Bug: Search fails if started with Dash

Try performing a search that starts with a '-'. The - starting the search string is interpreted by the grep commands as more options. If I search for -T, I should return this page, but I get an empty result page. I will probably also get an error in the log files saying -T not a valid option.

I found this while writing a wrapper for bool to make it work better under TWiki.

Test case

Try searching for -T or -l in this web.

Environment

Possible Fix

If you add '--' after the option arguments to f/egrep and before the search string, most greps (and all posix greps) will do the right thing. The '--' means end of options and stops grep from trying to parse the search string as a series of options.

Looks like this patch fixes it.

diff -r1.1.1.3 Search.pm
204c204
<         $cmd = "%GREP% %SWITCHES% -l $TWiki::cmdQuote%TOKEN%$TWiki::cmdQuote %FILES%";
---
>         $cmd = "%GREP% %SWITCHES% -l -- $TWiki::cmdQuote%TOKEN%$TWiki::cmdQuote %FILES%";

-- JohnRouillard - 06 Aug 2002

Follow up

I've been running it for a few weeks now, and it works fine. I have tried the -- option on fgreps on sun solaris 2.8 and 2.6, SunOs 4.1.4, cygwin, Linux RedHat and Debian (Linux's and cygwin use gnu grep). Can somebody not operating on one of the above platforms check their f/egrep and see if there are any problems? It is possible older versions of HPOV, AIX, and Ultrix may be bitten by this. Its been too long for my memory to provide valid data for thes OS's.

-- JohnRouillard - 26 Aug 2002

Fix record

I think the '--' convention goes back quite a long way on Unix, and you've tested this widely already, so I've committed this to the TWikiAlphaRelease. Thanks for the patch!

-- RichardDonkin - 17 Oct 2002