On Wed, 25 Sep 2002, Giorgos Keramidas wrote:
> On 2002-09-24 18:48, Peter Leftwich <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > I'm surprised that xargs has no flag for interactive mode (-i) so that the
> > command line will be echoed to the terminal asking [y/n/!] where y means yes
> > proceed and n means no stop now and ! would mean answer y to all remaining
> > promptings.
> So, what would you do when a thousand files are piped to xargs? :)
> Write 'yes' a thousand times?
> Giorgos.

First of all, the user would need only hit y or n -- not write out yes.

Second of all, the user could press '!' meaning to answer yes to all future
prompts (this is similar to search/replace in emacs, if you are familiar).

Third of all, I am surprised there is a third-of-all but here it is: anyone
working with a thousand files would probably be at a level of expertise
where they would not use the "-i" flag, and even if they did, xargs could
have been compiled such that it only shows the command line about to be
executed.  The user cannot use "-n 1" and "-i" both; the "-i" flag would
only be for single-line commands.

Do you follow my logic?

--
Peter Leftwich
President & Founder
Video2Video Services
Box 13692, La Jolla, CA, 92039 USA
+1-413-403-9555


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