• [ksh] Expanding variables interactively in vi edit mode

    From Janis Papanagnou@21:1/5 to All on Sat Aug 5 13:59:19 2023
    In ksh I expand entities with <Tab> and/or in vi command editing mode
    with <Esc>* .

    In the presence of files "AAA BBB" and "AAA CCC" the effect with <Tab> completion after typing A<Tab> AAA\ (i.e. terminated by an escaped
    blank because of the ambiguity after "AAA "). If I <Esc>* instead I
    get AAA\ BBB AAA\ CCC, as expected, both blanks correctly escaped.

    With x="AAA BBB" and expanding $x or "$x or "$x" with <Esc>* the blanks
    don't get escaped. Similar with, say, calling
    pdfreader some\ doc.pdf
    and subsequently trying to expand "$_"; I have to manually quote the
    argument or escape the space(s). (Which is of course cumbersome.)

    My question is, is there a point in the observed behavior or should
    that be changed/fixed? (I tried it with ksh93u+ and ksh93u+m alpha.)

    Janis

    --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
    * Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)