[23475] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 5689 Volume: 10
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Tue Oct 21 06:05:47 2003
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 03:05:09 -0700 (PDT)
From: Perl-Users Digest <Perl-Users-Request@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU>
To: Perl-Users@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Perl-Users Digest Tue, 21 Oct 2003 Volume: 10 Number: 5689
Today's topics:
Re: <$fh> question <neil.shadrach@corryn.com>
Re: Any thought on "Perl Database" based on "Tie:File"? <djo@pacifier.com>
Re: Arguments to CORE::pipe? <grazz@pobox.com>
converting date/time to timestamp <primergy@t-online.de>
Re: converting date/time to timestamp <djo@pacifier.com>
Re: converting date/time to timestamp <andy@shitov.ru>
Re: converting date/time to timestamp <noreply@gunnar.cc>
Re: converting date/time to timestamp <andy@shitov.ru>
DBI & primary keys <someone@somewhere.com>
Re: DBI & primary keys <andy@shitov.ru>
Re: DBI & primary keys <abigail@abigail.nl>
Re: DBI & primary keys <nospam@bigpond.com>
Re: escape email quotes news@roaima.freeserve.co.uk
Re: Help me with is code <no@no.no>
Re: Help me with is code <no@no.no>
Re: Help me with is code <tom@nosleep.net>
Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: tadmc@augustmail.com
rsh & perl -Directory creation not possible (qazmlp)
Re: rsh & perl -Directory creation not possible <nospam@bigpond.com>
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 08:03:24 +0000 (UTC)
From: Neil Shadrach <neil.shadrach@corryn.com>
Subject: Re: <$fh> question
Message-Id: <bn2p86$hgg$2@visp.bt.co.uk>
Abigail wrote:
> Neil Shadrach (neil.shadrach@corryn.com) wrote on MMMDCCII September
> MCMXCIII in <URL:news:bn0th1$hgg$1@visp.bt.co.uk>:
> !!
> !! If I have a few lines like this which work fine:
> !!
> !! my $fh=$p->{'fh'};
> !! while (<$fh>)
> !! { # loop contents
> !! }
> !!
> !! How do I avoid resorting to temporary variable $fh?
> !! I've had a look at the perlop pages but all is still not clear to me :(
>
>
> Parsing of the content of <> is tricky. One way of solving it is
> by not using <>, which is just a shorthand for calling readline:
>
> while (defined ($_ = readline $p -> {fh})) {
> # Your loop here
> }
Thanks for that. Not as pretty as I'd hoped but enlightening nonetheless.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 07:57:50 GMT
From: "David Oswald" <djo@pacifier.com>
Subject: Re: Any thought on "Perl Database" based on "Tie:File"?
Message-Id: <2G5lb.15091$YO5.7183805@news3.news.adelphia.net>
"Public Interest" <ir@labranche.com> wrote:
> Here is what my friend told me: Database sucks and MySQL too. Try program
> without using database. Database is a file system. It is slow, take more
> space...
>
> But still there is many things I can not do with just simple text file,
such
> as updating a record....
>
> I just found Tie:File which added many features to text files. Here is my
> feature request to the owner of Perl: Add Perl Database, or at least
> something called Perl Table
<nonsensical ramblings snipped>
> And things like that. I don't know much about SQL, so my SQl syntax maybe
> wrong.
>
> Any thought on my idea?
Yes. I think you should RTFM before you go requesting anything else.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 08:18:20 GMT
From: Steve Grazzini <grazz@pobox.com>
Subject: Re: Arguments to CORE::pipe?
Message-Id: <gZ5lb.9403$PZ1.4460@nwrdny03.gnilink.net>
David Coppit <newspost@coppit.org> wrote:
> What are the arguments to CORE::pipe? Does it check that the arguments are
> either filehandle globs or UNIVERSAL::isa('IO::Handle')?
The arguments have to be globs -- but you can pass barewords, normal strings,
glob references, undefined scalars, or the *FOO{IO} references and perl will
find the glob automatically.
> The reason I ask is that I've written a wrapper class for FileHandle, and
> CORE::pipe doesn't seem to be working even though I believe I've tied what I
> need to and proxied every method in FileHandle to the wrapped filehandle.
Okay, when you do
my $r = FileHandle::Unget->new;
Then $r is a blessed glob reference, and the glob is tied to a hash reference
like this:
tied(*$r) ---> { fh => FileHandle->new, buffer => '' }
And then I think you borrow the scalar slot of the glob to hold the hashref.
