--list-packets not entirely passive

[Anonymous]

David Shaw wrote:
>> It would be more natural (and consistent with
>> the documentation) if it only listed the sequence
>> of the packets it finds without actually doing anything.
>
> Unfortunately, it can't.

It could just show you the packets inside the file.  Encrypted packets
could be labeled "encrypted packet".  This would be the natural thing
for "--list-packets" to do.

> There is no way to list the packets inside an encrypted packet
> without decrypting.

I should certainly hope so! ;-)

> If you want --list-packets to just list what it can see without
> decrypting, try:
>
> gpg --batch --list-packets

Thanks for the tip!

Mostly what I'm trying to do here is help gpg be a better program.  I
can deal with being asked for a password.  But if --list-packets is
going to be on the man page, it should work in a predictable way which
is consistent with the documentation and what somebody would
reasonably expect it to do.

Okay, so this isn't the most important usability issue of all time,
but small stuff like this does matter.  A little bit, anyway.