bug#62272: closed (Erroneous claim in grep man page)

[GNU bug Tracking System]

Your message dated Sun, 19 Mar 2023 18:54:32 -0700
with message-id 
<CA+8g5KGXgP-hYU0GOx-EOp6sGcuq=5xcG2=GjwZGTfG+Bi5x6A@mail.gmail.com>
and subject line Re: bug#62272: Erroneous claim in grep man page
has caused the debbugs.gnu.org bug report #62272,
regarding Erroneous claim in grep man page
to be marked as done.

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62272: https://debbugs.gnu.org/cgi/bugreport.cgi?bug=62272
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--- Begin Message --- Subject: Erroneous claim in grep man page Date: Sun, 19 Mar 2023 11:27:41 +0200

This is a request and further endorsement of a report from 2008, ending with https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-grep/2008-08/msg00002.html

Request: Either add four words to the manpage or delete the entire sentence.

ASIS: "In GNU grep there is no difference in available functionality between basic and extended syntaxes."

TOBE: "Although the syntaxes differ, in GNU grep there is no difference in available functionality between basic and extended syntaxes."

Reasoning: The user should not suffer for not realizing that "no difference in available functionality" does not imply "no difference in syntax."
Example:
$ grep -i "([A-Z])\1\1"
grep: Invalid back reference
#but no problem with:
$ grep -i -E "([A-Z])\1\1"

or
$ grep -i "\([A-Z]\)\1\1"

---

Thank you,

David A. Kra
__________________________________________________________________

--- End Message ---

> --- Begin Message ---
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> Subject: 
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> Re: bug#62272: Erroneous claim in grep man page
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> Date: 
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> Sun, 19 Mar 2023 18:54:32 -0700
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> tags notabug 62272
> stop
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> On Sun, Mar 19, 2023 at 5:47 AM David Kra <dakra137@gmail.com> wrote:
> > This is a request and further endorsement of a report from 2008, ending
> > with https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/bug-grep/2008-08/msg00002.html
> >
> > Request: Either add four words to the manpage or delete the entire
> > sentence.
> > ASIS: "In GNU grep there is no difference in available functionality
> > between basic and extended syntaxes."
> >
> > TOBE: "Although the syntaxes differ, in GNU grep there is no difference in
> > available functionality between basic and extended syntaxes."
> >
> > Reasoning: The user should not suffer for not realizing that "no difference
> > in available functionality" does not imply "no difference in syntax."
>
> Thanks, but that sentence already says there are two different
> syntaxes: basic and extended.
> Those are different names, which usually implies they denote different things.
> So adding those four words at the beginning of the sentence would be
> unnecessary and repetitive.
>
> I'm marking this as done, but discussion may continue.
>
>
> --- End Message ---