[lpi-discuss] Importance of style?

[Evan Leibovitch]

anselm.lingnau at linupfront.de wrote:

>I'm all in favour of exhibiting good style in exam questions. However,
>exactly what good style is supposed to be is often in the eye of the
>beholder. Especially when we're talking one-off throwaway command lines
>it mostly makes no difference whatsoever as long as it works at all.
>  
>
Agreed. The purpose of a program such as LPIC1 is to demonstrate 
familiarity with concepts, not the optimal or prettiest methods to do 
something. It's always been a strength of Linux (going back to its Unix 
heritage) that there are often many ways to solve a problem.

While the "cat foo | bar" style may look ugly or non-optimal to some, 
there's a counter-argument that questions such as that demonstrate 
(rudimentary but real) understanding pipes. This is an important concept 
that shouldn't be taken for granted at entry level.

- Evan