From owner-freebsd-doc Mon Nov 19 13:20: 5 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Received: from freefall.freebsd.org (freefall.FreeBSD.org [216.136.204.21]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id A7E4937B416 for ; Mon, 19 Nov 2001 13:20:02 -0800 (PST) Received: (from gnats@localhost) by freefall.freebsd.org (8.11.4/8.11.4) id fAJLK2x90278; Mon, 19 Nov 2001 13:20:02 -0800 (PST) (envelope-from gnats) Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2001 13:20:02 -0800 (PST) Message-Id: <200111192120.fAJLK2x90278@freefall.freebsd.org> To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Cc: From: swear@blarg.net (Gary W. Swearingen) Subject: Re: docs/32082: true.1 totally incorrect Reply-To: swear@blarg.net (Gary W. Swearingen) Sender: owner-freebsd-doc@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk List-ID: List-Archive: (Web Archive) List-Help: (List Instructions) List-Subscribe: List-Unsubscribe: X-Loop: FreeBSD.org The following reply was made to PR docs/32082; it has been noted by GNATS. From: swear@blarg.net (Gary W. Swearingen) To: setantae Cc: FreeBSD-gnats-submit@FreeBSD.ORG, doc@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: docs/32082: true.1 totally incorrect Date: 19 Nov 2001 13:12:42 -0800 I think "true" and "false" should not bother with DIAGNOSTIC sections, but if used they should match the description's terminology and sense. All of "exit code", "exit status", "status" are in common use ("exit value", less so), but in the "sh", "ksh", and "csh" man pages "exit code" is used only in "sh" and there only in two adjacent sentences. Selection of "status" or "exit status" is more context dependent and a matter of taste. (I would try to avoid using "code", even though that is more natural to me than "status" because of my personal experience.) It's debatable whether the status of "false" should be given as "one" or "non-zero". Should man pages describe the actual program or the presumed specification of the program? What specification should be presumed in this case? The shell man pages sometimes say that a command returns "one" when "non-zero" would seem to suffice. (I think man pages should describe presumed specifications, but in this case I think the specification should be that "false" should exit with status = "1".) Which brings up another issue. Is an exit status code value an integer or a string and should they be given as numerics or English words? (I guess I'd wimp out and say that people should be expected to deal with the small confusion and allow both forms but recommend English words in most contexts as demanded by standard rules of English for readability.) To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-doc" in the body of the message