From: Richard Dawe <rich AT phekda DOT freeserve DOT co DOT uk>
Newsgroups: comp.os.msdos.djgpp
Subject: Re: GNU Pascal (gpc) 2.1 released
Date: Fri, 24 May 2002 21:51:10 +0100
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To: djgpp AT delorie DOT com
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Reply-To: djgpp AT delorie DOT com

Hello.

CBFalconer wrote:
[snip]
> Which means that "rm @foo" cannot mean to remove the file "@foo",
> because if it exists it is an extended command line, and if it
> doesn't it becomes an argument.  So, at least for rm, that usage
> makes no sense.  For other programs it is another matter.
[snip]

FWIW this works analogously to shell wildcards do. In bash try:

    rm -v somefilethatdoesnotexist*.foo

where nothing matches the wildcard. You should find that
'somefilethatdoesnotexist*.foo' is not expanded, because it doesn't match
anything.

I'm not saying this behaviour makes sense, just that the treatment of '@foo'
is analogous.

Regards,

-- 
Richard Dawe [ http://www.phekda.freeserve.co.uk/richdawe/ ]