More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
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More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
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Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#2>On Linux, more is part of the util-linux package but its manpage outright tells you to use less instead
On minimal distros (say, Debian in the minbase configuration), more is more likely to be included than less. I haven't used any other small distros for a while but is util-linux normally there instead of other packages (actually, I wonder why minbase doesn't just use busybox).
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#3Now all we need is someone to modify less to recognize that its standard in is connected the output of more so that if you type `cat /etc/passwd | more | less` it could output something which, more or less, looked like the input.
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#4I applaud all distributions that include the simplest tools. Sometimes - always the worst times - they're the ones that still work.
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#5>On Linux, more is part of the util-linux package but its manpage outright tells you to use less instead On minimal distros (say, Debian in the minbase configuration), more is more likely to be included than less. I haven't used any other small distros for a while but is util-linux normally there instead of other packages (actually, I wonder why minbase doesn't just use busybox).
Not a debootstrap or any sort of Debian developer, but I assume minbase is expected to be strictly a subset of the packages one would find on a regular Debian system, which would imply having bash, dash, util-linux and so on, rather than attempting to use busybox (which is Priority: optional).
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#6I prefer less. Incidentally, the other day I was on a CentOS system where I wanted to paginate a log file and typed in "less". Turns out, unlike more, less isn't installed by default. Was a bit surprised because I was under the impression that most Linux systems would have had it in their default install.
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#7There is another pager, less advanced than more http://www.unix.com/man-page/linux/1/pg/
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#8I can see the fossilization, but I don't see what's so typical Unix of that phenomenon. Windows still includes cmd.exe with all its broken, retarded features, while it has powershell, which is supposedly (no experience myself) a little less retarded.
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#9I can see the fossilization, but I don't see what's so typical Unix of that phenomenon. Windows still includes cmd.exe with all its broken, retarded features, while it has powershell, which is supposedly (no experience myself) a little less retarded.
cmd.exe starts in a second, powershell takes 5 and then another 10 to actually be interactive.
So it's still useful to me.
Re: More, less, and a story of typical Unix fossilization
#10I can see the fossilization, but I don't see what's so typical Unix of that phenomenon. Windows still includes cmd.exe with all its broken, retarded features, while it has powershell, which is supposedly (no experience myself) a little less retarded.
Contrary to less, PowerShell is definitely not backwards-compatible with cmd. Microsoft has changed cmd a select few times, most notably adding command extensions around NT 4, I think. But those changes were very careful not to break existing scripts (which means delayed expansion is always disabled by default). If vi acts a little bit different, or more accepts other keys that don't scroll a whole page, it's also not a big deal because those are tools people interact with, not programs. People are a bit more flexible with change. And Microsoft certainly changed a lot of things in our around its user interfaces.
cmd is still around for the same reason sh is still around. For compatibility.