Chet Ramey wrote in
 <[email protected]>:
 |On 4/11/25 3:37 PM, Steffen Nurpmeso wrote:
 |> Chet Ramey wrote in
 |>   <[email protected]>:
 |>|On 4/11/25 3:47 AM, Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
 |>|wrote:
 |>|>|So I think the question for the shell authors is can they reach a
 |>|>|consensus on which two behaviors are "right" (by which I mean they meet
 |>|>|user expectations, not that they behave as currently described in the
 |>|>|standard), or do they think more than two of the observed behaviors are
 |>|>
 |>|> Well, only to add that bash, NetBSD k?sh and possibly more behave
 |>|> exactly "as currently described in the standard", except for, as
 |>|> you say, the special parameter $*, they use "the quoted variant of
 |>|> $*" as a source for field splitting, instead of generating "one
 |>|> field for each positional parameter that is set", and splitting
 |>|> the result of that.
 |>|
 |>|That doesn't matter; the implementation doesn't matter. All that matters
 |>|is that the result conforms to the standard, and the bash output does
 |>|("any empty fields may be discarded").
 |> 
 |> I am sorry that you alway react stroppingly if i come over with
 |> something, unless you are right or can give advice.
 |
 |I'm sorry it came across that way. That was meant to be a plain factual
 |statement.

Sure, forget it.

 |> The above is plain not true, and it took me months to finally
 |> believe that it is not my code that is broken, but that the
 |> standard is not in line with what is actually happening.
 |
 |What about the above quoted text from the standard does not reflect

Yes.  ..And hoping the issue solves it.

 |what is happening? I think kre's stepwise explanation was pretty good.

It actually boils down to

  Both bash and the netbsd shell retain leading empty words from $*
  expansions,

that, then.

 |> And never was, as Geoff Clare has shown when trying against ksh88.
 |
 |It would not be the first time that the standard as written did not
 |reflect the behavior of the reference implementations (or any
 |implementations, for that matter).

I seem to recall Geoff Clare's "unfortunately not".

 |>|For everyone who isn't on the bash mailing list, this is the message
 |>|from kre that Steffen is referring to that explains the bash and NetBSD
 |>|sh behavior.
 |>|
 |>|https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bash/2025-03/msg00030.html
 |> 
 |> No.  That is not the message. 
 |
 |It is the message that explains how bash (and the NetBSD sh) arrive at the
 |results they do, and why those results are consistent with the standard
 |text. It is by no means the only message in the thread. :-)

To recall it boils down to

  Both bash and the netbsd shell retain leading empty words from $*
  expansions,

 |> But i looked, and it more is
 |> 
 |>    https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-bash/2025-03/msg00041.html
 |
 |I'll let kre speak for himself if he wants to repost his responses. They're
 |there in the bug-bash thread.

If that is what they do.  I never looked.  I would have to think
and find an example where the approach that works for me (simply
taking the quoted variant of $*) will create a different result;
i am a bit out of desire to find more complicated ones ... and
i now have quite some (mostly bash-only) disproofer scripts.
(It would be complicated to implement "retain leading empty words"
here.)

A nice weekend i wish,

--steffen
|
|Der Kragenbaer,                The moon bear,
|der holt sich munter           he cheerfully and one by one
|einen nach dem anderen runter  wa.ks himself off
|(By Robert Gernhardt)

  • Call for input on 2.... Andrew Josey via austin-group-l at The Open Group
    • Re: Call for in... Geoff Clare via austin-group-l at The Open Group
      • Re: Call fo... Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
        • Re: Cal... Chet Ramey via austin-group-l at The Open Group
          • Re:... Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
            • ... Chet Ramey via austin-group-l at The Open Group
              • ... Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
          • Re:... Geoff Clare via austin-group-l at The Open Group
            • ... Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
              • ... Geoff Clare via austin-group-l at The Open Group
                • ... Steffen Nurpmeso via austin-group-l at The Open Group
                • ... Geoff Clare via austin-group-l at The Open Group

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