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bug#10828: POSIX will say running "rm -f" with no argument is OK
From: |
Stefano Lattarini |
Subject: |
bug#10828: POSIX will say running "rm -f" with no argument is OK |
Date: |
Thu, 16 Feb 2012 21:41:03 +0100 |
Severity: wishlist
[CC:ing bug-automake, so that we won't forget about this issue]
Reference:
<http://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=10819#40>
POSIX will say in a future version that running "rm -f" with no argument is OK;
we might simplify several automake-generated "cleaning" rules accordingly, to
get rid of the awful idiom:
test -z "$(VAR)" || rm -f $(VAR)
On 02/16/2012 08:15 PM, Philip Rowlands wrote:
> On 16/02/2012 18:58, Eric Blake wrote:
>
>>> so that we could simplify a bunch of automake recipes); but a more extensive
>>> probing is needed in this matter I guess. And if you are right (as I hope),
>>> then this 'rm' feature could be documented in the Autoconf manual.
>>
>> Yep, I think that's appropriate, as it is unlikely that we will come up
>> with any counterexamples any time soon.
>
> As the now-POSIX-infringing behaviour is simple to detect, couldn't automake
> detect
> it early and die with a helpful message, or is that contrary to its
> philosophy?
>
Well, that might be an overkill, since it appears that all the non-museum
implementations of 'rm' have the behaviour we want. But I agree that, in case
we ever stumble upon a system violating this new expectation, adding proper
configure-time probing and warning might be helpful (and might convince the
users of such an inferior system to start using GNU coreutils).
Regards,
Stefano
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