Date: Sun, 18 Feb 2001 17:21:05 +0200
From: "Eli Zaretskii" <eliz AT is DOT elta DOT co DOT il>
Sender: halo1 AT zahav DOT net DOT il
To: "Tim Van Holder" <tim DOT van DOT holder AT pandora DOT be>
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Subject: Re: GNU_grep-2.5c_beta
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> From: "Tim Van Holder" <tim DOT van DOT holder AT pandora DOT be>
> Date: Sun, 18 Feb 2001 15:39:38 +0100
> >
> > ???  How is this different from piping the output of `ls' through Less?
> 
> It's not. But with grep/diff, the color support offers a great advantage in
> readability

I don't agree.  I think that color is as important in `ls's output as
it is in Grep's or Diff's (or any other utility).  In both cases,
there are enough visual cues in the absence of the colors to get the
info (the effect of the -F switch in the case of `ls' and the
"file:NN:" prefix in the case of Grep).

IMHO, of course.

> > In other words, when stdout is redirected to a disk file, the DJGPP
> > implementation of the color support should turn off its special color
> > code and use stdio functions instead.  That's what the ported `ls' does.
> Yes - 'ls --color=yes |less' emits ANSI color sequences instead of using
> screen writes.

That's not what I meant.  I meant to use --color=auto, which avoids
escape sequences entirely for redirected output.

> What I'm suggesting is that an option is added to less or
> to its DJGPP port) that will support and translate ANSI color sequences.

Why an option?  Why shouldn't Less do that by default?