Typed streams sound great. Most data being line oriented (with white space field separators) has historically worked well enough, but I get your point that the

Typed streams sound great. Most data being line oriented (with white space field separators) has historically worked well enough, but I get your point that the wheels will eventually fall off. It’s important to remember that the shell hasn’t always been about high concept programming tasks. $ grep TODO xmas-gifts grandma TODO auntie Sian TODO jeanie MASTODON T shirt The bug (bugs!) in the above example doesn’t really matter in the context of the task at hand.