Re: [PATCH 3/3] mingw: document the experimental standard handle redirection

From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Nov 2, 2017, 01:31 UTC
Message-ID: <xmqqr2thsby4.fsf@gitster.mtv.corp.google.com>
In-Reply-To: <alpine.DEB.2.21.1.1711011726030.6482@virtualbox>

Johannes Schindelin <Johannes.Schindelin@gmx.de> writes:

Show 10 quoted lines

>> > I feel this is the wrong way round. `>/dev/null` may sound very intuitive
>> > to you, but this feature is Windows only. Guess three times how intuitive
>> > it sounds to Windows developers to write `>/dev/null` if you want to
>> > suppress output...
>> 
>> It would be just as intuitive to write '2>&1' for dup-redirection,
>
> No. You misunderstand. I was mainly concerned with the `/dev/null`. Every
> Windows developer knows what `>file.txt` means, and many know what
> `2>error.txt` means. But `/dev/null` is not Windows, period.

Actually I did know that much.

If I was correct in assuming that "2>&1" is just as foreign as ">/dev/null", then we should be shunning "2>&1" just like we shun ">/dev/null". That was all I meant to say.

Are you saying "2>&1" is just as likely to be known as ">file.txt" and my assumption of foreignness of "2>&1" was incorrect?

	Side note: would ">NUL" look more familiar, I wonder, and
	can stand for ">/dev/null" for the target audience?

> ... It is so not
> Windows that Git itself translates it to `NUL` (which you Linux die-hards
> won't have a clue about, I would wager a bet).

Ah, you lost your bet.  When can I collect ;-)?