Re: shell-quote-argument escapes '='

[Philipp Stephani]

Am Fr., 24. Apr. 2020 um 15:29 Uhr schrieb Stefan Monnier
<monnier@iro.umontreal.ca>:
>
> >   (shell-quote-argument "a=b")
> >
> > I get:
> >
> >   "a\\=b"
>
> Which is the printed representation of the string that contains
> 4 characters:
>
>     a\=b
>
> > That's wrong, because it does not work in Bash:
> >
> >   $ echo "a\\=b"
> >   a\=b
>
> You're not supposed to put quotes around nor to double the backslash:
>
>     $ echo a\=b
>     a=b
>     $
>


Note that those two aren't the same. The command

a=b

sets the variable 'a' to the string 'b'. The command

a\=b

runs a function/command/binary called 'a=b'. So not quoting = (i.e.
replicating the printf %q behavior) would be a breaking change.