On Sun, 30 Dec 2007 19:11:46 -0500, Shmuel Metz (Seymour J.) wrote: >>Which was a grievous and irresponsible and unnecessary design blunder. > >No. > I'll retract "grievous". Why was it necessary, or even beneficial? Adding complexity and code with no benefit is a blunder.
>>Who benefits from this special treatment of PATH=/dev/null? > >What special treatment? > If the argument of PATH is anything other than '/dev/null' (or '//dev/null'), the file is allocated as a UNIX file and can be processed as a UNIX file. If it is '/dev/null' it as allocated as DUMMY, and may be impossible to process as a UNIX file. I consider this special treatment. Rudimentary JCL sample available on request. Again, who benefits. >>It only adds confusion by making the behavior of PATH=/dev/null >>different from the behavior of PATH=/./dev/null and from the behavior of >>PATH=[any symbolic link to /dev/null]. > >No. > It's worth a chapter in the JCL RM. Users must learn and be aware of this unnecessarily distinct behavior. Pointless complexity leads to confusion. What benefit of this distinct treatment of /dev/null justifies the resource spent on its implementation? -- gil ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
