[TUHS] Systematic approach to command-line interfaces

[Chet Ramey]

On 7/31/21 2:56 PM, Michael Siegel wrote:
> Am Sat, 31 Jul 2021 10:30:18 -0700
> schrieb Anthony Martin <ality at pbrane.org>:
> 
>> Michael Siegel <msi at malbolge.net> once said:
>>> So, I've prepared a bit of a write-up, pondering on the pros and
>>> cons of two different ways of having task-specific tool sets
>>> (non-hierarchical command sets vs. sub-commands) that is available
>>> at
>>>
>>>    https://www.msiism.org/files/doc/unix-like_command-line_interfaces.html
>>>
>>> I tend to think the sub-command approach is better. But I'm neither
>>> a UI nor a Unix expert and have no formal training in computer
>>> things. So, I thought this would be a good place to ask for comment
>>> (and get some historical perspective).
>>
>> You're missing the approach taken in Plan 9 (and
>> 10th edition Unix): put related commands in a
>> directory and use a shell that doesn't restrict
>> the first argument of a command to a single path
>> element.
>>
>> This lets you execute commands like:
>>
>> 	auth/as
>> 	disk/prep
>> 	git/rebase
>> 	ip/ping
>> 	ndb/dns
>> 	upas/send
>>
>> without having a prefix on every command name or
>> single large binaries with every command linked
>> in as subcommands.
> 
> Thanks for pointing this out. I had no idea.
> 
> Unfortunately(?), I'm looking to make my life easier on more "Unix-like
> Unix-like systems" (for want of a better term), for the time being
> (Linux, BSD, maybe illumos). (I mean, which shell would I use to
> accomplish this on Unix?)

POSIX forbids this behavior, FWIW, so you'll probably have a hard time
finding a shell -- at least one with POSIX aspirations -- that implements it.



-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
		 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    chet at case.edu    http://tiswww.cwru.edu/~chet/