[tau5210]

I also agree. In fact, I have a feeling it is not simply a matter of allure, but one of the most decisive and important factors if not the single most.

I think we tend to underestimate the importance of this kind of uniformity (aka homogeneity, consistency, sameness, equivalence etc) that allows us to freely shift back and forth and work across different environments (aka contexts, mindsets, etc) without any essential changes and translations. i.e. in a sense, minimizing the boundary such that the difference effectively disappears and it feels as if it's all just one same. In this case the environments being shell <-> script. But I think I see similar patterns in many other places, including outside of tech.

So, similar to as you also mentioned, as long as there is no language that beats the current shell as both a shell language and a scripting language, and one that sufficiently matures for real practical uses as both, I have a hard time imagining the most perfect scripting language alone still being able to make shell scripts go away. At least, I have a hard time imagining myself abandoning shell scripts otherwise.