Why questions don't get answered, or "No, I've already RTFM, tell me the answer!"

[Antonio Olivares]

--- Jeff Vian <jvian10 at charter.net> wrote:

> On Fri, 2005-12-30 at 10:29 -0600, Les Mikesell
> wrote:
> > On Fri, 2005-12-30 at 05:21, Gene Heskett wrote:
> > > >
> > > >Often the man pages have examples of the way
> the author expected
> > > >the program to be used.  However, there's still
> a good chance
> > > >that isn't exactly what you want to do with it.
> > > 
> > > I submit to you all the manpages for bash.
> > > 
> > > Paragraph after paragraph of explanation of this
> option and that option 
> > > in a quite verbose manner, and not a single
> actual example of a 
> > > command line, and the results it should return.
> > 
> > Bash is kind of unusual because it is normally the
> 'calling'
> > program, not the one being executed on a command
> line - or if
> > you do execute it intentionally as a command the
> purpose is
> > to start some other program in a subshell.  What
> you need
> Not entirely true.  Many of us use shell scripts to
> do a significant
> amount of work that would otherwise be tedious and
> repetitive.
>
Very true!  Shell scripts save time and run very
efficiently.  There are many examples of these,  using
lame to convert wav's to mp3's/ogg's among others.  
> 
> 
> > to know about bash is what it does to your command
> lines
> > (splitting on IFS, expanding variables and
> wildcard filenames,
> > redirection i/o etc.) before starting any other
> program.
> > What those other programs do or return is their
> own business
> > but they probably are the real reason you are
> issuing a
> > shell command.
> Sure, you need to know *how* to use it and the
> programming features that
> often function in the background. Bash is a genuine
> programming
> environment, as well as a command interpreter.
> 
> What most people see is the ability to call other
> programs.  What is
> actually there is *much* more and extremely
> versatile.
> 
> > 
> > > That makes writing 
> > > even a 10 line bash script into an extended
> reading and re-reading 
> > > session with heavy use of the manpages builtin
> grep because its so 
> > > poorly organized that the complete answer may be
> in 3 or more places 
> > > scattered through it.
> > 
> > That 10 line bash script might execute 20
> different external
> > commands, none of which the bash author
> anticipated.  That's
> > why the system is powerful - whenever anyone adds
> a new tool
> > you are able to combine it's operations with all
> the others
> > but it also makes it impossible to document all
> the possibilities.
> > 
> > -- 
> >   Les Mikesell
> >     lesmikesell at gmail.com
> > 
> > 
> 
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> 

This list is amazing.  There are many great
individuals that go out of their way to help users in
need.  I would like to thank all the users but that is
very hard to do.  Many people have very interesting
points to make.  But to say that people are not
helpful is not a good one.  If one does not know the
answer to a certain question, we continue on, why give
out information that will not help the users out. 
Someone that has been there generally comes through
and helps out.

Best Regards,

Antonio 


		
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