Sure, but this is taking things to a bit of an absurd extreme. If I worked in a restrictive environment where I couldn't install my own tools, I don't think I would be in a position to burn a ton of my employer's time building sophisticated development tools in bash.
(One-off small scripts for things, sure. But I'm not going to implement something like ctags or cscope or a LSP server in bash.)
certainly it's absurd! nobody would deny that. on the other hand, the problem to solve is also an absurd problem
and i wasn't suggesting trying to bill for doing it, but rather, if you were frequently in this situation, it might be reasonable to spend non-billable time between clients doing it
I guess I don’t see the problem as absurd. As a freelancer I need to focus on the problems the customer will pay for. I don’t write code for free or in my spare time anymore, I used to years ago. i feel comfortable working with the constraints imposed, I think of that as a valuable skill, not a handicap.
(One-off small scripts for things, sure. But I'm not going to implement something like ctags or cscope or a LSP server in bash.)