Re: bug in the unix join command or maybe in the sort command

[Robert Castelo]

hi,

i think we're getting to the point.

> I assume we're talking about coreutils 5.2.1 here?  I don't remember.

no, i was debugging on the source of coreutils-5.3.0.tar.gz but in my
fedora core-2 the "buggy" sort belongs to 5.2.1

in fact, the 5.3.0 version works right for the following case, consider
the file:

q.txt======(tab-separated columns)
aa      value-aa
a       value-a
===========

and the command:

sort -k 1,1 q.txt

outputs correctly:

a       value-a
aa      value-aa

for 5.3.0, but for 5.2.1 does not and this is the result:

aa      value-aa
a       value-a

so this would close the case: 5.2.1 is buggy, 5.3.0 is fixed. however, i
was confused (and confusing you, sorry!) in the previous email by the
fact that both versions 5.2.1 and 5.3.0 output

aa      value-aa
a       value-a


when sorting over the entire line:

sort q.txt

or more specifically:

sort -k 1,2 q.txt


should not sort output first "a value-a" than "aa       value-aa" also when
sorting over the entire line ??



cheers,
robert.