Re: lowercase environment variable names

"clemens fischer" <[email protected]> wrote:
> Paul Jarc:
>> Is there any reason other than tradition to make variable names
>> all-uppercase?
>
> are you serious?  :)  i use lower- or mixed case environment variables
> every day, and thay never failed me (on my freebsd system).

I know that case doesn't affect the mechanics, but for example: sh has
only a single namespace for shell variables and environment variables;
scripts need to be able to use shell variables without interfering
with the environment; and scripts typically don't expect that
lowercase shell variable names will interfere with the environment.
I'm not sure if this is *enough* of a reason to avoid them, but it's
something to consider.  Setting an environment variable that collides
with a script's shell variable may break the script, or may cause the
script's variable value to be exported to subsequent commands.


paul