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authorMatt Kraai <kraai@debian.org>2001-08-01 17:21:35 +0000
committerMatt Kraai <kraai@debian.org>2001-08-01 17:21:35 +0000
commit2d91deba45d5a284614e06cc55e2be03599ca26d (patch)
tree0ba0d2096b4305465ddea8532a5931cb4c02b343 /README
parent00344431402703089c6b93f6119f9966cc7ba566 (diff)
Allow multiple shells to be enabled.
Diffstat (limited to 'README')
-rw-r--r--README32
1 files changed, 32 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/README b/README
index ae0215c47..4f806a0bf 100644
--- a/README
+++ b/README
@@ -51,6 +51,38 @@ Supported kernels:
----------------
+Shells:
+
+lash is the very smallest shell (adds just 10k) and it is quite usable as
+a command prompt, but it is not suitable for any but the most trivial
+scripting (such as an initrd that calls insmod a few times) since it does
+not understand Bourne shell grammer. It does handle pipes, redirects, and
+job control though. Adding in command editing makes it very nice
+lightweight command prompt.
+
+hush is also quite small (just 18k) and it has very complete Bourne shell
+grammer. It handles if/then/else/fi just fine, but doesn't handle loops
+like for/do/done or case/esac and such. It also currently has a problem
+with job control.
+
+msh: The minix shell (adds just 30k) is quite complete and handles things
+like for/do/done, case/esac and all the things you expect a Bourne shell to
+do. It is not always pedantically correct about Bourne shell grammer (try
+running the shell testscript "tests/sh.testcases" on it and compare vs bash)
+but for most things it works quite well. It also uses only vfork, so it can
+be used on uClinux systems. This was only recently added, so there is still
+room to shrink it further...
+
+ash: This adds about 60k in the default configuration and is the most
+complete and most pedantically correct shell included with busybox. This
+shell was also recently added, and several people (mainly Vladimir and Erik)
+have been working on it. There are a number of configurable things at the
+top of ash.c as well, so check those out if you want to tweak things. The
+Posix math support is currently disabled (that bit of code was horrible) but
+will be restored for the next BusyBox release.
+
+----------------
+
Getting help:
When you find you need help, you can check out the BusyBox mailing list