> Date: Fri, 04 Nov 2005 16:53:03 -0500
> From: Charles Levert <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: Re: grep . /; echo $?
> To: bug-grep@gnu.org
>
> ..... This would go well with
> my proposal to track the kind of error (i.e.,
> which system call) with a bit-flag in the exit
> code as well.
My two cents: this isn't worth the trouble. I've written lots of shell scripts
in my life, and typically all one really wants to know is success/failure:
if grep pattern file > /dev/null
then
...
else
...
fi
Not to mention that extracting bits from the exit value in a shell script
is, shall we understate it, painful.
My suggestion is to K.I.S.S.:
EXIT CODE
0 - found at least one match
1 - found no matches at all
2 - something went wrong
Arnold
