Subject: bug#25009: ls -b fails to escape '-' c-style (ls (GNU coreutils) 8.21)

From: Pádraig Brady <[email-masked]>
Date: Wed, 23 Nov 2016 23:34:20 +0000

On 23/11/16 23:27, Eric Blake wrote:
> tag 25009 notabug
> thanks
> 
> On 11/23/2016 05:02 PM, Kay Parker wrote:
>> ls -b  (ls (GNU coreutils) 8.21): fails to escape '-' 
>> 1\ 2\ 3\ -\ 4\ -5\ 6
>> should be: 1\ 2\ 3\ \-\ 4\ \-5\ 6
> 
> Why? The documentation states:
> 
>   -b, --escape               print C-style escapes for nongraphic characters
> 
> but - looks like a graphical character to me, so it doesn't need an escape.
> 
> I don't see a problem here, so I'm marking this as not a bug; however,
> feel free to followup with more details, such as better justification
> for why - should be treated as a nongraphic character.

Note you may be expecting ls to quote the file name
so that it's subsequently usable as a parameter to a command.
In that case --quoting=shell is more appropriate.