GNU bug report logs - #44460
[PATCH] processes: Optionally normalize recutils output.

Previous Next

Full log

View this message in rfc822 format

From: John Soo <jsoo1 <at> asu.edu>
To: Ludovic Courtès <ludo <at> gnu.org>
Cc: 44460 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: [bug#44460] Add copyright lines
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 2020 07:37:39 -0800

Hi Ludo,

Ludovic Courtès <ludo <at> gnu.org> writes:

>> * Still not normalized - how can I search for just the child processes
>>   associated with a particular command?
>
> Like:
>
>   guix processes | recsel -e 'ClientCommand ~ "xyz"' -p ChildProcess
>
> ?
>
> Actually what does “normalized” mean in this context?

Excellent question. I was thinking along the lines of database
normalization. The default output has multi-valued fields for child
processes, so the idea is to make them their own record set.  Does that
make sense?

An aside - Probably to be entirely honest about normalizing the output,
locks really would be in a separate record set too.

Another challenge is making sure the user can understand what
"normalized" means.  I am not sure readers of the manual/cli help will
be able to infer what it means from context.  On the other hand, it is
such a small use case that it seems imbalanced to provide a lot of
background for the term "normal". What do you think?

>> I wouldn't be opposed to splitting ChildProcess into ChildPID and
>> ChildCommand.  I would like it best if that change was made in addition
>> to adding the normalized version, since the normalized version allows
>> more functionality.
>
> I would think it’s OK to break compatibility on just these
> “ChildProcess” fields.

Ok. Would it be ok if I put that in a separate commit?

Thanks again!

- John

Previous Next

GNU bug tracking system
Copyright (C) 1999 Darren O. Benham, 1997,2003 nCipher Corporation Ltd, 1994-97 Ian Jackson.