${*$r} = tied(*$r);
And then some/all of the methods are delegated to ${*$r}->{fh}.
Right?
Now, so far, you haven't opened ${*$r}->{fh}, and you seem to expect
pipe($r,$w)
to initialize it -- but pipe() will just use *$r instead. You pass it a
glob reference and it will use that glob reference for the filehandle.
--
Steve
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 09:20:08 +0200
From: "Peter Pippinger" <primergy@t-online.de>
Subject: converting date/time to timestamp
Message-Id: <bn2mhu$frp$03$1@news.t-online.com>
Hello NG,
i know, this might be also a FAQ, but i havn´t found this in the Perldoc. Maybe
someone can point me to the right place in the Handbook?
I have two variables:
$date="10/21/2003"
$time="18:30"
And i want to have the UNIX-timestamp for these variables in $timestamp.
How can i convert this?
Thanx for any hints and best regards!
Peter
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 07:26:29 GMT
From: "David Oswald" <djo@pacifier.com>
Subject: Re: converting date/time to timestamp
Message-Id: <Fc5lb.15088$YO5.7181021@news3.news.adelphia.net>
"Peter Pippinger" <primergy@t-online.de> wrote in message
news:bn2mhu$frp$03$1@news.t-online.com...
> i know, this might be also a FAQ, but i havn´t found this in the Perldoc.
Maybe
> someone can point me to the right place in the Handbook?
>
> I have two variables:
> $date="10/21/2003"
> $time="18:30"
>
> And i want to have the UNIX-timestamp for these variables in $timestamp.
The process is to convert those two variables to seconds since epoc, and
then plug that into the 'localtime' function in scalar context. You can
look at perlfaq4 from the POD that came with your Perl installation for a
discussion of dates and times, and at perlfunc "localtime" and "time" for a
discussion of Perl's built-in time functions.
There is also a very convenient module on CPAN called Date::Manip. It, and
Date::Transform are both very good at deciphering date/time strings in many
different formats and converting them into a more standardized format. You
can find those modules along with their documentation at search.cpan.org.
Good luck.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 11:29:34 +0400
From: Andrew Shitov <andy@shitov.ru>
Subject: Re: converting date/time to timestamp
Message-Id: <bn2n8s$2cab$1@gavrilo.mtu.ru>
> I have two variables:
> $date="10/21/2003"
> $time="18:30"
>
> And i want to have the UNIX-timestamp for these variables in $timestamp.
>
If you want to get number of seconds from zero(1970)-year, use
timelocal() function from Time::Local module:
$time = timelocal ($sec, $min, $hour, $mday, $mon, $year);
Before that you have to separate $date and $time into several variables:
use Time::Local;
$date="10/21/2003";
$time="18:30";
my ($mon, $mday, $year) = split /\//, $date;
my ($hour, $min) = split /:/, $time;
print timelocal (0, $min, $hour, $mday, $mon, $year);
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 10:14:59 +0200
From: Gunnar Hjalmarsson <noreply@gunnar.cc>
Subject: Re: converting date/time to timestamp
Message-Id: <bn2q1g$sla47$1@ID-184292.news.uni-berlin.de>
Andrew Shitov wrote:
>
> use Time::Local;
>
> $date="10/21/2003";
> $time="18:30";
>
> my ($mon, $mday, $year) = split /\//, $date;
> my ($hour, $min) = split /:/, $time;
> print timelocal (0, $min, $hour, $mday, $mon, $year);
That prints the number of epoch seconds representing November, 21.
-----------------------------------------------------^^^^^^^^
The last line should rather be:
print scalar localtime timelocal(
0, $min, $hour, $mday, $mon - 1, $year);
--
Gunnar Hjalmarsson
Email: http://www.gunnar.cc/cgi-bin/contact.pl
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 12:39:01 +0400
From: Andrew Shitov <andy@shitov.ru>
Subject: Re: converting date/time to timestamp
Message-Id: <bn2rb4$2ftq$1@gavrilo.mtu.ru>
> The last line should rather be:
Absolutely
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 09:40:42 +0100
From: "Bigus" <someone@somewhere.com>
Subject: DBI & primary keys
Message-Id: <bn2rec$r4e@newton.cc.rl.ac.uk>
I'm inserting a new record into a MySQL table using Perl DBI. I need to
retrieve the unique primary key that's created automatically by the db as
the new record is inserted. Since this will be a multi-user application, and
two different users could be creating new records in that db within a
split-second of each other, I'm not sure whether performing a subsequent
SELECT statement to find out the max number in that column will be
water-tight enough. I would have thought it must be a fairly common desire
to want to know the primary key for a newly inserted record, but can't find
any mention of it in the DBI instructions. Any ideas?
