Why Bash, ZSH etc are combo of both Command Interpreter & Command Language
by blueray from LinuxQuestions.org on (#53HZA)
I have been thinking about this for a long time now. This has become a brainworm. I have to ask this question to get it out of my system.
The Linux philosophy is to make each program do one thing well. The Linux shell seems to have started with this philosophy. I checked the manual of Thompson Shell. It did precisely what it was supposed to do (maybe a little thing here and there).
But then came Mashey shell, Bourne shell, C shell, Korn shell, Bash, ZSH, Powershell etc. Which integrated a Command Language with the Command interpreter.
So, what was the real issue? Why we can't use a minimal Command interpreter(Something like Thompson Shell) with the language we prefer (maybe something like abs-lang). Why do we need to package Command interpreter & Command Language together?
The Linux philosophy is to make each program do one thing well. The Linux shell seems to have started with this philosophy. I checked the manual of Thompson Shell. It did precisely what it was supposed to do (maybe a little thing here and there).
But then came Mashey shell, Bourne shell, C shell, Korn shell, Bash, ZSH, Powershell etc. Which integrated a Command Language with the Command interpreter.
So, what was the real issue? Why we can't use a minimal Command interpreter(Something like Thompson Shell) with the language we prefer (maybe something like abs-lang). Why do we need to package Command interpreter & Command Language together?