Bug in *report with -fp

[Jay R. Ashworth]

On Thu, Mar 08, 2007 at 02:42:48PM -0500, fpsupport wrote:
> Quoting Fairlight (Wed, 7 Mar 2007 20:17:17 -0500):
> > There's a bug in dreport and rreport as late as 5.0.14R4 (Linux in this
> > case).
> >
> > If you specify "-fp tablename" on the command line, and the table does
> > not exist, it does not complain in any way, shape, or form.  It acts as
> > if it just did a sane job of running.
> [...]
> 
> First, let me say that I do not consider this a "bug", as the behavior
> is consistent with the rest of the prc-related flags.  (And using the
> "-f" flag for a prc-only output format for which there is no
> corresponding processing will generate no error, either.)

Fine.  But using -f with a missing *output* format *will* generate
an error, right?

> That said, however, I do see the value in changing this particular
> behavior to one that makes more sense.  That is, since the "-fp" flag
> with a non-existent processing name is basically treated as "run this
> prc-only output that has no prc, so the entire output phase is
> basically a no-op".  (Yes, the sort/select processing [if any] was
> run on the first pass, and the automatic processing [if any] will be
> run on the second pass.)

Exactly.

> If I were re-designing filePro from scratch, I would not have allowed
> the non-existent prc name give to the -v/-y/-z flags to be treated as
> a "use no processing" flag, unless the name were "" to explicitly set
> that meaning.  However, that design decision was made more than 23
> years ago, and too many people use too many variants on the name they
> give in order to change that behavior.

Indeed.

> Changing this behavior for "-fp" has been entered as a requested change
> for a future update.  (Task list item number 1000.)

Wheee!  :-)

Cheers,
-- jra
-- 
Jay R. Ashworth                                                jra at baylink.com
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