file not working on executables?

Corinna Vinschen corinna-cygwin@cygwin.com
Fri Sep 9 12:49:00 GMT 2005


On Sep  8 23:12, Gary R. Van Sickle wrote:
> > From: Corinna Vinschen
> [snip]
> > You should not mount the whole Cygwin tree in textmode, it 
> > will always give trouble when you expect it the least.
> 
> I've had everything mounted as text for years, and the only trouble I've
> ever had is not related to the existence of textmode mounts, but to programs
> that erroneously assume all text files are '\n' xor '\r\n', as I've stated
> in my previous post on this subject.  Text mounts have *saved* me untold
> amounts of trouble; that's why they exist at all in the first place!  I
> can't begin to understand where you're coming from there; I am certainly a
> counterexample to the statement, and I doubt I'm the only one.
> 
> >  Just 
> > mount home dirs or something as textmode, but even then 
> > refrain from it as much as possible.
> 
> Why?  Certainly mixing the two mount modes is going to result in problems
> when you forget things work differently in one mount than in another.
> 
> > There are tools out there to convert line endings, for 
> > instance d2u and u2d.  I bet, if you count the cases where 
> > the conversion is necessary, you will be surprised how 
> > _seldom_ it's necessary.
> 
> Any program that doesn't open all files, except text files, with "rb", is a
> counterexample to this.
> 
> Again, I 100% share the notion that text mounts should not be necessary.
> But when even such basic apps as tar get this wrong, I simply don't see how
> anybody can realistically entertain the idea that eliminating them will
> somehow solve any problems.

You're a lucky guy that you don't have problems with textmode mounts
but from my point of view, CRLF lineendings are just insane and dealing
with them in libraries and applications is a real PITA.

Dunno how you work, but I for one use native Win apps only if it's
totally unavoidable.  I certainly don't use a native Win32 editor
as long as I have vim and I certainly don't create textfiles with
CRLF lineendings in them.  If I get those files, my first action is
to convert them to LF.

However, that's getting cygwin-talk fodder.  So please move any further
discussion there.  Reply-To set accordingly.


Corinna

-- 
Corinna Vinschen                  Please, send mails regarding Cygwin to
Cygwin Project Co-Leader          cygwin AT cygwin DOT com
Red Hat, Inc.

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