Re: Bug or change?

[Eric Blake]

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According to Fredrik Andreasson on 9/18/2007 1:43 AM:
> Hi, maybe this it a bug?

Not a bug, but a difference in POSIX compliance.

> address@hidden ~]$ sort --version
> sort (GNU coreutils) 5.97

Even this version is somewhat old - the latest stable version of coreutils
is 6.9.

> address@hidden ~]$ cat file|sort -nr +2
> sort: open failed: +2: No such file or directory

Reread the NEWS - as of 5.90, this change was deliberate, because of POSIX
requirements:

  A few usages still have behavior that depends on which POSIX standard is
  being conformed to, and portable applications should beware these
  problematic usages.  These include:

    Problematic       Standard-conforming replacement, depending on
       usage            whether you prefer the behavior of:
                      POSIX 1003.2-1992    POSIX 1003.1-2001
    sort +4           sort -k 5            sort ./+4

Furthermore, the info manual describes a way to override which version of
POSIX you want - 'info coreutils standard'.

- --
Don't work too hard, make some time for fun as well!

Eric Blake             address@hidden
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