Better explain implicit quotes in command line

[bogdang989]

Conformance tests (for v1.0) 34, 46, 47, 48, 104, 173 expect implicit quotes in command line around baseCommand item that has spaces. I couldn't find in the spec if this is stated as expected behavior.

I propose that we:

• Add this to the spec (for start v1.1.0-dev1)

[bogdang989]

This should probably fit in the specification here: https://www.commonwl.org/v1.1.0-dev1/CommandLineTool.html#Input_binding

@mr-c @tetron can you please help with the technical explanation why baseCommand item with space is quoted in the command line? 😅

[mr-c]

baseCommand is defined as an array of strings, so this is the correct behaviour.

[bogdang989]

What confuses me is why do the strings need to be quoted when there is space in some of them? I.e., why does baseCommand: ["a b", "c"] return 'a b' c and not a b c? I know this is expected behavior, but I don't know enough to write a proper technical explanation.

Reason why I think it would be nice to add a clarification/explanation to the spec is that, as a new CWL user, one could expect basic string concatenation. E.g. in pseudocode a simple

" ".join(baseCommand)

which would result in a b c command line in the example above.

If this is already explained somewhere in the spec, I think this can be closed. I couldn't find anything on it though.