Re: [Bug-gnulib] Re: quotearg styles

[Bruno Haible]

Paul Eggert wrote:
> Thanks, good suggestion.  However, I borrowed wording from the
> coreutils manual rather than using new wording

Unfortunately, there are a few things to criticize about the current
wording. Can you improve the wording here and in coreutils simultaneously?

> Quote names for the shell

"for the shell" means nothing because it does not say which kind of
interpretation the shell will do.

"shell" means nothing because for some people shell is csh, for some others
it's sh, for some others it's only bash or ksh.

> Quote names as for a C language string

"for a C language string" does not tell whether the surrounding double-quotes
are output or not. Suggestion: "as a C language string literal".

> Like c_quoting_style except ...

Recursive definitions are hard to understand for a user who wants to
pick the style that he wants. As someone who has to read the descriptions,
I much prefer a description of each item on its own, even if some of the
half-sentences are repeated.

> in the default C locale

But the code does it differently: It uses quotes `like this' also if not
in the C locale and the two strings "`" "'" are not translated in the message
catalog.

Bruno