[Solved]Strange piping issue..

Question

Sometimes when I try piping commands, I simply get a "command not found" even though the commands are correct for sure.
The commands will work when I remove the space after the pipe... It's really annoying and it has happened to me on different distributions, so it's not just Arch. I managed to get a fantastic example just now and this time I thought to myself "This time, I'll HAVE to figure this out!!!"
So, see this example below. I even got an error message, which I think hasn't happened before.
~$ man bash | wc -l
4892
~$ man mplayer | wc -l
bash: wc: command not found
Error executing formatting or display command.
System command (cd "/usr/share/man" && (echo ".pl 11i"; /bin/cat '/usr/share/man/man1/mplayer.1') | /usr/bin/gtbl | /usr/bin/nroff -mandoc -c | /bin/less -is) exited with status 36096.
No manual entry for mplayer
~$ man mplayer |wc -l
8086
So, what's this? It isn't a simple one-time issue, if I try to repeat the command it fails every time but when I remove the space it works. I don't know if the error message is related to this issue though, because this is the first time it has shown itself, even though I've stumbled across this issue many times.
Last edited by initbox (2008-12-01 20:10:01)

Answer 1

XDG_DATA_HOME=/home/nk/.local/share
SHELL=/bin/bash
TERM=screen
HISTSIZE=1000
QT_XFT=true
HUSHLOGIN=FALSE
WINDOWID=8388615
QTDIR=/opt/qt
LC_ALL=en_US.UTF-8
USER=nk
TERMCAP=SC|screen|VT 100/ANSI X3.64 virtual terminal:\
:DO=\E[%dB:LE=\E[%dD:RI=\E[%dC:UP=\E[%dA:bs:bt=\E[Z:\
:cd=\E[J:ce=\E[K:cl=\E[H\E[J:cm=\E[%i%d;%dH:ct=\E[3g:\
:do=^J:nd=\E[C:pt:rc=\E8:rs=\Ec:sc=\E7:st=\EH:up=\EM:\
:le=^H:bl=^G:cr=^M:it#8:ho=\E[H:nw=\EE:ta=^I:is=\E)0:\
:li#85:co#279:am:xn:xv:LP:sr=\EM:al=\E[L:AL=\E[%dL:\
:cs=\E[%i%d;%dr:dl=\E[M:DL=\E[%dM:dc=\E[P:DC=\E[%dP:\
:im=\E[4h:ei=\E[4l:mi:IC=\E[%d@:ks=\E[?1h\E=:\
:ke=\E[?1l\E>:vi=\E[?25l:ve=\E[34h\E[?25h:vs=\E[34l:\
:ti=\E[?1049h:te=\E[?1049l:us=\E[4m:ue=\E[24m:so=\E[3m:\
:se=\E[23m:mb=\E[5m:md=\E[1m:mr=\E[7m:me=\E[m:ms:\
:Co#8:pa#64:AF=\E[3%dm:AB=\E[4%dm:op=\E[39;49m:AX:\
:vb=\Eg:G0:as=\E(0:ae=\E(B:\
:ac=\140\140aaffggjjkkllmmnnooppqqrrssttuuvvwwxxyyzz{{||}}~~..--++,,hhII00:\
:po=\E[5i:pf=\E[4i:k0=\E[10~:k1=\EOP:k2=\EOQ:k3=\EOR:\
:k4=\EOS:k5=\E[15~:k6=\E[17~:k7=\E[18~:k8=\E[19~:\
:k9=\E[20~:k;=\E[21~:F1=\E[23~:F2=\E[24~:F3=\E[25~:\
:F4=\E[26~:F5=\E[28~:F6=\E[29~:F7=\E[31~:F8=\E[32~:\
:F9=\E[33~:FA=\E[34~:kb=:K1=\EOw:K2=\EOu:K3=\EOy:\
:K4=\EOq:K5=\EOs:kB=\E[Z:kE=\E[8\^:*4=\E[3$:*7=\E[8$:\
:#2=\E[7$:#3=\E2$:#4=\E[d:%c=\E[6$:%e=\E[5$:%i=\E[c:\
:kh=\E[1~:@1=\E[1~:kH=\E[4~:@7=\E[4~:kN=\E[6~:kP=\E[5~:\
:kI=\E[2~:kD=\E[3~:ku=\EOA:kd=\EOB:kr=\EOC:kl=\EOD:km:
OOO_FORCE_DESKTOP=gnome
MOZ_PLUGIN_PATH=/usr/lib/mozilla/plugins:/opt/mozilla/lib/plugins
XDG_CONFIG_DIRS=/etc/xdg:/opt/kde/etc/xdg
PATH=/bin:/usr/bin:/sbin:/usr/sbin:/opt/kde/bin:/usr/bin/perlbin/site:/usr/bin/perlbin/vendor:/usr/bin/perlbin/core:/opt/qt/bin
MAIL=/var/spool/mail/nk
STY=2868.pts-0.hostname
LC_COLLATE=C
PWD=/home/nk
INPUTRC=/etc/inputrc
EDITOR=vim
LANG=en_US.utf8
KDEDIRS=/usr:/opt/kde
PS3=>
HISTCONTROL=ignoredups
HOME=/home/nk
PS4=+
SHLVL=5
COLORFGBG=15;0
XDG_CONFIG_HOME=/home/nk/.config
TERMINFO=/usr/share/terminfo
XDG_CACHE_HOME=/home/nk/.cache
LOGNAME=nk
LESS=-R
WINDOW=5
XDG_DATA_DIRS=/usr/share:/usr/local/share:/opt/kde/share
PKG_CONFIG_PATH=:/opt/kde/lib/pkgconfig:/opt/qt/lib/pkgconfig
WINDOWPATH=7
DISPLAY=:0
G_BROKEN_FILENAMES=1
XAUTHORITY=/home/nk/.Xauthority
COLORTERM=rxvt
_=/usr/bin/printenv
Here you go. But I don't think it's really environment specific, since I've had this occur in Ubuntu with full Gnome and now I'm using urxvt with screen. I think I've actually seen this happen in actual shells. I've always had bash though. Oh well..
Last edited by initbox (2008-12-01 19:20:19)