GNU bug report logs - #57613
grep man page tries to rewrite POSIX history

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Geoff Clare <gwc <at> opengroup.org>
To: bug-grep <at> gnu.org
Subject: grep man page tries to rewrite POSIX history
Date: Tue, 6 Sep 2022 13:28:37 +0100

The grep 3.8 man page at https://www.gnu.org/software/grep/manual/grep.html says, under "What happened to egrep and fgrep?":

egrep and fgrep were not standardized by POSIX

This is factually incorrect. They were included in POSIX.2-1992 but marked as obsolescent. When POSIX.2-1992 and POSIX.1-1996 were merged (along with the Single UNIX Specification) to form POSIX.1-2001, the obsolescent features from POSIX.2-1992 were removed.

Suggested fix - change:

egrep and fgrep were not standardized by POSIX and are no longer needed

to:

egrep and fgrep were marked obsolescent when they were standardized by POSIX in 1992 and were removed in the 2001 revision; they have long been deprecated by GNU.

(I have it second hand that the GNU deprecation occurred in 2007; you could give that date instead of saying "long" if you can confirm it.)

Message #10 received at 57613-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Paul Eggert <eggert <at> cs.ucla.edu>
To: Geoff Clare <gwc <at> opengroup.org>
Cc: 57613-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#57613: grep man page tries to rewrite POSIX history
Date: Tue, 6 Sep 2022 14:28:12 -0500

[Message part 1 (text/plain, inline)]

On 9/6/22 07:28, Geoff Clare wrote:
> They were included in POSIX.2-1992 but marked as obsolescent.

Ouch, as I recall reading POSIX.2-1992 and seeing egrep and fgrep 
mentioned, but not as part of the standard. I guess I misread the 
standard. I am away from my printed copy and so cannot easily check this 
now.

I installed the attached which I hope clears this up.

[0001-Fix-obsolescence-doc-for-egrep-fgrep.patch (text/x-patch, attachment)]

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