Especially when writing a tutorial for beginners - please use the long-form flags (e.g. sudo usermod --append --groups sudo newuser) instead of short-form flags (e.g. sudo usermod -aG sudo newuser). Short-form flags make commands look like arcane voodoo magic. They make sense only to help you save time entering commands if you know them by heart already. Tutorials are read by beginners who are not necessarily familiar with the commands in the first place - long-form flags help communicate what these commands are actually doing and thus make for a more effective tutorial.
I would go as far as to say short flags should never be shared or saved (besides man pages or similar). Long flags help anyone who needs to review something in the future, even the author. Perfect for scripts of all sorts, tutorials, anything checked into git, etc.
Comments
Especially when writing a tutorial for beginners - please use the long-form flags (e.g. sudo usermod --append --groups sudo newuser) instead of short-form flags (e.g. sudo usermod -aG sudo newuser). Short-form flags make commands look like arcane voodoo magic. They make sense only to help you save time entering commands if you know them by heart already. Tutorials are read by beginners who are not necessarily familiar with the commands in the first place - long-form flags help communicate what these commands are actually doing and thus make for a more effective tutorial.
I would go as far as to say short flags should never be shared or saved (besides man pages or similar). Long flags help anyone who needs to review something in the future, even the author. Perfect for scripts of all sorts, tutorials, anything checked into git, etc.
Powershell recommendations, for instance, are that you keep aliases and short-form for yourself, and long-form for scripts and tutorials.
Yes please! This came up enough for us we standardized on this for all documentation and CI scripts.
https://architecture.lullabot.com/adr/20211006-avoid-command...
"Acronyms seriously suck" ~Elon
At least it would be funny if signed by RMS.[0]
[0] He wouldn't as he was a fan of recursive ones.