Re: grep: return code with -v and empty input

[Edward Avis]

On Fri, 23 Mar 2001, Alain Magloire wrote:

>>>According to the documentation, the -v flag is supposed to invert the
>>>exit status:
>>>
>>>>Normally, exit status is 0 if matches were found, and 1 if no matches
>>>>were found (the `-v' option inverts the sense of the exit status).

>grep.info and man page:
>Diagnostics
>***********
>
>   Normally, exit status is 0 if selected lines are found and 1
>otherwise.  But the exit status is 2 if an error occurred, unless the
>`-q' or `--quiet' or `--silent' option is used and a selected line is
>found.
>
>Is this not clear?

That's not quite the same as the info page for grep that I had.  (Do you
mean this is the proposed new documentation?)  But yes, it is clear.
The misleading sentence '-v inverts the exit status' was the problem I
think.

-- 
Ed Avis
address@hidden