Re: ash vs. bash

[Fabien Tassin <fta@oleane.net>]

According to Michael Stone:
> 
> On Sat, Jul 24, 1999 at 10:57:54AM +0200, Carlo Strozzi wrote:
> > I agree. That's why I think that the easiest thing to do is probably 
> > leave bash as required and enforce using #!/bin/bash in configuration
> > scripts that require bash constructs. I think that developers should
> > always test their scripts also with 'ash -n scriptname' and try and make
> > them truly bourne-compatible. 
> 
> That's simply not adequate. There are not just syntax differences
> between the shells, there are logical differences as well. That's why I
> refuse to screw with /bin/sh on production systems even though I use ash
> on my own machine

I refuse too but for some other reasons. I really would like to have
a real /bin/sh that is both statically linked (*) and limited to the standard
functionnalities/syntax (**). IMHO, we must have a "sh" package (required)
instead of "bash" or "ash" (which can be both recommended).

(*) with /bin/sh -> bash, there's no way to obtain a shell if you loose /lib.
(**) to be sure that scripts written with this shell will work on other
Un*x (Solaris, Irix, HP-UX, etc..).

I like the solaris way (/sbin/sh [static], /bin/sh [dynamic])..
(their sh is not a link to something else [ except jsh which is not
really an extended shell ]. It'd saved me several times in the past ;)

-- 
Fabien Tassin -+- fta@oleane.net