Re: GNU grep 2.5.4 released

[Reuben Thomas]

> Antonio Diaz Diaz wrote:
>> Also, by using zgrep from zutils[1][2], I hope you can avoid bloating
>> grep with decompression code[3] and non-standard options.

A word about this. In an ideal world, transparent decompression would
happen in a standard API atop stdio, and all text utilities would
support it, offering a single flag to turn it off (it would be on by
default). If someone would like to work on that, great.

I most often need this feature is for grep. The "zgrep" shell scripts
that have become common in recent years help, but have various
problems; zutils seems to overcome most of them. However, zutils still
leave one problem: the name is not the same. They also add an
additional dependency. I want to be able to get transparent
decompression on any system with GNU grep.

However, in practical terms, if you can get zutils into Debian and
Ubuntu in such a way that when I type "grep" I get zgrep &c. then my
wish is fulfilled. I first submitted my patch to grep 3 years ago, so
maybe your way is quicker!

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