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A comment on Use long flags when scripting (2013). Parent comment

Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by scbrg on Saturday September 19, 2020 @02:43AM (#24525664) 

    $ tar --help
    tar: unknown option -- help
    usage: tar [-]{crtux}[-befhjklmopqvwzHJOPSXZ014578] [archive] [blocksize]
               [-C directory] [-T file] [-s replstr] [file ...]
    $
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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by a1369209993 on Saturday September 19, 2020 @03:17AM (#24525787)
Okay, so your tar is defective[0], and? I can do that too:

  $ list '#! /bin/sh' 'echo "tar: invalid command" >&2' 'exit 64' >/tmp/tar
  $ chmod a+x /tmp/tar
  $ PATH="/tmp:$PATH"
  $
  $ tar -cf a.tar a/
  tar: invalid command
  $
0: any program that doesn't support --help is defective, which was rather my point.
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Re:Use long flags when scripting (2013) by scbrg on Saturday September 19, 2020 @03:56AM (#24525929)
> 0: any program that doesn't support --help is defective, which was rather my point.

Fair enough. My point was that there's a category of operating systems where long options (including --help) isn't really a thing. You may of course consider them defective, though I'm not sure everybody agrees.

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