[4192] in Athena Bugs
/usr/bin/diff design flaw all releases
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (geer@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Mon Feb 12 08:44:31 1990
From: geer@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 90 08:44:17 -0500
To: bugs@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
it seems to me that if you run diff on two arguments
that are, in truth, a single file (i.e. identical
inodes or symlink targets), then diff ought to
complain in a manner similar to diff's existing
complaint about needing two arguments.
we have now:
athena% diff /etc/motd
diff: two filename arguments required
we should have:
athena% diff /etc/motd /etc/motd
diff: two distinct filename arguments required
i suppose the question is, however, how many
shell scripts rely on the presence of this bug...
--dan
