root /etc/csh

[Polytropon]

On Sat, 15 Nov 2008 01:19:57 -0500, dan-freebsd-questions at ourbrains.org wrote:
> Why doesn't FreeBSD ship bash and other shells besides
> the `sh' linked statically is beyond me. It wouldn't break ports, would
> it?

I can't speak for FreeBSD's developers, but I think it's a primary
philosophy to provide only a set of basic means by the base system,
instead of a more or less complete collection of shells, just for
the case that someone might want it. Well, bash, zsh or ksh are very
powerful tools, but those who want them will surely install them
right after the base system. Furthermore, there are those users
who are not interested in those shells at all (maybe because they're
using GUI stuff only, or maybe because they're completely happy
with sh for scriting and csh for dialog mode). For UNIX compati-
bility, /bin/sh is sufficient, and csh, configured properly, is
an excellent dialog shell.

FreeBSD isn't a shell collection, it's an operating system. :-)

Just as a sidenote, when you put this into /etc/csh.cshrc, your
csh will behave (except scripting constructs, of course) somewhat
like bash:

        set promptchars = "%#"
        set prompt = "%n@%m:%~%# "
        set autolist

or

        set promptchars = ">#"
        set prompt = "[%n@%m] %~ %# "
        set autolist


-- 
Polytropon
>From Magdeburg, Germany
Happy FreeBSD user since 4.0
Andra moi ennepe, Mousa, ...