Consistent behavior when piping through all commands. A lack of modes of operation to consider. Simplicity.

Simplicity exists on more than a single dimension. Choosing one column from "ls" output for example is not simple, bordering on impossible using the consistent behaviour of standard pipes.

Sometimes the inconsistent solution will be simpler by moving the complexity to the choice of the mode of interaction. Sometimes not.

You are correct. It is all about how you think about things.

"ls" lists files. Sure. Simple interactive command. But, thinking about this, "echo " also lists files. "ls" provides information about files. Sure. Simple interactive command. But, "stat" specifically provides information.

So, I would reach for

stat --format "%n %a"

To get name and octal permissions. You are correct, and wrong at the same time. Easy enough to accomplish -- but using * instead of ls. Note that the "space in filename" becomes the big issue (use %N in stat format).

So your conclusion is 100% correct. Thank you for your post and insight

> Choosing one column from "ls" output for example is not simple, bordering on impossible using the consistent behaviour of standard pipes.

  ls -l | awk '{print $3}'
  ls -l | cut -f 3 -d ' '

Maybe a shell is the wrong tool for that job, and hiding the modes that the language is operating in complicates things.