This is the mail archive of the cygwin mailing list for the Cygwin project.


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]
Other format: [Raw text]

Re: PATHEXT is fundamental to Windows and Should be recognised by CYGWIN


> On Aug 3, 2016, at 8:43 PM, Michel LaBarre wrote:
> 
> The CYGWIN site makes it quite difficult to discern how somebody can report
> an issue or comment.

If you think a plainly labeled “Reporting Problems” and “Mailing Lists” in the prominent sidebar is difficult, then I’m afraid it’s only going to get worse from here.

> Problem 1:  Cygwin does not support PATHEXT and really should.
> 
> Fundamental reason:  from the Cygwin FAQ - What is it?  "Cygwin is a
> distribution of popular GNU and other Open Source tools running on Microsoft
> Windows.”

> PATHEXT is as fundamental component of Windows program execution as PATH.

“To you.” Almost every sentence in that paragraph should have “to you” at the end. I’ve used Cygwin for over a dozen years, and I have never once missed having PATHEXT in mintty/bash.
You can continue to use PATHEXT to your heart’s content in CMD.
Bash isn’t CMD.

> The published solutions in the various FAQs are not satisfactory.

“To you."

> Problem 2:  Cygwin does not support CR-LF delimiters.

Yes it does, although it is heartily suggested they be left behind (pretty much any Windows program can handle Unix line endings but Notepad, and anyone using Notepad has bigger issues than line endings).
Text mounts can be created in Cygwin (although, again, not suggested). There are also a few (non-standard) things in Cygwin’s bash to try to handle CRLF scripts. You can search the archives for more information.

> CYGWIN could be a very smart supplement to that requirement.
> …
> If CYGWIN  could mitigate some of the recurring impediments new users trip over, (as evidenced by the many web-references to both my problems) it would facilitate its adoption by both Unix and non-Unix types.  

No, Cygwin _is_ a very smart supplement to that requirement. You talk as if Cygwin just showed up last week. It’s been around for almost twenty years, is widely used and widely respected.

> I disagree completely.  If you are in an interactive bash, running on a Windows computer, you sure as hell expect to be able to run "foo.bat" by typing "foo”.

No, _you_ expect to. I don’t. I know that Bash isn’t CMD.

Cygwin is providing a Posix environment on Windows. If you want a Windows environment on Windows, then use CMD. Almost all of Cygwin’s supplied programs work perfectly well in CMD, as long as you remember they’re providing a Posix environment and therefore need Unix paths, etc.



--
Problem reports:       http://cygwin.com/problems.html
FAQ:                   http://cygwin.com/faq/
Documentation:         http://cygwin.com/docs.html
Unsubscribe info:      http://cygwin.com/ml/#unsubscribe-simple


Index Nav: [Date Index] [Subject Index] [Author Index] [Thread Index]
Message Nav: [Date Prev] [Date Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next]