Bug#2312: Silly message from diff about fifos
You're right about diff not considering this an error. diff-2.7
treats unusual files (fifos, devices, etc.) differently than it
treats regular text files, and documents that fact in the info
file. The diff authors aren't entirely happy with the current
behavior, and they document that in the info file as well.
What diff-2.7 does when comparing two fifos is whine about the fact
that they're fifos, and consider them to be different.
I still don't consider this a bug, and I'm leaving this bug report
closed. If you have a problem with the design from upstream, or
suggestions about how the upstream maintainers might handle unusual
files better than they currently handle them, please take it directly
to the upstream maintainers.
mitchell@mdd.comm.mot.com (Bill Mitchell)
On Sat, 4 May 1996, Ian Jackson wrote:
>Bill Mitchell writes ("Re: Bug#2312: Silly message from diff about fifos"):
>> I'm closing this bug report again. The program is working as designed.
>> In particular, the program considers it an error to do a diff operation
>> on named pipes (fifos). To me, this seems reasonable.
>
>Have you read the Info documentation ? Particularly, see
>`(diff)Shortcomings' and from the menu there `(diff)Special Files'.
>
>In fact, diff (the program) doesn't consider it an error, since it
>gives a zero exit status.
>
>> If you have a disagreement with the authors regarding this aspect of
>> their design, please take it up with them. The upstream bug report
>> address is bug-gnu-utils@prep.ai.mit.edu.
>
>The GNU people actually seem to agree with me that this is a bug
>(shortcoming, whatever) in their program.
>
>In fact, the `Special Files' node contains some suggestions for future
>improvement that I agree would be very usefl.
>
>If you prefer please reopen the bug and mark it forwarded.
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