dotnet-install.sh uses the wrong name when dot-sourced

[JayBazuzi]

• [ ] This issue is blocking
• [ ] This issue is causing unreasonable pain

Make a script my-script.sh:

curl -sSL https://dot.net/v1/dotnet-install.sh -O
. ./dotnet-install.sh --help

When run it prints out:

Usage:
       # Install a .NET SDK of a given Quality from a given Channel
       my-script.sh [-c|--channel <CHANNEL>] [-q|--quality <QUALITY>]
       # Install a .NET SDK of a specific public version
       my-script.sh [-v|--version <VERSION>]
       my-script.sh -h|-?|--help

my-script.sh is a simple command line interface for obtaining dotnet cli.
...

Note that the help says my-script.sh instead of dotnet-install.sh.

[missymessa]

@mairaw do you know who owns this now?

[mairaw]

Adding @MichalPavlik and @YuliiaKovalova

[MichalPavlik]

@baronfel, I think the problem is caused by this line: https://github.com/dotnet/install-scripts/blob/c4501ac2f3714e080e425ce499a0f077ab15a0b0/src/dotnet-install.sh#L1738

Is this behavior expected?

[baronfel]

It's not bad in the sense that it's not harming anything, but generally you wouldn't dot source this script. Is not that kind of script. We can change this to hard-code the name but it's kind of a mixed bag, because then you're incorrect if the users just rename the script.

[JayBazuzi]

generally you wouldn't dot source this script

Right here it says it is intended to be dot-sourced: https://github.com/dotnet/install-scripts/blob/c4501ac2f3714e080e425ce499a0f077ab15a0b0/src/dotnet-install.sh#L1860

[JayBazuzi]

One option is to stop supporting dot-sourcing all together.

An approach I have used elsewhere is to add an option to suppress all other stdout and only print the path. Then the caller can do:

export PATH="$( ./dotnet-install.sh --print-path-only )":"$PATH"

[baronfel]

There is no portable way to get the name of a script that is sourced - you have to do bash- or zsh- or other-shell-specific code to get that. I'm not convinced that this is a high priority to be 100% correct in all scenarios. We should either ignore this side effect or hard-code the dotnet-install.sh name.

[YuliiaKovalova]

There is no portable way to get the name of a script that is sourced - you have to do bash- or zsh- or other-shell-specific code to get that. I'm not convinced that this is a high priority to be 100% correct in all scenarios. We should either ignore this side effect or hard-code the dotnet-install.sh name.

I would vote for hardcoding the name. I don't envision a change of it .

[MichalPavlik]

Hardcoding was my first thought. I don't think we will change the name, and I don't see a reason why would customers change the script name...

[JayBazuzi]

I don't see a reason why would customers change the script name

Because the instructions are basically "download a file and run it", they might download it to any name of their choosing. If they download in a browser, the browser will add a (1) or similar if there's a conflict. If they copy it in Explorer, it will get Copy of.

That said, I think hard-coding the name and being wrong in these cases is reasonable.

[MichalPavlik]

I didn't think too much about browsers and Explorer as this script is designed to be used in CI. Anyway, we will hardcode the name :)