to the tmux socket for the second one...

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#42

Post by dfcowell » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:26 PM UTC

txutxu wrote: post #32

joosters wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you pipe the output of one command into another, e.g 'ls | wc' (obviously a dumb example), the second command will split the filenames on spaces and so will not run properly. The workarounds for this all involve nasty extra parameters for different commands (e.g. the -print0 example)

ls is not bash wc is not bash And that is a discouraged way to count files in shell script. Still, simply adding -l to ls, could handle spaces correctly (the files count) I insist, spaces are not your enemy, there are much more weird file names for a shell. Shell can handle spaces if used properly.

That there are worse things that exist is no reason not to pluck the low hanging fruit. I see this attitude on HN a lot. Spaces are probably the 80 in the 80/20 rule here. Why not address them?

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#43

Post by StreakyCobra » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:26 PM UTC

pjmlp wrote: post #11

For me a next generation UNIX shell needs to catch up with what REPL environment in Lisp Machines, Interlisp-D, Mesa/Cedar, Smalltalk, Oberon(-2), AOS features and capabilities. For the young HNers, think having something like Swift Playgrounds or IPython as your shell, while having full access to the OS API without relying on external programming languages. Otherwise the next generation prefix isn't worth mentioning…

As you said, something like IPython: https://ipython.org/ipython-doc/3/interactive/shell.html

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#44

Post by dustingetz » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:27 PM UTC

If processes were referentially transparent functions, the shell would be wicked fast as it can run commands speculatively as you type them and discard the side effects if you backspace and memorize the results. Along with a zillion other game changer benefits like determinism. Built in perfect auditing. Rewind and restore processes to past states. That's what we should be striving for. But it's a lot harder.

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#45

Post by txutxu » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:29 PM UTC

txutxu wrote: post #32

joosters wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When you pipe the output of one command into another, e.g 'ls | wc' (obviously a dumb example), the second command will split the filenames on spaces and so will not run properly. The workarounds for this all involve nasty extra parameters for different commands (e.g. the -print0 example)

ls is not bash wc is not bash And that is a discouraged way to count files in shell script. Still, simply adding -l to ls, could handle spaces correctly (the files count) I insist, spaces are not your enemy, there are much more weird file names for a shell. Shell can handle spaces if used properly.

Not sure on why this comment got down-voted.

If it's because I did not explain how to do that, there is howto do it:

    http://mywiki.wooledge.org/BashFAQ/004

If it's because the comment on the given example...

    $ touch file1
    $ ls -l | wc -l
    1
    $ touch "file 2"
    $ ls -l | wc -l
    2

... (?)

If we were talking about "new lines in file names", or "dashes at the beginning of file names", or code injection through file names, then we could be talking of more complex solutions.

But the space issues in shell are simple, and have known solutions. If you're a daily user or you're not at learning stage, spaces don't turn to be a issue.

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#46

Post by nailer » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:29 PM UTC

anfroid555 wrote: post #23

But why nodejs?? There are a lots better languages to base this off of.

Probably because JavaScript is the worlds most popular programming language, it's portable, has the largest package manager, supports the shell's non blocking requirement, and the current version (ES6) has a better stdlib than previous versions.

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#47

Post by leephillips » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:29 PM UTC

Curious if anyone here has adopted the shell mode of iPython as their routine shell (or something similar). Is it a good idea? Experiences?

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#48

Post by azdle » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:29 PM UTC

yoodenvranx wrote: post #17

Something I would LOVE to see (not only in a shell but in all tools) is some kind of "project mode". - In Chrome/Firefox I'd like to have a mode for recreational browsing, one for research of webdesign and one for fitness/health stuff. This basically means that I want to click at a browser window and say "This is now my fitness window. Please remember all the open tabs". And then there is a list of open sesions/proje…

> - In Chrome/Firefox I'd like to have a mode for recreational browsing, one for research of webdesign and one for fitness/health stuff. This basically means that I want to click at a browser window and say "This is now my fitness window. Please remember all the open tabs". And then there is a list of open sesions/projects where I can switch between those views/instances. I'd like to be able to close my fitness-window (without losing my fitness tabs) and then re-open the same fitness-window on the next day.

Sounds like you're asking for 'Tab Groups'. It used to be a feature built into Firefox, but recently got removed due to lack of use, it is however still available as an add-on (mostly using the existing code that was removed from Firefox itself afaik):

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tab-groups-pa...

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#49

Post by StreakyCobra » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:30 PM UTC

heydonovan wrote: post #9

I'm sure we can all agree that the current state of shells needs some work, but I don't think inventing a new one is the right solution. I'm a huge fan of the fish shell, but in the real world, it never seems to be installed across the farm, and convincing the older SysAdmins to install it is more trouble than it's worth. We should be focusing on saner bash defaults, since it's the most common shell in use. We should…

Side note: https://github.com/supercrabtree/k is a ZSH plugin in the same register that `exa`.

Re: NGS: Next Generation Unix Shell

#50

Post by gravypod » Thu, Apr 21, 2016, 1:31 PM UTC

What is this intended on fixing?

I don't think the solution to anything is to make the shell more user-friendly. The only solution is to make the graphical user-interface more user friendly and feature full.

The only time it should be acceptable to be forced to use a shell, in my opinion, is if you are swapping out your desktop environment.

Until that happens, Windows and OS X will rule the desktop and PC market.

I'm fairly certain that Linux-based distributions will win out in the end if we can overcome this clingy gravitation to a command line. It's already happening already. Android is already winning against all of the major phone platforms and it's not because of it's award winning terminal emulator.