Re: [doc] LINES/COLUMNS auto-update in non-interactive shells contradicts manual

Chet Ramey <[email protected]> Mon, 11 May 2026 15:18:02 -0400

Newsgroups	gmane.comp.shells.bash.bugs
Organization	ITS, Case Western Reserve University
Message-ID	<[email protected]>

On 5/11/26 1:26 PM, Zachary Santer wrote:
> On Mon, May 11, 2026 at 11:47 AM Chet Ramey <[email protected]> wrote:
>>
>> It's easy to do
>>
>> shopt -u checkwinsize
>> : ${LINES:=24} ${COLUMNS:=80}
>>
>> if it matters, without having to wait for any changes to the shell. TheOP
>> is already two major versions back.
> 
> Guess what I'm asking for would be more along the lines of this, at
> least in bash 5.3:
> 
> if [[ -v COLUMNS || -v LINES ]]; then
>    shopt -u checkwinsize
> else
>    ( : )
>    trap '( : )' SIGWINCH
> fi

You can make the piece of shell script code as complicated as you want,
without waiting for a distro to update bash.


> My work machine is six bash major versions back. I'd still rather
> things improve at some point.

I think we disagree on whether or not this would be an improvement.
More people than not have expressed a desire to have LINES and COLUMNS
reflect the true window size.

-- 
``The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne.'' - Chaucer
		 ``Ars longa, vita brevis'' - Hippocrates
Chet Ramey, UTech, CWRU    [email protected]    http://tiswww.cwru.edu/~chet/

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