Subject: silly problem with less

From: Joey Hess <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 12 Aug 1996 15:32:03 -0400 (EDT)

When I run less on a 0 byte file, it displays its help screen (same as
if you less a normal file and press 'h').

Example:

[joey@kite] ~/work>touch foo 
[joey@kite] ~/work>less foo

                   SUMMARY OF LESS COMMANDS

      Commands marked with * may be preceded by a number, N.
      Notes in parentheses indicate the behavior if N is given.

  h  H                 Display this help.
  q  :q  Q  :Q  ZZ     Exit.

  e  ^E  j  ^N  CR  *  Forward  one line   (or N lines).
...

I hesitate to report this as a bug, but it's really annoying me, as I
expect that if I look at a zero byte file, I'll just see 
"foo line 0/0 (END)". I do a double-take every time I look at some empty
log file and get the less help screen. I've used less in slackware,
redhat, etc, and those versions of less all work as I expect. Does anyone
know how to get the behavior I want with debian's less (version 321-1)?

-- 
#!/usr/bin/perl -i=-/*/~%*~%/~~%/~~~-/*/_/=~~~-/====~~!   [email-masked]
$o=35;$_="$^I-*!=====_!/";s/~/!*/g;s~%~-/ / ~g;$_.='---       Joey Hess
';s/=/__/g;y|*!| \\|;for(split/-/){print' 'x$o--."$_\n"}
      "How appropriate, you fight like a cow." - - Guybrush Threepwood