[256] in Moira
Changing a printer to non-existent server
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU)
Thu Jan 31 13:43:44 1991
Date: Thu, 31 Jan 91 10:43:48 -0800
From: haynes@ucscc.UCSC.EDU (99700000)
To: bug-moira@ATHENA.MIT.EDU
Version: the version of Moira available from athena-dist.mit.edu,
running on Sun platforms
What were you trying to do?
Change a printcap, changing the printer from one machine to another.
But, mistakenly, the new server was not yet in the data base.
What happened?
Moira correctly pointed out, after taking all the input, that the
new print server was unknown. So I went to the machine menu and
added it. Then I went back to the printcap menu and tried to
make the change again. Core dump!
So I went to a VAX to run the Moira client. The printer was gone
from the data base, and I had to re enter it.
What should have happened?
1. I would have been less surprised if the printcap entry had
stayed there unchanged after the first attempt, rather than
disappearing entirely.
2. Core dump shouldn't have happened. In general, Moira clients
on Sun platforms tend to core dump whenever they encounter
an empty data element, such as trying to modify a printcap
when the printer is not in the data base. This suggests there
are some null pointer dereferencing bugs that escape notice
on VAXen because the latter are so much more forgiving.
