3 ms·

I found this. I use a Mac at work but I've got a laptop with Windows on it. My first instinct was to partition and whack on a Linux distribution. But I chose t

I found this. I use a Mac at work but I've got a laptop with Windows on it. My first instinct was to partition and whack on a Linux distribution. But I chose to just leave it alone. I don't want to enamour my Mrs with a bootloader again. Despite the simplicity, the typical UI for a bootloader intimidates non-techies. So I tried writing some code on Windows, using PowerShell as a terminal. How hard could it be? I've done it before. Well, PowerShell is a big leap over CMD. But it just wasn't unix. I remember one specific example. I wanted to pipe a list of URLs to a program. Easy enough in a unix shell. In power shell it's something like Get-Contents <path> | <program> That's a trivial example but when you're doing real work how burdensome does that base verbosity become? I know there's this Linux in Windows stuff and Cygwin but really, for real work, I'll just use a *nix.

steveklabnik 9y ago
Tab complete is a thing. I haven’t found it to be as significant as I expected.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
pjmlp 9y ago
The meaning of real work is very subjective. My real work doesn't have much to do with running shell commands, rather using graphical tools and making use of REPLs for scripting.
- jwdunne 9y ago
  Of course. I'm not saying that people who don't use shell don't do real work. My workflow happens to use shell. Trying to use the same workflow, or modified, creates too much friction on Windows. It felt sluggish.
  - pjmlp 9y ago
    Faire enough.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 9y ago
Powershell makes liberal use of aliasing[0] for when you'rehacking at the commandline as opposed to writing a script (where the verbosity is actually a good idea). Also, it has tab complete for cmdlets, variables, and even switches. For example, "Get-Content" is aliased to "cat", and "type", which is the old DOS equivalent of cat, and "gc". And of course you can add your own aliases. But you're right, it isn't the core-utils you're used to from UNIX, it's better. So much goddamned better. It aught to be, it was developed with 30+ years of hindsight. [0]http://ilovepowershell.com/2011/11/03/list-of-top-powershell-alias/ http://ilovepowershell.com/2011/11/03/list-of-top-powershell...
- jwdunne 9y ago
  Point taken. I'll have a look at the list you've linked to and try again. Thank you for clearing up my ignorance :)

steveklabnik 9y ago

Tab complete is a thing. I haven’t found it to be as significant as I expected.

deleted 9y ago

[deleted]

pjmlp 9y ago

The meaning of real work is very subjective. My real work doesn't have much to do with running shell commands, rather using graphical tools and making use of REPLs for scripting.

jwdunne 9y ago
Of course. I'm not saying that people who don't use shell don't do real work. My workflow happens to use shell. Trying to use the same workflow, or modified, creates too much friction on Windows. It felt sluggish.
- pjmlp 9y ago
  Faire enough.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 9y ago

Powershell makes liberal use of aliasing[0] for when you'rehacking at the commandline as opposed to writing a script (where the verbosity is actually a good idea). Also, it has tab complete for cmdlets, variables, and even switches. For example, "Get-Content" is aliased to "cat", and "type", which is the old DOS equivalent of cat, and "gc". And of course you can add your own aliases. But you're right, it isn't the core-utils you're used to from UNIX, it's better. So much goddamned better. It aught to be, it was developed with 30+ years of hindsight. [0]http://ilovepowershell.com/2011/11/03/list-of-top-powershell-alias/ http://ilovepowershell.com/2011/11/03/list-of-top-powershell...

jwdunne 9y ago
Point taken. I'll have a look at the list you've linked to and try again. Thank you for clearing up my ignorance :)