Thanks
Bigus
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 12:50:50 +0400
From: Andrew Shitov <andy@shitov.ru>
Subject: Re: DBI & primary keys
Message-Id: <bn2s18$2glp$1@gavrilo.mtu.ru>
Either
lock table Tablename write;
insert into Tablename...;
select max(id) from Tablename;
unlock Tablename;
or
insert into Tablename...
select last_insert_id();
------------------------------
Date: 21 Oct 2003 09:37:02 GMT
From: Abigail <abigail@abigail.nl>
Subject: Re: DBI & primary keys
Message-Id: <slrnbp9vhu.8t7.abigail@alexandra.abigail.nl>
Bigus (someone@somewhere.com) wrote on MMMDCCIII September MCMXCIII in
<URL:news:bn2rec$r4e@newton.cc.rl.ac.uk>:
&& I'm inserting a new record into a MySQL table using Perl DBI. I need to
&& retrieve the unique primary key that's created automatically by the db as
&& the new record is inserted. Since this will be a multi-user application, and
&& two different users could be creating new records in that db within a
&& split-second of each other, I'm not sure whether performing a subsequent
&& SELECT statement to find out the max number in that column will be
&& water-tight enough. I would have thought it must be a fairly common desire
&& to want to know the primary key for a newly inserted record, but can't find
&& any mention of it in the DBI instructions. Any ideas?
Whether there might be a specific MySQL solution for this particular,
I do not know (but if there is, it's in the manual page). However, the
general solution to the problem ("I make a change, then a select, and I
won't want it to be influenced by someone else modification") is solved
by transactions. MySQL has some very basic support for transcations,
so whether you can do what you want you'll have to find out.
You might of course be better of with a decent database instead of MySQL.
Abigail
--
sub _ {$_ = shift and y/b-yB-Y/a-yB-Y/ xor !@ _?
exit print :
print and push @_ => shift and goto &{(caller (0)) [3]}}
split // => "KsvQtbuf fbsodpmu\ni flsI " xor & _
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 20:00:38 +1000
From: Gregory Toomey <nospam@bigpond.com>
Subject: Re: DBI & primary keys
Message-Id: <1411606.X9WjIpK71f@gregs-web-hosting-and-pickle-farming>
It was a dark and stormy night, and Bigus managed to scribble:
> I'm inserting a new record into a MySQL table using Perl DBI. I need to
> retrieve the unique primary key that's created automatically by the db as
> the new record is inserted. Since this will be a multi-user application,
> and two different users could be creating new records in that db within a
> split-second of each other, I'm not sure whether performing a subsequent
> SELECT statement to find out the max number in that column will be
> water-tight enough. I would have thought it must be a fairly common desire
> to want to know the primary key for a newly inserted record, but can't
> find any mention of it in the DBI instructions. Any ideas?
>
> Thanks
> Bigus
See http://www.mysql.com/doc/en/example-AUTO_INCREMENT.htm
"You can retrieve the most recent AUTO_INCREMENT value with the LAST_INSERT_ID() SQL function"
gtoomey
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 10:59:01 +0100
From: news@roaima.freeserve.co.uk
Subject: Re: escape email quotes
Message-Id: <5kcf61-t58.ln1@news.roaima.co.uk>
Kimberly Baderhoefen <kim@foo.com> wrote:
> My script is getting an email address passed to it as one of the
> arguments through getopt. [...] When I send email to the variable that
> the email addess is stored in, it bounces because perl does not escape
> the "@" symbol in the variable.
Why do you think perl should need to escape the @ symbol?
my $mailer = '/usr/lib/sendmail';
...
open (MAIL, "| $mailer -t") or die "Can't mail: $!";
print MAIL "From: whoever@wherever\n";
print MAIL "To: $opt_email\n";
print MAIL "Subject: ...\n";
...
close MAIL or die "Can't send mail: $!";
Chris
--
@s=split(//,"Je,\nhn ersloak rcet thuarP");$k=$l=@s;for(;$k;$k--){$i=($i+1)%$l
until$s[$i];$c=$s[$i];print$c;undef$s[$i];$i=($i+(ord$c))%$l}
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 07:19:17 GMT
From: "Public Interest" <no@no.no>
Subject: Re: Help me with is code
Message-Id: <V55lb.9066$Ec1.829516@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
"Keith Keller" <kkeller-usenet@wombat.san-francisco.ca.us> дÈëÓʼþ
news:15j2nb.8d5.ln@goaway.wombat.san-francisco.ca.us...
