From owner-freebsd-hackers@FreeBSD.ORG Wed Aug 26 07:06:31 2009 Return-Path: Delivered-To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org Received: from mx1.freebsd.org (mx1.freebsd.org [IPv6:2001:4f8:fff6::34]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 3D341106568E for ; Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:06:31 +0000 (UTC) (envelope-from j.mckeown@ru.ac.za) Received: from f.mail.ru.ac.za (f.mail.ru.ac.za [IPv6:2001:4200:1010::25:6]) by mx1.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 750608FC21 for ; Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:06:30 +0000 (UTC) DomainKey-Signature: a=rsa-sha1; q=dns; c=nofws; s=ru-msa; d=ru.ac.za; h=Received:From:Organization:To:Subject:Date:User-Agent:References:In-Reply-To:X-Face:MIME-Version:Content-Type:Content-Transfer-Encoding:Content-Disposition:Message-Id:X-Virus-Scanned:X-Authenticated-User; b=c7rCssn9wuQ2ig1G7nVzUljkb13hEAO9OTkVTY6Y3zxVPX1JPAYDEdWksBuE020g6aDvREiNjVkNc3lXitAlwMrlzEiE8IKA3cuDbq+YVd4R3wWQ7zyTKYaJraxExozB; Received: from vorkosigan.ru.ac.za ([2001:4200:1010:1058:219:d1ff:fe9f:a932]:64105) by f.mail.ru.ac.za with esmtpsa (TLSv1:AES256-SHA:256) (Exim 4.69 (FreeBSD)) (envelope-from ) id 1MgCaL-0005rN-Iv; Wed, 26 Aug 2009 09:06:21 +0200 From: Jonathan McKeown Organization: Rhodes University To: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org, rick-freebsd2008@kiwi-computer.com Date: Wed, 26 Aug 2009 09:06:21 +0200 User-Agent: KMail/1.9.10 References: <20090825034054.2d57e733@dev.lan.Awfulhak.org> <200908251609.09302.j.mckeown@ru.ac.za> <20090825205143.GA46753@keira.kiwi-computer.com> In-Reply-To: <20090825205143.GA46753@keira.kiwi-computer.com> X-Face: $@VrUx^RHy/}yu]jKf/<4T%/d|F+$j-Ol2"2J$q+%OK1]&/G_S9(=?utf-8?q?HkaQ*=60!=3FYOK=3FY!=27M=60C=0A=09aP=5C9nVPF8Q=7DCilHH8l=3B=7E!4?= =?utf-8?q?2HK6=273lg4J=7Daz?=@1Dqqh:J]M^"YPn*2IWrZON$1+G?oX3@ =?utf-8?q?k=230=0A=0954XDRg=3DYn=5FF-etwot4U=24b?=dTS{i X-Virus-Scanned: f.mail.ru.ac.za (2001:4200:1010::25:6) X-Authenticated-User: s0900137 from vorkosigan.ru.ac.za (2001:4200:1010:1058:219:d1ff:fe9f:a932) using auth_plaintext Cc: Subject: Re: Deprecating ps(1)s -w switch X-BeenThere: freebsd-hackers@freebsd.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.5 Precedence: list List-Id: Technical Discussions relating to FreeBSD List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , X-List-Received-Date: Wed, 26 Aug 2009 07:06:31 -0000 On Tuesday 25 August 2009 22:51:43 Rick C. Petty wrote: > On Tue, Aug 25, 2009 at 04:09:09PM +0200, Jonathan McKeown wrote: > > I usually want to see ps(1) output in easily-read columns. Without width > > limits, this can't be guaranteed. > > > > I would strongly object to the complete removal of any option to limit > > the output width of ps(1) and make it easily human-readable. > > > > I'm also astonished at the suggestion that not using -ww is ``a > > mistake''. I very seldom need to see the whole commandline for every > > process. > > Then you must not use Java much. I almost always need the -ww option. > I'm fine with the default being "fit into my terminal width", but I'd be > for one option to specify limited width and another option (-w) to > specify "as wide as possible". As it happens, you're right: I don't use Java at all. Neither do I object=20 (much) to a change in the default behaviour such that wide output is the no= rm=20 and restricted-width an option. In the original message, Brian Somers wrote: > The suggestion is that ps's -w switch is a strange artifact that can > be safely deprecated. =A0ps goes to great lengths to implement width > limitations, and any time I've seen people not using -ww has either > been a mistake or doesn't matter. =A0Using 'cut -c1-N' is also a great > way of limiting widths if people really want that... > > I'd like to propose changing ps so that width limits are removed and > '-w' is deprecated - ignored for now with a note in the man page > saying that it will be removed in a future release. The suggestion seems to be to remove the width-limiting code altogether, an= d=20 make people who want width-restricted output (for example to keep it in=20 columns which are easily scanned by eye) pipe the output through another=20 command. That I do object to.