Re: $(shell ...) and SHELL problems in 3.81

[Christopher Faylor]

On Mon, Apr 16, 2007 at 12:04:59AM +0300, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>On Sun, Apr 15, 2007 at 06:16:56AM +0300, Eli Zaretskii wrote:
>>Date: Sun, 15 Apr 2007 16:09:39 -0400
>>From: Christopher Faylor <address@hidden>
>>
>>I think you interpret the problem incorrectly.  GNU Make allows any
>>program to be used as SHELL, and promises only that the named SHELL
>>will be called once for each command it runs.
>
>I don't think anyone claimed that cmd.exe was not being run.  However,
>since cmd.exe does not qualify as a POSIX shell, it is not producing
>the desired outcome, anymore than if SHELL had been set to /bin/cat.
>
>>Cygwin may try to be an island of POSIX in a sea of Windows but as soon
>>as you leave the island by running cmd.exe you have to expect trouble.
>>I don't have the POSIX specification handy but I'd be surprised of
>>cmd.exe qualified as a POSIX shell since, AFAICT, the POSIX shell
>>specification is based on the Bourne Shell which accepts "-c" as a
>>command-line argument.
>
>If -c is the problem (which I agree it probably is), then it's not
>specific to cmd.exe; any program that doesn't grok -c as a shell does
>will behave that way.  For example, cat or perl, even if they are
>Cygwin programs.

Yes.  I've put back the part that you snipped where I *made* the point
about cat.  I don't see any reason for you to cut my point and then
claim it as your own.

There is no Cygwin component here.  If you set your SHELL to something
which is not the type of shell that make expects, it will not work.
That is make working as designed and it is not an issue that needs to
be taken up with the cygwin mailing list.

>> Above and beyond that point, however, it is not a goal of Cygwin to
>> operate flawlessly with cmd.exe.
>
>But Cygwin doesn't (AFAIK) do anything to deliberately defeat cmd.exe
>more than it does with any other program.

And that wasn't my point.  My point was that if there is some subtle
thing that cmd.exe needs in order to be used as a shell and Cygwin
isn't supplying we will not be extremely interested in standing on our
heads to supply it.

I am, again, trying to dissuade anyone from the potentially discouraging
experience of expecting that their cmd.exe woes will be actively
considered on the Cygwin mailing list.

cgf