Date: Mon, 10 Jul 2000 23:40:03 -0700 (PDT) From: Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai <asmodai@FreeBSD.org> To: freebsd-doc@freebsd.org Subject: Re: docs/18792: date man page has misleading description of -r option Message-ID: <200007110640.XAA76667@freefall.freebsd.org>
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The following reply was made to PR docs/18792; it has been noted by GNATS.
From: Jeroen Ruigrok/Asmodai <asmodai@FreeBSD.org>
To: Ben Smithurst <ben@FreeBSD.org>
Cc: freebsd-gnats-submit@FreeBSD.org, bobj@atlantic.net
Subject: Re: docs/18792: date man page has misleading description of -r option
Date: Tue, 11 Jul 2000 08:38:18 +0200
-On [20000711 04:01], Ben Smithurst (ben@FreeBSD.org) wrote:
>The man page now says:
>
> -r Print out the date and time that is seconds from the Epoch
> (00:00:00 UTC, January 1, 1970; see time(3)).
>
>I'm not sure when this was changed, but is that any better? I don't
>really like it because it's not valid English really, although it makes
>more sense in the real manpage because _seconds_ is underlined. Still,
>I'd prefer the following:
>--- date.1 2000/06/28 09:20:06 1.39
>+++ date.1 2000/07/11 01:32:00
>@@ -45,7 +45,7 @@
> .Nm date
> .Op Fl jnu
> .Op Fl d Ar dst
>-.Op Fl r Ar seconds
>+.Op Fl r Ar sec
> .Op Fl t Ar minutes_west
> .Oo
> .Fl v
[snip]
> -r Print out the date and time that is _sec_ seconds ...
>
>Is that ok? If Jeroen (my mentor) approves this and no-one objects then
>I'll commit it. If people think the current text is fine I'll just
>close the PR.
Yeah, the change might make it more clear for non native english
speakers (and probably the english ones as well).
It looks clearer to me.
But don't forget that:
[8:36] [asmodai@daemon] (356) $ date ?
date: illegal time format
usage: date [-nu] [-d dst] [-r seconds] [-t west] [-v[+|-]val[ymwdHMS]] ...
[-f fmt date | [[[[[cc]yy]mm]dd]HH]MM[.ss]] [+format]
You cannot change the function arguments (.Fa) around for sake of
clarity, since it would now conflict with the shown arguments. =)
I am sure you can find another wording for the paragraph which solves
this riddle.
--
Jeroen Ruigrok vd Werven/Asmodai asmodai@[wxs.nl|bart.nl|freebsd.org]
Documentation nutter/C-rated Coder BSD: Technical excellence at its best
The BSD Programmer's Documentation Project <http://home.wxs.nl/~asmodai>;
So take a look at me now, well there's just an empty space...
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