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 23:37:59 +0000

On 23/11/16 23:34, Pádraig Brady wrote:
> 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.

Actually 1\ -\ 2 is fine as a command parameter
(as the shell doesn't split it).
Sorry for the noise