*BSD News Article 31561


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From: rsanders@mindspring.com (Robert Sanders)
Newsgroups: comp.os.386bsd.misc,comp.os.linux.misc
Subject: Re: Linux vs *BSD (new twist)
Date: 11 Jun 1994 18:05:12 GMT
Organization: MindSpring Enterprises, Inc.
Lines: 34
Message-ID: <RSANDERS.94Jun11140512@hrothgar.mindspring.com>
References: <2sl6o3$pvs@aurora.engr.latech.edu> <2spm91$1b2@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM>
	<me.771084458@tartufo> <2t9jo2$gek@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM>
	<2ta8jr$ii9@nkosi.well.com> <Dr7DpL.J5@pe1chl.ampr.org>
NNTP-Posting-Host: msdem5.mindspring.com
In-reply-to: rob@pe1chl.ampr.org's message of Fri, 10 Jun 1994 22:41:45 GMT

In article <Dr7DpL.J5@pe1chl.ampr.org> rob@pe1chl.ampr.org (Rob Janssen) writes:
   In <2ta8jr$ii9@nkosi.well.com> gonzo@magnet.mednet.net (Patrick J. Volkerding) writes:

   >In article <2t9jo2$gek@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM>,
   >Peter da Silva <peter@Starbase.NeoSoft.COM> wrote:
   >>In article <me.771084458@tartufo>,
   >>Michael Elbel <me%dude.pcs.dec.com@inet-gw-2.pa.dec.com> wrote:
   >>>Does it? I'm pretty sure, it doesn't. I distinctively remember that the
   >>>/etc/DIRCOLORS file holds the actual escape sequences to use.
   >>
   >>What if you have more than one terminal?

   >Then you can use $HOME/.dir_colors to override the file in /etc.

   Ah, so you get a new home with each terminal?

Look, the whole point of this thread -- what little there was -- was
that color ls was a huge, bloaty thing that betrayed the
features-are-bad legacy of V7 UNIX.  Although it's actually kind of
amusing and perverse that it's turned into complaints about the
limitations of color ls (perhaps making Peter's point), the fact is
that most people using Linux use the console or color xterm and not a
Televideo 925 or (insert your own archaic terminal name here), and
even if they did most terminals don't support color, and even for
those that do there isn't a standard termcap string to describe color
sequences, so it really would be an effort all out of proportion to do
color ls 'right'.

Patrick's comment is silly, of course.  What you *can* do with HPA's
version of color ls is set the LS_COLORS environment variable
different for each terminal.  That doesn't change the basic ANSI-ish
escape sequence used to initiate the color change, but that could be
wedged into the variable as well.