simonb@telstra.com.au (Simon Burge) writes:

>The test that grep uses to decide if a file is binary is to look for a
>NUL in the first 32k of the file (or the total file if it's less that
>32k).  Note that I'm not an international language specifist by _any_
>stretch of the imagination, but this would seem like a valid test.

I guess that should be OK for non ASCI character sets.  AFAICT no
normal text files contain NULs.  Although, Mail(1) on one of my
machines claims that my inbox contains NULs.

>> Note also, that I grep object files regularly enough that having
>> to remember that I now need -a for what has "just worked" for the last 15
>> year would be utterly annoying to me.

>Completely seriously - of what use can this be?

E.g. when I'm looking for strings in object or .db files.  It's just faster
to pipe grep into more then to diddle with strings and every system's object
dumping utility only to finally have to resort to grep anyway.

>When I've accidently
>grep'd some sort of object file, more often than not my xterm needs to
>have a full reset from the ctrl-middle-btn menu because text is now
>invisible or something else.

I really can't remember when I last messsed up an xterm.  It must be many
months ago.  And since I keep no useful information in the scroll back,
resetting an xterm isn't a problem.

>Pagers like more and less handle this
>better - if this is what you do, would a compromise like a check of
>isatty(STDOUT_FILENO) do?

I guess that would work for me, but I don't like this change -- too much magic.
I guess I have to put up with -a.

>No thanks, I value some semblance of sanity :)

:-)
-- 
Christoph Badura

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