Re: cut enhancement: -C as short option for --complement

[Mark Krenz]

On Thu, Apr 05, 2012 at 05:08:23PM GMT, Jim Meyering [address@hidden] said the 
following:
> 
> Did you know that --co is an acceptable abbreviation for --complement?

  Actually I didn't know you can do this with programs that use getopts.
Do you happen to know where is this documented?

  I also feel like relying on this behavior can be a bad thing.
Eventually another option may come along and all the people who are used
to typing --co will suddenly need to use another character or two. Then
eventually you might as well just type in the whole option anyways.

> We try to avoid adding new short-named options unless there is a
> very compelling reason.

  I understand this stance and agree with it in many cases due to the
overpolluted option namespaces you see in some programs. However it
seems harmless enough in the case of the cut command, which has only a
few options and also already has the complement functionality, but
simply has no short option for it.

 Lots of programs have modes where they do the reverse of what they
normally do by default (grep -v for instance). I would think that a
short option for reversing cuts default operation would be a welcome
addition for many people. So I think that's a pretty compelling reason
to add a short option for it and save even more typing.


-- 
Mark Krenz
address@hidden
 
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