Thanks Dieter, yes, I took a look at the code where it's clear that -v is available only if stat is called as readlink. However, the manpage not only isn't as clear, but doesn't specify clearly _how_ to invoke stat as readlink. Matter of perception, perhaps.
On Sun, Jan 3, 2016 at 9:37 PM, dieter roelants <dieter.net...@pandora.be> wrote: > On Sun, 3 Jan 2016 18:34:36 +0200 > Rares Aioanei <scha...@gmail.com> wrote: > > > Environment is NetBSD 7.0/i386. The manpage displays -v as an option : > > > > "-v Turn off quiet mode." > > > > However, that option is not recognized by stat(1) : > > > > $ stat -v > > stat: unknown option -- v > > > > However (again), the stat(1) code seems to indicate otherwise : > > > > while ((ch = getopt(argc, argv, options)) != -1) > > If you look at the synopsis in the man page, you'll see that it's only > an option when stat is called as readlink. It makes it print a warning > for nonexisting files, which stat does by default unless called with > -q, which turns on quiet mode. (I guess the man page could be more > verbose about this, and also describe the option as turning on > verbosity.) > > kind regards > dieter > -- Rares Aioanei
