[yjftsjthsd-h]

Shell is a bad fit for many uses (an ACME client is more ambitious than I would build in shell, personally), but the things it's good at, it's really good at. I have yet to find anything else that's even close to as good for glue code when I have a handful of tools and/or a bunch of files that I need to string together. Unless you're writing in Ada, I promise whatever language you think is better has its own sharp edges (if we're allowing eval, then not many languages are going to be safe, really).

[Bystroushaak]

I usually replace shell scripts with python (using sh module: https://amoffat.github.io/sh/ for calling other scripts/programs).

[pdimitar]

Golang is better suited for this, for my needs at least.

[ianlevesque]

Yeah, lego-acme is a solid alternative.

https://github.com/go-acme/lego

[yjftsjthsd-h]

Er, are we comparing ACME clients or shell alternatives?

[cozzyd]

yeah until your scripts stop running someday because python...

[Bystroushaak]

Can you elaborate?

[cozzyd]

Python scripts will often break with system upgrades, most acutely when Python2 went away, but under many other circumstances as well.

[yjftsjthsd-h]

I would expect python2 to only have gone away across major versions of an OS, which is about as non-disruptive as it could have been, considering.

Of course, as I write this ansible is broken on one of my machines for reasons that appear to stem from a python 3.x->3.y update, so...

[pornel]

That's the thing — Python can break with any OS update (I personally can break it whenever I touch it ;)

OTOH a script for /bin/sh written 30 years ago has a good chance running today unchanged.

Having said that, I still would not recommend shell for anything that needs to be robust and secure.

[broknbottle]

macOS doesn’t even come with Python..

[monetus]

Ever tried TCL? Curious on your thoughts.