On Wed, Feb 11, 1998 at 08:22:08PM +0100, Milan Zamazal wrote: > >>>>> "MB" == Marcus Brinkmann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes: > > MB: There is no need to keep a silly choosen upstream name. We > MB: change a lot of things defined upstream (file location, etc), > MB: and I don't think that changing a name from "B" to something > MB: more readable is confusing (the opposite is the case). > > File location is no problem, most users don't care about it. Moreover, > they expect e.g. documentation in certain directories on Debian > systems. On the other hand they want to run the program by the same > command on all systems. Moreover, makefiles, shell scripts, etc., may > have problems, if the binary has different name on each computer.
Mmmh, I don't think we talk about standard packages here. I think most Linux users (or even Unix users) would expect a "i", "l" or "B" binary *at all*. I never saw so such names in make files, too. I am *not* proposing that cp should renamed to copy ;) > MB: Beside the reason you gave above, consider that a short name > MB: gives *no* idea about the functionality. > > That's not true--`pl' (the main SWI Prolog binary name) is also the > extension of Prolog source files (do not confuse this with the fact that > Perl bigots chose already used extension for their source files) coming > from ProLog. So it is clear for every Prolog programmer that binary > `pl' has to do something with Prolog. Sure, every rule has its exception. Most two letter names are well known, so "cp", "rm" and "ls" speak a clear and well understood language. Again, I was more thinking of "i", "l" and "B", I was not thinking of "X" or something like this. "pl" is fine for me, although it is not obvious for non-prolog programmers. I would never think of suggesting renaming gcc to "this-is-the-gnu-c-compiler" ;) But a program that is not yet standard of a well known programming language or not a standard unix command (whatever well known and standard means) should probably not be thrown in in the two letter arena. > I repeat it again: I don't think it's a good idea to have few letters > binaries, but I would rename already existing user programs only if some > conflict arised. I mostly agree with you, if you mean with "already existing user programs" programs with at least *some* history. Note that there already exists "i", "l" and "B" binaries (packages chris-cust and sam). Please check the description of chris-cust, "i" and "l" don't seem to provide functionality that you can't achieve better with an alias. The one I could agree with is "B", but where shall be drawn the border? Wondering, Marcus -- "Rhubarb is no Egyptian god." Debian GNU/Linux finger brinkmd@ Marcus Brinkmann http://www.debian.org master.debian.org [EMAIL PROTECTED] for public PGP Key http://homepage.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/Marcus.Brinkmann/ PGP Key ID 36E7CD09
