Re: bin/59956: gpt(8): show human-readable units

["Robert Elz via gnats" <gnats-admin%NetBSD.org@localhost>]

The following reply was made to PR bin/59956; it has been noted by GNATS.

From: Robert Elz <kre%munnari.OZ.AU@localhost>
To: Martin Husemann <martin%duskware.de@localhost>
Cc: gnats-bugs%netbsd.org@localhost, campbell+netbsd%mumble.net@localhost
Subject: Re: bin/59956: gpt(8): show human-readable units
Date: Thu, 05 Feb 2026 01:36:55 +0700

     Date:        Wed, 4 Feb 2026 18:32:42 +0100
     From:        Martin Husemann <martin%duskware.de@localhost>
     Message-ID:  <aYOCuuN0Ok83w01j%big-apple.aprisoft.de@localhost>
 
   | Something very close to the -b format would be fine for -a + new magic
   | machine readable switch (plus: make -b use the identical format if the
   | new switch is given too).
 
 I can do that, should be easy.
 
 The one thing I worry about however is:
 
   | Label:	Backup_Root
 
 Labels are just (UTF16 or whatever it is) text strings.
 That means they can contain anything, including newlines, etc.
 They can certainly contain spaces, though those alone - even leading
 spaces, should be no real problem to handle.  But I think we need some
 kind of encoding for this (to be properly parsable, rather than just
 human readable) to deal with newlines, and other similar junk.
 
 Would perhaps vis encoding the label make sense, or perhaps
 even (for this purpose) simply encoding the label as a series
 of hex values (of however many bits the chars actually are,
 with leading 0's suppressed) ?
 
 Everything else should be no problem (though I see no reason for
 using tabs anywhere - except in the label if one is present there)
 nor more than a single space between fields (and do you really need
 both ',' and ' ' between the attribute names ? ... that's one where
 I assume the names are easier to deal with than simply printing the
 64 bit field in hex).  This is not supposed to be pretty, just easy
 for code to read and understand.
 
 I will do all this tomorrow sometime (or rather, later today sometime)
 and send you (off list to start with) a sample or three, so you can
 determine if it will work for you.
 
 kre