Juha Saarinen <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> types:
> :: The real issue is why should a command raise an error for no good
> :: reason. Either a kernel panic or a message is a bit extreme just
> :: because a user issued a command that someone else thinks is
> :: unusual. Until you can prove that there is no use for the output of
> :: tail on a directory, adding code to tail to generate an error in that
> :: case is silly.
>
> If you are a typist with 100% accuracy, there is of course no need for any
> error handling in any program.
>
> Is there any use for the the garbage tail outputs on a directory? If there
> is, I won't say anything else...
Yes, there is. If you're monitoring a programm that creates a lot of
files in a previously empty directory (for example, extracting a tar
file into it), then:
tail -f targetdir
will do the trick, though it would be better to clean up the output
(cat -v, maybe).
Deciding for the users what actions are an error and which aren't is a
*really* nasty habit. Windows does it all to often, which is one of
the reasons Windows sucks. Linux - at least some distributions - seems
to have picked up the habit from Windows. Oh well.
<mike
--
Mike Meyer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.
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