[Nix-dev] Dealing with non-Bash /bin/sh on non-NixOS

[Peter Simons]

Hi Eelco,

 >> we should link /bin/sh to Dash instead of Bash. That would catch any
 >> implicit dependencies on non-POSIX shell features,
 >
 > What's the point of that? Breaking zillions of existing scripts for
 > very little gain doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

now I am confused. In the very posting I was responding to, you said:

 | Yes, fix builders not to rely on /bin/sh (or at least not to assume
 | it's Bash).

Apparently, we consider builders broken that assume /bin/sh to be Bash.
So why don't you see the benefit of using a non-Bash shell for /bin/sh
to expose those broken builders?

Besides, everyone who is running Nix on a host system other than NixOS
potentially *has* a non-Bash /bin/sh. (Which is why this thread was
started.) So it doesn't feel right to say that changing /bin/sh to a
non-Bash shell would "break scripts". That change would just expose
scripts that are broken already.

Am I missing something?

Take care,
Peter