> -----BEGIN xxx SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
>
> On 2003-10-21, Public Interest <no@no.no> wrote:
> >
> > Talking about spam, Do you know SPAM can be easily stoped with a 100%
rate?
> > I designed the 2 systems which can do this.
>
> You did, eh?
>
> > System 1, why there are fewer postal mail spam than email spam? Because
> > postage is not free. This can be done with the sender pays 1c to the
> > receiver to receive the money/credit for reading. In a personal world,
> > people send to and receive equal number of mails form friends, so it
> > balances out. It is like some verifying system, which is currently done
by
> > some other system without much success.
>
> Uh-huh. How does payment change hands?
>
> > System 2. all bulk non spam mailers are business/org related, so they
must
> > afford a hosting server. Put the message on a webserver, and when a mail
> > server receives the bulk, it will first go to the url within the email
to
> > compare the document, If 90% matchs, then the server pass the mail. If
it is
> > still a spam, the hosting will be shut-off, or the ower will pay.
>
> Pay whom? And can't bulk spam mailers afford a hosting server, too?
>
> Considering how you can't even articulate clearly your system that stops
> spam with a 100% rate, I'm not sure how you expect anyone to believe
> that your system could ever work, especially since you haven't posted
> any code (or links to code) for your alleged system.
>
> > Ok, I got it and will follow. As my name, public interest, I want to
help
> > the people by bring the cap of the poor and rich smaller. I want to be
> > educated and educating.
>
> You say so, but you still haven't fixed your From: email address.
>
> - --keith
>
Should I use I designed two ideas? The anti-spam systems are too easy to
design and too easy to implement. I don't have the system running, so I
still have to use fake email address. International calls are paid by
caller's countries. Hosting traffics are paid by hosters. Mailservers should
pay for sending out info too. It does not matter if the Governing system is
profitable or not, because it reduce PULLUTION of SPAM. A payment system
make the fiction of mailing. Spam works only because sending is FREE. Spamer
can set up a spam from a DSL or cable and hide Ip via Socks Proxy, but
Nobody can hide their ID from hosting service. Got it? That way all spams
can be tracked via creditcard, physical address...
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 07:20:28 GMT
From: "Public Interest" <no@no.no>
Subject: Re: Help me with is code
Message-Id: <075lb.9069$Ec1.829797@bgtnsc05-news.ops.worldnet.att.net>
> 2. You do not get any spam due to your filters.
>
>
> So why is it that you must munge?
>
>
Because it is just an idea. I don't have any filters running. Although it is
not difficult to program in perl.
> --
> Tad McClellan SGML consulting
> tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
> Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 00:34:23 -0700
From: "Tom" <tom@nosleep.net>
Subject: Re: Help me with is code
Message-Id: <3f94e0ba@nntp0.pdx.net>
"Tad McClellan" <tadmc@augustmail.com> wrote in message
news:slrnbp9e66.kvt.tadmc@magna.augustmail.com...
> Tom <tom@nosleep.net> wrote:
>
> > I'll answer your email.
>
>
> Usenet is not email.
I was referring to answering him via direct email, which I did.
>
>
> --
> Tad McClellan SGML consulting
> tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
> Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 02:22:49 -0500
From: tadmc@augustmail.com
Subject: Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: 1.4 $)
Message-Id: <bX2dnWHam6pUQwmiU-KYjA@august.net>
Outline
Before posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
Must
- Check the Perl Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- Check the other standard Perl docs (*.pod)
Really Really Should
- Lurk for a while before posting
- Search a Usenet archive
If You Like
- Check Other Resources
Posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
Is there a better place to ask your question?
- Question should be about Perl, not about the application area
How to participate (post) in the clpmisc community
- Carefully choose the contents of your Subject header
- Use an effective followup style
- Speak Perl rather than English, when possible
- Ask perl to help you
- Do not re-type Perl code
- Provide enough information
- Do not provide too much information
- Do not post binaries, HTML, or MIME
Social faux pas to avoid
- Asking a Frequently Asked Question
- Asking a question easily answered by a cursory doc search
- Asking for emailed answers
- Beware of saying "doesn't work"
- Sending a "stealth" Cc copy
Be extra cautious when you get upset
- Count to ten before composing a followup when you are upset
- Count to ten after composing and before posting when you are upset
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: 1.4 $)
This newsgroup, commonly called clpmisc, is a technical newsgroup
intended to be used for discussion of Perl related issues (except job
postings), whether it be comments or questions.
