3 ms·

>`ls | xargs cat | my-util` lol, this is really turning the whole 'useless use of cat' thing on its head.

• LukeShu 10y ago
  `cat` is short for conCATenate. Here it is being used to concatenate files. This is the canonical useful use of cat. The problem with that example is parsing `ls` output.
  • marvy 10y ago
    so, how to avoid parsing ls? maybe use cat *, or something?
    • LukeShu 10y ago
      It really depends on what you are trying to accomplish. `cat -- *` might be the right choice. Maybe `find . -maxdepth 1 -type f -exec cat -- {} +`
  • okdana 10y ago
    Yes, that's what i was getting at. The use of `cat` isn't useless (for once) — the use of `ls` and `xargs` is.
  • dllthomas 10y ago
    > The problem with that example is parsing `ls` output. Yeah, I left that alone to keep things simpler and was assuming `ls` was simply being used as short-hand for "some unspecified approach to outputting file names". In a context where hard-to-handle filenames are possible, you'd of course need to do something a little more robust.