The invalid escape sequence error message is delimited with backticks
and isn't used as input to other programs. This diff tweaks the escaping rules
slightly when printing invalid escape sequences. In particular, `, \, ',
and " are now not be escaped.
`env_var(key)` looks up the value of the environment variable with name `key`, aborting execution if it is not found.
`env_var_or_default(key, default)` looks up the value of the environment variable with name `key`, returning `default` if it is not found.
