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Same. I feel like I spend 45 minutes every time I write a shell script to determine simple things like "is this environment variable set". Stack Overflow alwa

Same. I feel like I spend 45 minutes every time I write a shell script to determine simple things like "is this environment variable set". Stack Overflow always has 100 answers on how to do this, and every one has someone replying "well that doesn't work if..." In general, after 20 years of using Unix, I'm starting to sour on the "everything is a string" and "streams are just newline separated plain-text records". The shell is a pretty good REPL, and glue like seq, find, xargs, grep, etc. are very good. But honestly, I find myself reaching for purpose-built tools rather than ad-hoc pipelines more and more. fdfind does more of what I want on average than find; rg does more of what I want than 'find | xargs grep'. I also find myself using more and more structured data, and write more jq pipelines than I do bash pipelines. Finally, I am getting more and more frustrated at basic shell mechanics like history handling. I have 5 terminals open on average, and I don't understand why C-r in one won't find history in another (I know why, of course, but I don't like it). I'm getting pretty close to just writing my own shell and toolchain. I feel like if the Unix shell needed to be fundamentally reimagined, someone would have already done it. But they haven't. They just hacked Unicode and remote RPCs into shell prompts so that pressing "enter" on an empty shell prompt takes 25 seconds to run. I'm not sure why people are so focused on the polish and not the core inadequacies, but they are, and I feel like I'm going to have to fix that myself in the next couple years...

chubot 6y ago
Have you tried any of the shells here? https://github.com/oilshell/oil/wiki/Alternative-Shells https://github.com/oilshell/oil/wiki/Alternative-Shells Discussed recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26121592 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26121592 A lot of them are "fundamentally reimagining" shell -- actually I'd say MOST of them are; whether that's good or bad depends on the user's POV. Oil is reimagining shell, but also providing a graceful upgrade path. Out of all the shells I'd say it's most focused on the fundamental language and runtime, and less on the interactive issues (right now).
deleted 6y ago
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imiric 6y ago
I agree with some of your frustrations, but it's honestly not that bad once you setup your environment properly and get used to some of the quirks. > I feel like I spend 45 minutes every time I write a shell script to determine simple things like "is this environment variable set". Adopt some best practices[1] and have a template to start new scripts with. ShellCheck also helps with avoiding the most common pitfalls. > I find myself reaching for purpose-built tools rather than ad-hoc pipelines It helps to distinguish day-to-day interactive work in the shell from writing portable shell scripts that will be robust and require little maintenance for years to come. For the former you want user friendly tools that help you the most with a particular task. For the latter you want to use battle-tested tools with a stable interface that are available on many systems or are preferably built-in to the shell. > I am getting more and more frustrated at basic shell mechanics like history handling That's mostly a solved problem in many shells. Zsh supports it natively[2]. I wouldn't want to discourage you from writing your own shell, good luck with that, but there are plenty of good POSIX compatible and alternative shells out there. We can agree that "real" programming languages are much more powerful, safer and friendlier, but plain old shell scripts are the right tool for the job in many situations and shouldn't be ignored at all cost. [1]: http://redsymbol.net/articles/unofficial-bash-strict-mode/ http://redsymbol.net/articles/unofficial-bash-strict-mode/ [2]: https://nuclearsquid.com/writings/shared-history-in-zsh/ https://nuclearsquid.com/writings/shared-history-in-zsh/
codethief 6y ago
I couldn't agree more! > I feel like if the Unix shell needed to be fundamentally reimagined, someone would have already done it. But they haven't. AFAICT this has a lot to do with the fact that most people who'd be able to "reimagine" / fundamentally improve the Unix shell are also the people that are so intimately familiar with the shell and all its quirks that they don't see any need for improvement. It has always been that way, so it must stay that way. > I feel like I'm going to have to fix that myself in the next couple years... Please let me know when you do. :)

chubot 6y ago

Have you tried any of the shells here? https://github.com/oilshell/oil/wiki/Alternative-Shells https://github.com/oilshell/oil/wiki/Alternative-Shells Discussed recently: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26121592 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26121592 A lot of them are "fundamentally reimagining" shell -- actually I'd say MOST of them are; whether that's good or bad depends on the user's POV. Oil is reimagining shell, but also providing a graceful upgrade path. Out of all the shells I'd say it's most focused on the fundamental language and runtime, and less on the interactive issues (right now).

deleted 6y ago

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imiric 6y ago

I agree with some of your frustrations, but it's honestly not that bad once you setup your environment properly and get used to some of the quirks. > I feel like I spend 45 minutes every time I write a shell script to determine simple things like "is this environment variable set". Adopt some best practices[1] and have a template to start new scripts with. ShellCheck also helps with avoiding the most common pitfalls. > I find myself reaching for purpose-built tools rather than ad-hoc pipelines It helps to distinguish day-to-day interactive work in the shell from writing portable shell scripts that will be robust and require little maintenance for years to come. For the former you want user friendly tools that help you the most with a particular task. For the latter you want to use battle-tested tools with a stable interface that are available on many systems or are preferably built-in to the shell. > I am getting more and more frustrated at basic shell mechanics like history handling That's mostly a solved problem in many shells. Zsh supports it natively[2]. I wouldn't want to discourage you from writing your own shell, good luck with that, but there are plenty of good POSIX compatible and alternative shells out there. We can agree that "real" programming languages are much more powerful, safer and friendlier, but plain old shell scripts are the right tool for the job in many situations and shouldn't be ignored at all cost. [1]: http://redsymbol.net/articles/unofficial-bash-strict-mode/ http://redsymbol.net/articles/unofficial-bash-strict-mode/ [2]: https://nuclearsquid.com/writings/shared-history-in-zsh/ https://nuclearsquid.com/writings/shared-history-in-zsh/

codethief 6y ago

I couldn't agree more! > I feel like if the Unix shell needed to be fundamentally reimagined, someone would have already done it. But they haven't. AFAICT this has a lot to do with the fact that most people who'd be able to "reimagine" / fundamentally improve the Unix shell are also the people that are so intimately familiar with the shell and all its quirks that they don't see any need for improvement. It has always been that way, so it must stay that way. > I feel like I'm going to have to fix that myself in the next couple years... Please let me know when you do. :)