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by OJFord 846 days ago
> This works because the `:` is a way to set a label, and it implicitly returns 0. It's just a weird wrinkle of the language.

Do you have a source for that? I thought it was just POSIX built-in for true. Like `.` vs. `source`. What's a label in this context anyway?
3 comments
VSpike 846 days ago
Hah, yeah I was completely wrong on that! Should have fact checked myself. That's a falsehood I absorbed at some point and didn't question.
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OJFord 846 days ago
Well there's a blog post idea for you, sounds primed for the front page already - Falsehoods Programmers Believe About Colons...
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dolmen 845 days ago
: is the prefix for labels in DOS batch files.
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cryptonector 846 days ago
No need to ask for a source. The word "label" in the POSIX shell documentation only occurs in the description of `case`, and it doesn't happen in the manual page for bash, dash, zsh, etc.
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penguin_booze 846 days ago
Equally surprised. I know ':' is a label in sed, but labels in (ba)sh, I'm not aware. If it's indeed a label, is there a goto?
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