Re: c-api.test fails on MS-Windows due to non-portable quoting

[Eli Zaretskii <eliz@gnu.org>]

> From: Andy Wingo <wingo@pobox.com>
> Cc: guile-devel@gnu.org
> Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2016 23:11:08 +0200
> 
> > It fails like this:
> >
> >      Running c-api.test
> >      'CUR' is not recognized as an internal or external command,
> >      operable program or batch file.
> >      egrep: Unmatched ( or \('CUR' is not recognized as an internal or 
> > external command, operable program or batch file.
> >
> > This is because it quotes shell commands /bin/sh '..' style:
> 
> Of course, because that's how `system' is specified.

On Posix hosts, yes.  But the ANSI C standard only says that the
argument will be passed to the host environment's command processor.

> > --- test-suite/tests/c-api.test~0     2016-01-02 13:32:40.000000000 +0200
> > +++ test-suite/tests/c-api.test       2016-07-23 14:12:57.257375000 +0300
> > @@ -22,7 +22,7 @@
> >  (define srcdir (cdr (assq 'srcdir %guile-build-info)))
> >  
> >  (define (egrep string filename)
> > -  (zero? (system (string-append "egrep '" string "' " filename
> > +  (zero? (system (string-append "egrep \"" string "\" " filename
> >                                  " >" %null-device))))
> >  
> >  (define (seek-offset-test dirname)
> >
> > OK to push such a change?
> 
> I think instead to get this to work on MinGW we should switch to use
> system* instead of praying that we get quoting right ;) Something like:
> 
>   (zero? (system* "egrep" "-q" string filename))

For this to work, the Windows implementation of system* will need to
be augmented to quote characters special for the shell, because
(unlike execvp on Posix hosts) the arguments of spawnvp are eventually
concatenated into a single string that gets passed to the system API
which invokes programs.  If this is the way you are willing to solve
this, I will submit a patch to that effect.