GNU bloat
gcal: The Gregorian calendar program (GNU cal) 3.01
I installed gcal to test my ISO 8601 parser. I have some differences with it.
First, if you type gcal --help, you get this:
gcal: The Gregorian calendar program (GNU cal) 3.01 Copyright (c) 1994, 95, 96, 1997, 2000 Thomas Esken Usage: gcal [[OPTION...] [%DATE] [@FILE...]] [COMMAND] Usage: gcal [-|/{[?|h|??|hh|L|V]|{CDFIPHKNORSXbcfijnpqrsuv}}] [[MM] [YYYY]] -h, --help Display this help text and quit program -hh, --usage[=ARG] Display extended help text and quit program -L, --license Display software license and quit program -V, --version Display version information and quit program -p, --pager Direct output through external `less' pager Use `gcal --usage[=ARG]|[=?] --pager' for more information. Email bug reports toor (if this fails) to .
So the –help option returns no actual help. Seeing this, I tried -hh. Here are SOME of the options it prints out.
- –exit-status-help-non-zero
- Set EXIT status of program to 127 on `–help’ etc.
- -R ARG
–response-file=ARG
- Create response file for the `@FILE‘ option
ARG = Store arguments of command line in file ARG
- -S ARG
–shell-script=ARG
- Create shell script which contains the arguments of command line
ARG = File name of the shell script
- –export-date-variables
- Export local date variables from file to file
- –export-text-variables
- Export local text variables from file to file
- -u
–suppress-calendar
- Suppress output of calendar sheet explicitly
- -p
–pager
- Direct output through simple internal pager
- –mail[=ARG]
- Send output via `mail’ program to user
[ARG] = Email address, otherwise eMail is send to user `boredzo’
- –adjust-value=ARG
- Set reference value for rise/set time respectively shadow length
ARG = Angular value respectively factor in range: -90.0…+90.0
- –atmosphere=ARG
- Set base data of Earth’s atmosphere
ARG = Air pressure and temperature separated by `,’ character
Air pressure in Millibar (actual: 1013.250)
Air temperature in degrees Celsius (actual: +15.000)
- –limit
- Limit rise/set times of Sun to the day
- –precise
- Represent astronomical times and data with utmost precision
- –execute-command
- Execute `%![ARG]’ shell commands and “TVAR[?|\:]COMMAND” assigments
finally, at the very end:
------------------------oOO \\\_''/ OOo--------------------------- Thomas Esken O (/o-o\) O eMail: deleted Im Hagenfeld 84 (( ^ )) Phone: +49 deleted D-48147 Muenster; Germany \____) ~ (____/ MotD : 2old2live, 2young2die
So:
- Why does this program reproduce functions (e.g. pipe to mail) already provided by the shell?
- Why does it need to know about the atmosphere? (UPDATE 2006-12-06: Thomas Ptacek says that it is to compute sunrise times.)
- WHY does it have such an awful email signature in there?
Technorati tags: complaints.
March 9th, 2006 at 00:43:00
Looks like GNU Cal is 2bad2use.
January 1st, 2017 at 15:35:32
GNU Cal is only impressive in the incredible CWH®† that the developer(s?) has spent on it.
† Countless Wasted Hours®