Re: [Evms-devel] Snapshots in batch... Another one

[Michel B. <mi...@bo...>]

Le Mardi 10 Décembre 2002 14:23, Kevin Corry a écrit :
>
> We have just recently added a "-b" option to the CLI. This option will
> force the default choice on any interactive error messages. This will be
> available in both the upcoming 1.2.1 release and the new 2.0 design, which
> should have an alpha-level release this month.

This is a good move, thank you.

However, I wonder about the choice of "the default choice on any interactive 
error message".

Not only because this "default choice" could maybe change from one version to 
the next, or because the default choice for every possible interactive 
warning may not be fully documented, but also for one simpler reason: EVMS's 
"default choice" may not always correspond to what the script's programmer 
wants to be done.

Example: Suppose that a script I wrote wants to delete an EVMS volume on which 
a filesystem resides.
If EVMS issues a message "Warning ! This will delete the filesystem that 
resides on the volume, do you really want to do this ? y/N" and the default 
is "no" for safety, then there is no way the volume can be deleted in batch.

So I think this concept of "default choice" can be misleading and problematic, 
and that the batch option should be seen as "Just do it" or "always answer 
YES" rather than "take default choice" that one will be unsure about.

This is the way options such as "-f" or "--force" usually work in Unix (see 
"cp" for example), and I think this is the way EVMS should behave.

Best regards.

-- 
Michel Bouissou <mi...@bo...> OpenPGP ID 0xDDE8AC6E