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Re: style, sysexits(3), and man RETURN VALUES for sys programs
> Date: Sat, 3 Jun 2023 13:45:44 +0200
> From: tlaronde%polynum.com@localhost
>
> So I suggest to add a mention of sysexits(7) to style.
I don't think sysexits(7) is consistently used enough, or really
useful enough, to warrant being a part of the style guide. Very few
programs, even those in src, use it, and I don't think anything
_relies_ on it for semantics in calling programs.
> But I'd like also to request some additions to sysexits(3):
> [...]
Sounds like overthinking this, unless you see specific semantic value
for composing programs that goes beyond the standard convention of 0
for success and nonzero for failure.
There are extremely rare cases of making finer distinctions than that.
For example, cmp(1) returns 0 for identical, 1 for difference, >1 for
error.
> Furthermore, I'm adding a RETURN VALUES section to inetd.8 and I think
> it should be standard practice for sys programs.
Normally this would go under EXIT STATUS, not RETURN VALUES.
> BTW, and still concerning style, is there a defined way of generating a
> MAN page needing to edit some part of the manual (ex.: usage) depending
> on some macros defined or not (in the case of inetd.8---even if this is
> not an actual problem because LIBWRAP is always defined---the [-l] flag
> depends on the macro; but it is always present in the usage).
I'd just document it unconditionally, and if it's really important,
mention in the text that it depends on a compile-time option.
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