As you would expect, clpmisc discussions are usually very technical in
nature and there are conventions for conduct in technical newsgroups
going somewhat beyond those in non-technical newsgroups.
This article describes things that you should, and should not, do to
increase your chances of getting an answer to your Perl question. It is
available in POD, HTML and plain text formats at:
http://mail.augustmail.com/~tadmc/clpmisc.shtml
For more information about netiquette in general, see the "Netiquette
Guidelines" at:
http://andrew2.andrew.cmu.edu/rfc/rfc1855.html
A note to newsgroup "regulars":
Do not use these guidelines as a "license to flame" or other
meanness. It is possible that a poster is unaware of things
discussed here. Give them the benefit of the doubt, and just
help them learn how to post, rather than assume
A note about technical terms used here:
In this document, we use words like "must" and "should" as
they're used in technical conversation (such as you will
encounter in this newsgroup). When we say that you *must* do
something, we mean that if you don't do that something, then
it's unlikely that you will benefit much from this group.
We're not bossing you around; we're making the point without
lots of words.
Do *NOT* send email to the maintainer of these guidelines. It will be
discarded unread. The guidelines belong to the newsgroup so all
discussion should appear in the newsgroup. I am just the secretary that
writes down the consensus of the group.
Before posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
Must
This section describes things that you *must* do before posting to
clpmisc, in order to maximize your chances of getting meaningful replies
to your inquiry and to avoid getting flamed for being lazy and trying to
have others do your work.
The perl distribution includes documentation that is copied to your hard
drive when you install perl. Also installed is a program for looking
things up in that (and other) documentation named 'perldoc'.
You should either find out where the docs got installed on your system,
or use perldoc to find them for you. Type "perldoc perldoc" to learn how
to use perldoc itself. Type "perldoc perl" to start reading Perl's
standard documentation.
Check the Perl Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Checking the FAQ before posting is required in Big 8 newsgroups in
general, there is nothing clpmisc-specific about this requirement.
You are expected to do this in nearly all newsgroups.
You can use the "-q" switch with perldoc to do a word search of the
questions in the Perl FAQs.
Check the other standard Perl docs (*.pod)
The perl distribution comes with much more documentation than is
available for most other newsgroups, so in clpmisc you should also
see if you can find an answer in the other (non-FAQ) standard docs
before posting.
It is *not* required, or even expected, that you actually *read* all of
Perl's standard docs, only that you spend a few minutes searching them
before posting.
Try doing a word-search in the standard docs for some words/phrases
taken from your problem statement or from your very carefully worded
"Subject:" header.
Really Really Should
This section describes things that you *really should* do before posting
to clpmisc.
Lurk for a while before posting
This is very important and expected in all newsgroups. Lurking means
to monitor a newsgroup for a period to become familiar with local
customs. Each newsgroup has specific customs and rituals. Knowing
these before you participate will help avoid embarrassing social
situations. Consider yourself to be a foreigner at first!
Search a Usenet archive
There are tens of thousands of Perl programmers. It is very likely
that your question has already been asked (and answered). See if you
can find where it has already been answered.
One such searchable archive is:
http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search
If You Like
This section describes things that you *can* do before posting to
clpmisc.
Check Other Resources
You may want to check in books or on web sites to see if you can
find the answer to your question.
But you need to consider the source of such information: there are a
lot of very poor Perl books and web sites, and several good ones
too, of course.
Posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
There can be 200 messages in clpmisc in a single day. Nobody is going to
read every article. They must decide somehow which articles they are
going to read, and which they will skip.
Your post is in competition with 199 other posts. You need to "win"
before a person who can help you will even read your question.
These sections describe how you can help keep your article from being
one of the "skipped" ones.
Is there a better place to ask your question?
Question should be about Perl, not about the application area
It can be difficult to separate out where your problem really is,
but you should make a conscious effort to post to the most
applicable newsgroup. That is, after all, where you are the most
likely to find the people who know how to answer your question.
Being able to "partition" a problem is an essential skill for
effectively troubleshooting programming problems. If you don't get
that right, you end up looking for answers in the wrong places.
