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On Thu, May 25, 2006 at 11:30:20AM -0500, David Champion wrote:
> But the larger point is that an exception occurs (-h is not recognized
> as an option) which triggers an error message. Given the history of
> -h, why should that error not be help itself, rather than metahelp?
OTOH, you really want to know what the problem was, so something like
this is needed first:
ERROR: -h not recognised
and you really don't want that to scroll off the top of the screen when
you then spew the help text, because the user isn't expecting that.
Yes, he could scroll back, or run the command again and capture its
output (but I bet he'd first try capturing stdout, not stderr, so have
to do it *again* when he realises his second mistake), but this is extra
work, and you want your users to do minimal work.
--
David Cantrell | top google result for "internet beard fetish club"
I think the most difficult moment that anyone could face is seeing
their domestic servants, whether maid or drivers, run away
-- Abdul Rahman Al-Sheikh, writing at
http://www.arabnews.com/?article=38558
There's stuff above here
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