Erase the source file open; specify a tempfile name option

[Wayne Davison]

On Sun, 20 May 2001, Theo de Raadt wrote:
> Actually, that is not the unix philosophy.

Consider why "mv" exists when we have "cp" and "rm".  Or why sort has a
-u option when uniq exists.  Or why grep has a -s (-q) option when we
could just pipe stdout to /dev/null.  Yes, part of the unix philosophy
is to create modular tools and use them together.  But another part is
to add (sensible) options to tools that make accomplishing common tasks
easier, even if we could have used several separate tools to accomplish
the task in a less convenient manner.  I think the key questions are: is
this option sensible for this particular tool (i.e. does it solve a
problem closely related to the core use of the utility and do so in a
better or more efficient way than using a separate utility) and/or does
the option make a common task easier.

..wayne..