0004981: ocamlbuild/my_std.ml shouldn't call bash

(0005330)
xleroy (administrator)
2010-04-18 19:00

As far as I can remember Windows's standard command-line interpreter (cmd.exe) is unusable in ocamlbuild's context (and in many others), because of its incomplete (and undocumented!) quoting behavior: there are plenty of commands that simply cannot be given as argument to "cmd /c" because they cannot be quoted properly. So, that leave little choice but going through a better shell like Cygwin's. Suggestions for alternative approaches most welcome. (Reclassified as "feature wish".)

(0005371)
samin (reporter)
2010-04-26 13:10

I'm OK with this being reclassified as a feature wish.
Can you point me to the examples of what can't be run using Sys.command on Windows?

(0005374)
ertai (developer)
2010-04-26 13:41

I don't rember exactly the examples but try to pass an argument to a command that contains spaces, quotes, slashes, blackslashes and you will quickly found the problem.

(0005375)
Julien Signoles (reporter)
2010-04-26 13:43

Bashisms are also an issue for BSD-like systems: that is not a Windows-only feature wish.

(0005377)
ertai (developer)
2010-04-26 14:17

Bashism is only when you call sh, here we call bash.

(0006722)
protz (manager)
2012-01-18 11:18

Hi,

First of all, thanks for reporting. While we believe you're
making a valid point, we don't have enough manpower to devote to this feature in
the foreseeable future. We're moving this to the resolved/suspended status: this
means the discussion is still open, but the PR won't appear in our to-do list.
You're welcome to reopen the issue if you have a patch; we would gladly review
it.

Thanks,

jonathan

(0007472)
ygrek (reporter)
2012-05-30 15:37

A description of windows quoting rules, including cmd.
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/twistylittlepassagesallalike/archive/2011/04/23/everyone-quotes-arguments-the-wrong-way.aspx [^]

(0007473)
protz (manager)
2012-05-30 15:55

The next version of the Windows installer will encourage the user to install Cygwin. A few bugs have been fixed as well, and now ocamlbuild calls bash with what we believe is proper quoting. This should be announced in a few days, once we package the beta release of OCaml 4.00.

The official position is now: "if you want to get an ocaml development environment under Windows, just install cygwin". The windows installer will offer you the option of launching cygwin's setup.exe with the right set of packages preselected.

But of course we'd be glad to accept a patch that lifts the requirement on bash on Windows. That being said, I don't think anyone here wants to be the person who writes the patch :).

Thanks,

jonathan

Issue History
Date Modified	Username	Field	Change
2010-02-17 15:22	samin	New Issue
2010-04-18 19:00	xleroy	Note Added: 0005330
2010-04-18 19:00	xleroy	Assigned To	=> ertai
2010-04-18 19:00	xleroy	Severity	major => feature
2010-04-18 19:00	xleroy	Status	new => feedback
2010-04-26 13:10	samin	Note Added: 0005371
2010-04-26 13:41	ertai	Note Added: 0005374
2010-04-26 13:43	Julien Signoles	Note Added: 0005375
2010-04-26 14:17	ertai	Note Added: 0005377
2010-07-22 11:41	ertai	Status	feedback => assigned
2010-07-22 11:41	ertai	Assigned To	ertai => xclerc
2012-01-18 11:18	protz	Note Added: 0006722
2012-01-18 11:18	protz	Status	assigned => resolved
2012-01-18 11:18	protz	Resolution	open => suspended
2012-02-02 15:17	protz	Category	OCamlbuild => OCamlbuild (the tool)
2012-05-30 15:37	ygrek	Note Added: 0007472
2012-05-30 15:55	protz	Note Added: 0007473

Notes
(0005330) xleroy (administrator) 2010-04-18 19:00	As far as I can remember Windows's standard command-line interpreter (cmd.exe) is unusable in ocamlbuild's context (and in many others), because of its incomplete (and undocumented!) quoting behavior: there are plenty of commands that simply cannot be given as argument to "cmd /c" because they cannot be quoted properly. So, that leave little choice but going through a better shell like Cygwin's. Suggestions for alternative approaches most welcome. (Reclassified as "feature wish".)

(0005371) samin (reporter) 2010-04-26 13:10	I'm OK with this being reclassified as a feature wish. Can you point me to the examples of what can't be run using Sys.command on Windows?

(0005374) ertai (developer) 2010-04-26 13:41	I don't rember exactly the examples but try to pass an argument to a command that contains spaces, quotes, slashes, blackslashes and you will quickly found the problem.

(0005375) Julien Signoles (reporter) 2010-04-26 13:43	Bashisms are also an issue for BSD-like systems: that is not a Windows-only feature wish.

(0005377) ertai (developer) 2010-04-26 14:17	Bashism is only when you call sh, here we call bash.

(0006722) protz (manager) 2012-01-18 11:18	Hi, First of all, thanks for reporting. While we believe you're making a valid point, we don't have enough manpower to devote to this feature in the foreseeable future. We're moving this to the resolved/suspended status: this means the discussion is still open, but the PR won't appear in our to-do list. You're welcome to reopen the issue if you have a patch; we would gladly review it. Thanks, jonathan

(0007472) ygrek (reporter) 2012-05-30 15:37	A description of windows quoting rules, including cmd. http://blogs.msdn.com/b/twistylittlepassagesallalike/archive/2011/04/23/everyone-quotes-arguments-the-wrong-way.aspx [^]

(0007473) protz (manager) 2012-05-30 15:55	The next version of the Windows installer will encourage the user to install Cygwin. A few bugs have been fixed as well, and now ocamlbuild calls bash with what we believe is proper quoting. This should be announced in a few days, once we package the beta release of OCaml 4.00. The official position is now: "if you want to get an ocaml development environment under Windows, just install cygwin". The windows installer will offer you the option of launching cygwin's setup.exe with the right set of packages preselected. But of course we'd be glad to accept a patch that lifts the requirement on bash on Windows. That being said, I don't think anyone here wants to be the person who writes the patch :). Thanks, jonathan

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