4 ms·

CSS is also on the list of programming languages along with "Shell" which is probably supposed to mean bash.

simias 11y ago
Bash is not the only shell out there though. Personally I'd never tell anybody to write bash: either I want a very portable script that can run basically everywhere (on un*x) without installing anything and I use POSIX sh syntax or I want a more expressive language and I use a real programming language like perl or python or whatever.
- balls187 11y ago
  It's not the only language, but I think you're splitting hairs on the spirit of "learn at least 1 shell programming language."
- GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
  In 2015, are there that many systems out there without a bash.
  - warp 11y ago
    Have we already forgotten shellshock? Especially in 2015 it seems like a good idea to avoid bash for anything non-interactive.
  - simias 11y ago
    In the base install? Last I checked all the BSDs at least.
  - liammclennan 11y ago
    Windows apparently has > 90% of the desktop market share. http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0 http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share....
- amyjess 11y ago
  If I'm going to be writing something that consists mostly of chaining commands together, I'm going to write a shell script, just because it gets out of my way for that purpose. At the same time, anything I do at that level is probably going to be the exact opposite of portable: it's going to be something I intend to be specific to the exact system I'm writing for (namely, it's meant to run on a specific version of a specific Linux distribution, and possibly even to specifics of the installation on that machine). While I'm not likely to take advantage of many bash-specific features just because anything I write in shell tends to be so simple as to not need them, I'd also be an idiot to eschew useful features like arrays just because they're bash extensions.
  - simias 11y ago
    If you don't care for portability and you need "advanced" language features like arrays and other bash-isms why do you hurt yourself by using such a terrible programing language? In my experience shell scripts are fine for starting (and restarting) various programs and daemons or as thin wrappers around other apps. Beyond that I don't see the point. There's nothing other languages won't do better. I've seen many "small bash scripts" grow up to thousands of lines, adding features one by one. And then you have to maintain that mess that catches fire every time an unexpected condition occurs because error handling in shell scripts is a joke.
    - amyjess 11y ago
      Because there's no point in writing a Python script if more than half my code will consist of calls to commands.getstatusoutput().
- nawitus 11y ago
  I've found that Node.js scripts are easy and fast to write and can be run everywhere easily with npm.
  - tracker1 11y ago
    At least until recently, it was pretty difficult to use node to wire together applications piping from one to another like you can do in a shell language... The recent cp.execSync addition along with ShellJS go a long way though... That's not to say I wouldn't use it... it's actually my preference, and I've used npm for stuff that isn't strictly even node, but ymmv.
komaromy 11y ago
GitHub also lists "Shell" as a language.

Bash is not the only shell out there though. Personally I'd never tell anybody to write bash: either I want a very portable script that can run basically everywhere (on un*x) without installing anything and I use POSIX sh syntax or I want a more expressive language and I use a real programming language like perl or python or whatever.

balls187 11y ago
It's not the only language, but I think you're splitting hairs on the spirit of "learn at least 1 shell programming language."
GFK_of_xmaspast 11y ago
In 2015, are there that many systems out there without a bash.
- warp 11y ago
  Have we already forgotten shellshock? Especially in 2015 it seems like a good idea to avoid bash for anything non-interactive.
- simias 11y ago
  In the base install? Last I checked all the BSDs at least.
- liammclennan 11y ago
  Windows apparently has > 90% of the desktop market share. http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share.aspx?qprid=10&qpcustomd=0 http://www.netmarketshare.com/operating-system-market-share....
amyjess 11y ago
If I'm going to be writing something that consists mostly of chaining commands together, I'm going to write a shell script, just because it gets out of my way for that purpose. At the same time, anything I do at that level is probably going to be the exact opposite of portable: it's going to be something I intend to be specific to the exact system I'm writing for (namely, it's meant to run on a specific version of a specific Linux distribution, and possibly even to specifics of the installation on that machine). While I'm not likely to take advantage of many bash-specific features just because anything I write in shell tends to be so simple as to not need them, I'd also be an idiot to eschew useful features like arrays just because they're bash extensions.
- simias 11y ago
  If you don't care for portability and you need "advanced" language features like arrays and other bash-isms why do you hurt yourself by using such a terrible programing language? In my experience shell scripts are fine for starting (and restarting) various programs and daemons or as thin wrappers around other apps. Beyond that I don't see the point. There's nothing other languages won't do better. I've seen many "small bash scripts" grow up to thousands of lines, adding features one by one. And then you have to maintain that mess that catches fire every time an unexpected condition occurs because error handling in shell scripts is a joke.
  - amyjess 11y ago
    Because there's no point in writing a Python script if more than half my code will consist of calls to commands.getstatusoutput().
nawitus 11y ago
I've found that Node.js scripts are easy and fast to write and can be run everywhere easily with npm.
- tracker1 11y ago
  At least until recently, it was pretty difficult to use node to wire together applications piping from one to another like you can do in a shell language... The recent cp.execSync addition along with ShellJS go a long way though... That's not to say I wouldn't use it... it's actually my preference, and I've used npm for stuff that isn't strictly even node, but ymmv.

komaromy 11y ago

GitHub also lists "Shell" as a language.