[Nix-dev] less: When assumptions ruin the world

Michael Jones m.pricejones at gmail.com
Fri Jan 2 12:57:35 CET 2015


If it helps at all, git seems to use GIT_PAGER first and then falls back to
PAGER and then to `less` for the commands that use it. Perhaps nix could
respect a NIX_PAGER env var?

To me it depends on the output of the command. I love that git pages the
output of `git log` automatically but that is because I generally want to
see the most recent commits first. I don't mind that `apt-cache search
<blah>` isn't paged as the top of the list is no more specifically relevant
than the bottom and I can scroll up in the terminal.

Michael

On Fri, Jan 2, 2015 at 11:46 AM, Paul Colomiets <paul at colomiets.name> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Fri, Jan 2, 2015 at 1:37 PM, Ertugrul Söylemez <ertesx at gmx.de> wrote:
> > No, they can't choose.  I would choose to use `less` as a pager when I
> > need it, and otherwise I would use my terminal.  I can't make that
> > choice without corrupting the PAGER variable (which I use for other
> > things!).
> >
>
> I'm not a fan of using less for nix tools. But it seems you're
> inconsistent here. Which other programs use $PAGER for legitimate
> reasons? And what reasons are good for that? I'm asking not to insult
> you, but rather to make my own future decisions better.
>
>
>
> --
> Paul
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