Unix Shell - Strange Behaviour of Exclaimation Mark

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Author Strange Behaviour of Exclaimation Mark
Alvin SIU

2004-05-22, 10:28 pm

Hi all,

I am using AIX 5.1
When I login, my prompt is something like this
alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu >
where
alvinsiu is my user-id
unix is the `hostname`
/home/alvinsiu is my current working directory.


I come across a directory named
THIS!IS!A!DIRECTORY

(Yes, it is all uppercase with exclaimation marks in between.)

When I change directory to it, for example
alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu > cd THIS!IS!A!DIRECTORY

The prompt become
alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu/THIS059IS059A059DIRECTORY >

Noted that the exclaimation has become the number 059.

I also noted that the number changes each time.
It is NOT always 059.

Can anyone explain this strange behaviour for me ?

Many thanks.
I am using AIX 5.1 and ksh.


Alvin SIU
2004-05-22
Chris F.A. Johnson

2004-05-22, 10:28 pm

On 2004-05-22, Alvin SIU wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I am using AIX 5.1
> When I login, my prompt is something like this
> alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu >
> where
> alvinsiu is my user-id
> unix is the `hostname`
> /home/alvinsiu is my current working directory.
>
>
> I come across a directory named
> THIS!IS!A!DIRECTORY
>
> (Yes, it is all uppercase with exclaimation marks in between.)
>
> When I change directory to it, for example
> alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu > cd THIS!IS!A!DIRECTORY
>
> The prompt become
> alvinsiu@unix /home/alvinsiu/THIS059IS059A059DIRECTORY >
>
> Noted that the exclaimation has become the number 059.
>
> I also noted that the number changes each time.
> It is NOT always 059.
>
> Can anyone explain this strange behaviour for me ?


Think "history".

Enter a command, and watch the number increase by 1.

I don't see this behaviour in bash or pdksh, just in ksh88 and
ksh93.




--
Chris F.A. Johnson http://cfaj.freeshell.org/shell
========================================
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My code (if any) in this post is copyright 2004, Chris F.A. Johnson
and may be copied under the terms of the GNU General Public License
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