On 12/01/2011 03:26 PM, Peng Yu wrote: >> realpath [-s|--strip] [-z|--zero] filename ... > > I'm not sure why you and Jim want to merge a different function under > the name realpath. To me, I think this less intuitive. The English > word 'real path' is different from the word 'relative path'. If > 'relpath' is used, probably don't need to read the man page to figure > out how to use it. With your proposal, the user will for sure need to > read the manual to figure out how to get relative path. So why merge > them?
> The corresponding functions from the following languages are > > perl: abs2rel > python: os.path.relpath > ruby: relative_path_from > > None of them use the work 'real'? Therefore, I'm not sure it is a good > idea to use 'real' instead of 'rel'. Well the relpath and realpath functionalities are quite cohesive. It's always a tradeoff for how much you break functionality down into separate units, and at the command level that's a bit higher than just a "relpath" function I think. Given there are existing realpath utils in both BSD and Debian, which could be easily augmented to add a --relative option, from experience I'm leaning towards that option. We can ensure that `apropos relative` will display realpath(1). cheers, Pádraig.
