[marklgr]

> "If you have to write more than 10 lines, then use a real language"

I swear, there should be a HN rule against those. It pollutes every single Shell discussions, bringing nothing to them and making it hard for others do discuss the real topic.

[dotancohen]

There are three numbers in this industry: 0, 1 and infinity. Any other number - especially when stated as a rule, limitation, or law - is highly suspect.

[pferde]

Are you one of those people who take everything literally, so any and all jokes fly far over their heads?

This rule of ten lines or less is clearly meant as an illustrative guideline. Obviously if you have a shell script that has 11 lines, but does what it has to do reliably, nobody will be bothered.

The idea that the rule is trying to convey is "don't write long, complex programs in shell". Arguing about exact numbers or wording here is detracting from the topic at hand.

[ndsipa_pomu]

0, 1, 3 and infinity

[NateEag]

Which works not just to preserve the previous statement from internal inconsistency, but also in regards to the incredibly useful Rule of Three (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_three_(computer_prog...).

[palunon]

> Which works not just to preserve the previous statement from internal inconsistency

It doesn't. You now have 4 numbers.

[ndsipa_pomu]

0, 1, 3, 4 and infinity - there's four numbers in this industry.

Five There's five numbers in this industry 0, 1, 3, 4, 5 and infinity

Wait, I'll come in again

[tuatoru]

0, 1, 7, and indeterminate, IME.

The 7 being for design. If there are more than 7 boxes on the whiteboard, try again.

[sargstuff]

thought the industry was broken down in 8 bit increments (0, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, etc)

log base 2 of 4 is only 16bits

[NateEag]

Good point. I'm not sure why I thought what I'd written above worked... shrug

[sargstuff]

Think use a real line discipline like n 8 1 would make more semantic sense than 'use a real lanaguage'.

Unless, the language is APL, in which case, 10 lines is an operating system.

[throw10920]

The majority of those comments have significantly more thought put into them (and adhere more closely to the HN guidelines) than this comment does.

[sargstuff]

Is there a link to HN line discipline criteria? (beyond asci ranges 0 through 31)