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Date: Fri, 25 Jul 1997 12:29:04 +0400 (DST)
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From: "Sergei S. Laskavy" <laskavy@cs.msu.su>
To: TLiddelow@cybec.com.au
CC: jkh@time.cdrom.com, thorpej@nas.nasa.gov, freebsd-bugs@hub.freebsd.org
In-reply-to: <33D7EC96.12F89534@cybec.com.au> (TLiddelow@cybec.com.au)
Subject: Re: bin/4154: wish /bin/sleep handled fractions of a second.
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>>>>> "Tim" == Tim Liddelow <TLiddelow@cybec.com.au> writes:

Wat do you think about the

	POSIXLY_CORRECT

environment variable?

    Tim> Jordan K. Hubbard wrote:

    >>  Erm, you're sorta missing the point.  This is not about
    >> upwards compatibility - this is about taking a BSD script and
    >> later trying to port it to, say, Solaris.  Portability cuts
    >> both ways, and there's no advantage to be gained by turning BSD
    >> into a roach motel, where code can get in but, once "BSD-ized",
    >> never leave again.
    >> 
    >> In this particular case, if you have a script which says
    >> something like:
    >> 
    >> foo sleep 0.8 bar sleep 0.9 baz
    >> 
    >> And you bring it to a non-BSD system, it will not sleep _at
    >> all_ since the other system sees "sleep 0", and that could be
    >> bad depending on what bar and baz do. This is exactly the kind
    >> of interoperability problem that POSIX was intended to try and
    >> solve.  Let's not fight it.
    >> 

    Tim> I do see your point.  As an avid FreeBSD user and hacker, I
    Tim> want to see compatibility and I push this in my travels.
    Tim> What I should have said is that perhaps if you want or need
    Tim> extra features you need to somehow push standards bodies
    Tim> (pipe dream?) or write a portable shell work-around.

Sergei S. Laskavy