4 ms·

Why do they need a file extension at all? The extension doesn't mean anything to the system. I agree that the shebang should be #!/usr/bin/env bash though.

gjvc 3y ago
Agree. I come across this all the time from people who should know better. Furthermore, eventually the actions taken by that file will outgrow bash, so if you wanted to replace it with something written in python (for example), you could with no loss of naming integrity.
Turing_Machine 3y ago
> I agree that the shebang should be #!/usr/bin/env bash though. That's not at all a given. This will use the first "bash" that it comes across, which has its good and bad points, while `#!/bin/bash` will use that specific one (if it exists). If J. Random User has been manipulated into installing a fake bash (or if the package installer or whatever has installed a fake bash) somewhere in his path, the env method can be very bad indeed. In general, that's going to be a far easier thing to do than installing a fake bash in /bin. In general, /bin/bash is gonna work fine, either because that's where it actually is (the overwhelming majority of *nix systems in use today, including most or all Linuxes and macOS), or the system and/or system administrator has created a link from /bin/bash to where it's actually located. It doesn't really gain you a whole lot anyway. If there's no guarantee that bash is located at /bin/bash, there's even less of a guarantee that env is located at /usr/bin/env.
- preseinger 3y ago
  /usr/bin/env is reliably present -- a system without this executable is basically non-functional, right? /bin/bash is not reliably present -- there is no guarantee that bash exists on a system at all, really!
  - Turing_Machine 3y ago
    > /usr/bin/env is reliably present -- a system without this executable is basically non-functional, right? It doesn't have to be in /usr/bin.
    - preseinger 3y ago
      i'm not aware of any modern system where this would be the case some ancient rhel systems put it in /bin/env, i believe, but in that case they usually symlink /usr/bin/env to it, or /usr/bin to /bin at least
- preseinger 3y ago
  > If there's no guarantee that bash is located at /bin/bash, there's even less of a guarantee that env is located at /usr/bin/env. i've seen way more systems that don't have a global /bin/bash than systems that don't have a /usr/bin/env as an example, /bin/bash on macos is forever stuck at version 3.2.something, if i run across a bash script that uses crazy features like associative arrays, i definitely want it to use the modern version of bash i've installed to my $HOME/bin/bash

gjvc 3y ago

Agree. I come across this all the time from people who should know better. Furthermore, eventually the actions taken by that file will outgrow bash, so if you wanted to replace it with something written in python (for example), you could with no loss of naming integrity.

Turing_Machine 3y ago

> I agree that the shebang should be #!/usr/bin/env bash though. That's not at all a given. This will use the first "bash" that it comes across, which has its good and bad points, while `#!/bin/bash` will use that specific one (if it exists). If J. Random User has been manipulated into installing a fake bash (or if the package installer or whatever has installed a fake bash) somewhere in his path, the env method can be very bad indeed. In general, that's going to be a far easier thing to do than installing a fake bash in /bin. In general, /bin/bash is gonna work fine, either because that's where it actually is (the overwhelming majority of *nix systems in use today, including most or all Linuxes and macOS), or the system and/or system administrator has created a link from /bin/bash to where it's actually located. It doesn't really gain you a whole lot anyway. If there's no guarantee that bash is located at /bin/bash, there's even less of a guarantee that env is located at /usr/bin/env.

preseinger 3y ago
/usr/bin/env is reliably present -- a system without this executable is basically non-functional, right? /bin/bash is not reliably present -- there is no guarantee that bash exists on a system at all, really!
- Turing_Machine 3y ago
  > /usr/bin/env is reliably present -- a system without this executable is basically non-functional, right? It doesn't have to be in /usr/bin.
  - preseinger 3y ago
    i'm not aware of any modern system where this would be the case some ancient rhel systems put it in /bin/env, i believe, but in that case they usually symlink /usr/bin/env to it, or /usr/bin to /bin at least
preseinger 3y ago
> If there's no guarantee that bash is located at /bin/bash, there's even less of a guarantee that env is located at /usr/bin/env. i've seen way more systems that don't have a global /bin/bash than systems that don't have a /usr/bin/env as an example, /bin/bash on macos is forever stuck at version 3.2.something, if i run across a bash script that uses crazy features like associative arrays, i definitely want it to use the modern version of bash i've installed to my $HOME/bin/bash