this post was submitted on 31 Aug 2023
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-11
Stop Using Bash (discuss.online)
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
15 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

  • Use Oil Shell if you want a faster and more modern version of Bash that's compatible with it and offers more modern oil language.
  • Use Zsh if you want better extendability and more plugins.
  • Use Fish if you want perfect out of the box configuration and a more modern (and less verbose for most cases) scripting language.
  • Use Dash/Ash if you want better speed and full POSIX compliance (no extension, no unimplemented features).
  • Use Yash if you want better autocomplete but still faster than Bash.
  • Use Xonsh if you want an awesome Python-based scripting experience and very nice autocomplete.
  • Use Elvish if you want a more modern scripting language.
  • Or use anything. Any shell will be better than Bash. Bash is slow, not POSIX compliant, and doesn't offer Zsh/Fish level autocomplete.
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[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Nah, bash is fine.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago (1 children)

As an admin this is madness. I'm good with bash,you know the shell I'll find on any running system.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

yeah, consistency is way more important than whatever pet features people want.

also, bash slow? what? it's an interactive shell, the vast majority of time will be spent waiting for my input. unless you mean when you write scripts in bash? but surely nobody would do that when there's perl...

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (2 children)

What is most likely to be standard on a base system image?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

AFAIK all distributions ship with bash as default, except maybe Kali that use zsh.

Any shell will have to be installed, but zsh is probably the most popular shell after bash.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Depends on the OS.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Well some OS are more popular than others, eg top 6 here https://distrowatch.com/ what would be found over most base images?

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

No.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

No.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago

I like bash, it's very standard. If you need better autocomplete I'd absolutely recommend ble.sh, which gives you an experience more similar to fish, without having to relearn the entire shell.

Look, I've been a fish user for years and still use it on some machines, but there are always cases where I cannot install fish, or fish is incompatible with a program I use (even via bass) or a feature I use in bash scripting works differently. Of course, I can always fix it, but it's always faster to just drop into a bash shell. I'm also much more familiar with configuring bash than zsh and therefore that's what I use. That's why bash is a staple on all my systems, even my BSD machines.

I think different shells are interesting and provide unique takes on what a shell can do, but telling people to stop using something that's so ubiquitous and useful to learn comes off as grandstanding to me.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

Bash is good and is standard. Have been experimenting with zsh but don't really see the appeal

If I need to write a script that is too complicated to do in bash I'll do it in python

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago

I still default to bash, but nu had some really cool features like a built in jq and several other formatters and pagers.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Thabks OP. Ive heard of zsh but I basically havent heard of the concept of using different shells. Certainly never used one, but I'll try it tomorrow.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Still using bash occasionally while mainlining zsh, it's just one of the most ubiquitous shells out there.

I'd rephrase your post title to "Use whatever shell you like, but try not to write Bash scripts"

At least scripts you want others to use... and you are going to be very grateful in the future when you might switch shells