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From: "Rafael Kitover" <caelum AT debian DOT org>
To: <cygwin AT cygwin DOT com>
Subject: RE: idea for a new project, libntcmd
Date: Fri, 24 Jan 2003 15:09:43 -0800
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>-----Original Message-----
>From: Max Bowsher [mailto:maxb AT ukf DOT net]
>Sent: Friday, January 24, 2003 1:38 PM


>> 2) support cmd.exe builtins like del/copy/exists/etc, and execute dos
>> batch files. Things like if and goto, because they're only useful in
>> batch, would present little problem as well.
>
>Yuk! Why?

Often when I go between cmd and zsh, I get my copy/cp del/rm mixed up.
This would also apply to folks who have to use both the unix and windows
command lines on a regular occasion. Also to support simple Makefiles,
batch files etc. in various packages.

Making aliases or shell functions would not work well, because those are
not propagated to subprocesses.

>
>> This would allow better interaction between the windows and cygwin
>> worlds, and also be convenient for windows users new to unix.
>
>Really? Or would it simply delay them learning the knowledge to
>function in
>an environment that does not make specific allowances for them?

Well, the goal would be for new cygwin users, who often have little
knowledge of UNIX, to have more space to get comfortable in learning the
environment.

>> It would
>> also remove most of the reasons a user might have to use cmd instead
>> of a cygwin shell.
>
>My only reason to use cmd is to execute MS commands which break with
>Cygwin's tty handling (e.g. net use's prompt-for-password)
>

This should also be fixed at some point. Not a simple task in itself.

>> It should also allow for running windows makefiles
>> as-is.
>
>This feels more like MSYS territory than Cygwin.

This would be useful for MSYS, which is a fork of Cygwin too of course.
We don't want MSYS to diverge too greatly, especially since Cygwin is a
perfectly functional environment for building mingw programs.

>> Thoughts? Is this interesting/crazy/impossible?
>
>Well, you're getting a biased opinion here - I hate cmd. But I think
>this
>has 2 flaws:
>
>1) You want to make bash play nice with Windows paths - what about all
>those
>supplementary tools that makefiles often invoke?

If a makefile uses visual studio or borland tools, we'd assume the user
has those installed and in their paths. Perhaps some simple wrappers for
some visual studio command line tools could also be made to use the
cygwin equivalents.

>2) I could be wrong, but I don't think you are going to get that much
>enthusiam about this.

That's what I expected :)

>Max.

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