Re: chase-0.5 - a new package for rewiev

[letters at hotpop dot com (Jari Aalto+mail.linux)]

* Sat 2003-06-14 Charles Wilson <cwilson@ece.gatech.edu> list.cygwin-apps
* Message-Id: <3EEB92EF.6060800@ece.gatech.edu>
> Jari Aalto+mail.linux wrote:
>
>> Debian package 'chase' has been ported. Please review.
>> 
>> http://www.tierra.dyndns.org:81/cygwin/chase
>> 
>> 
>
> How does this differ from namei, readlink, or realpath, all part of the 
> cygutils package?
>
> namei    - follow a pathname until a terminal point is found
> readlink - display target of symbolic link on standard output
> realpath - Print PATH with all references to `.', `..', and symlinks
>             resolved.

Debian also has  namei(1), readlink(1) and chase is one utility more.
In 'chase', there are couple of interesting options:

       -f, --from-file
              Treat the file names on the command line as sources for names to
              be  chased.   If this option is present, chase will read in each
              of the files given on the command line (both a sole dash "-" and
              the  absence of file names will be taken as meaning the standard
              input stream).  Each line in the files is taken  as  a  verbatim
              file name that will be chased like it had been given on the com-
              mand line of a run without this option.  There is no  means  for
              quoting the newline character; therefore only file names that do
              not contain newlines can  be  specified  via  the  files.   This
              restriction  is  lifted by the -0 option, though.  However, lit-
              eral spaces are preserved and are not interpreted as special.


       -D, --disable-loop-detection
              Normally chase keeps a record of all  symlinks  it  has  visited
              when  chasing the current file.  It uses this record to reliably
              detect symlink loops.  However, checking the  record  slows  the
              process  a  little  (more  for  long chains of symlinks) and the
              record requires a small amount of memory (more for  long  chains
              of  symlinks),  so  it may be desirable in some cases to inhibit
              this check.  This option disables this loop  detection  and  the
              associated  recording  of visited symlinks.  When this option is
              in effect (assuming no bugs in the related code) chase  runs  in
              constant  space  and  linear  time relative to the length of the
              symlink chains encountered.

Jari

-- 
http://tiny-tools.sourceforge.net/
Swatch  @time http://www.ryanthiessen.com/swatch/resources.htm
Convert @time http://www.mir.com.my/iTime/itime.htm