On Tue, Jan 24, 2017 at 10:05:28PM +0100, Christoph Biedl wrote:
> Olly Betts wrote...
> > The documentation seems to not exactly match either behaviour - "man
> > file" says:
> >
> > | The information identifying these files is read from /etc/magic and
> > | the compiled magic file /usr/share/misc/magic.mgc, or the files in the
> > | directory /usr/share/misc/magic if the compiled file does not exist.
> > | In addition, if $HOME/.magic.mgc or $HOME/.magic exists, it will be
> > | used in preference to the system magic files.
> >
> > The wording could perhaps be clearer, but that seems to imply that the
> > default should actually be to search:
> >
> > $HOME/.magic:/etc/magic:/usr/share/misc/magic
>
> Um, are you saying the wording short rather be in the order of actual
> probing so it was clearer - or is there something plain wrong?
Mostly that it would be clearer if the orders matched.
But I'm also not sure how to interpret "in preference" there - it could
mean "~/.magic is used if it exists, otherwise the system magic files are",
but as you say strace shows that's not what actually happens. So it seems
"will be used in preference to" really just means "will be read before".
Cheers,
Olly