It should be understood that you may not know that the root of your
problem is not Perl-related (the two most frequent ones are CGI and
Operating System related), so off-topic postings will happen from
time to time. Be gracious when someone helps you find a better place
to ask your question by pointing you to a more applicable newsgroup.
How to participate (post) in the clpmisc community
Carefully choose the contents of your Subject header
You have 40 precious characters of Subject to win out and be one of
the posts that gets read. Don't waste them. Take care while
composing them, they are the key that opens the door to getting an
answer.
Spend them indicating what aspect of Perl others will find if they
should decide to read your article.
Do not spend them indicating "experience level" (guru, newbie...).
Do not spend them pleading (please read, urgent, help!...).
Do not spend them on non-Subjects (Perl question, one-word
Subject...)
For more information on choosing a Subject see "Choosing Good
Subject Lines":
http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/D/DM/DMR/subjects.post
Part of the beauty of newsgroup dynamics, is that you can contribute
to the community with your very first post! If your choice of
Subject leads a fellow Perler to find the thread you are starting,
then even asking a question helps us all.
Use an effective followup style
When composing a followup, quote only enough text to establish the
context for the comments that you will add. Always indicate who
wrote the quoted material. Never quote an entire article. Never
quote a .signature (unless that is what you are commenting on).
Intersperse your comments *following* each section of quoted text to
which they relate. Unappreciated followup styles are referred to as
"Jeopardy" (because the answer comes before the question), or
"TOFU".
Reversing the chronology of the dialog makes it much harder to
understand (some folks won't even read it if written in that style).
For more information on quoting style, see:
http://web.presby.edu/~nnqadmin/nnq/nquote.html
Speak Perl rather than English, when possible
Perl is much more precise than natural language. Saying it in Perl
instead will avoid misunderstanding your question or problem.
Do not say: I have variable with "foo\tbar" in it.
Instead say: I have $var = "foo\tbar", or I have $var = 'foo\tbar',
or I have $var = <DATA> (and show the data line).
Ask perl to help you
You can ask perl itself to help you find common programming mistakes
by doing two things: enable warnings (perldoc warnings) and enable
"strict"ures (perldoc strict).
You should not bother the hundreds/thousands of readers of the
newsgroup without first seeing if a machine can help you find your
problem. It is demeaning to be asked to do the work of a machine. It
will annoy the readers of your article.
You can look up any of the messages that perl might issue to find
out what the message means and how to resolve the potential mistake
(perldoc perldiag). If you would like perl to look them up for you,
you can put "use diagnostics;" near the top of your program.
Do not re-type Perl code
Use copy/paste or your editor's "import" function rather than
attempting to type in your code. If you make a typo you will get
followups about your typos instead of about the question you are
trying to get answered.
Provide enough information
If you do the things in this item, you will have an Extremely Good
chance of getting people to try and help you with your problem!
These features are a really big bonus toward your question winning
out over all of the other posts that you are competing with.
First make a short (less than 20-30 lines) and *complete* program
that illustrates the problem you are having. People should be able
to run your program by copy/pasting the code from your article. (You
will find that doing this step very often reveals your problem
directly. Leading to an answer much more quickly and reliably than
posting to Usenet.)
Describe *precisely* the input to your program. Also provide example
input data for your program. If you need to show file input, use the
__DATA__ token (perldata.pod) to provide the file contents inside of
your Perl program.
Show the output (including the verbatim text of any messages) of
your program.
Describe how you want the output to be different from what you are
getting.
If you have no idea at all of how to code up your situation, be sure
to at least describe the 2 things that you *do* know: input and
desired output.
Do not provide too much information
Do not just post your entire program for debugging. Most especially
do not post someone *else's* entire program.
Do not post binaries, HTML, or MIME
clpmisc is a text only newsgroup. If you have images or binaries
that explain your question, put them in a publically accessible
place (like a Web server) and provide a pointer to that location. If
you include code, cut and paste it directly in the message body.
Don't attach anything to the message. Don't post vcards or HTML.
Many people (and even some Usenet servers) will automatically filter
out such messages. Many people will not be able to easily read your
post. Plain text is something everyone can read.
Social faux pas to avoid
The first two below are symptoms of lots of FAQ asking here in clpmisc.
It happens so often that folks will assume that it is happening yet
again. If you have looked but not found, or found but didn't understand
the docs, say so in your article.
Asking a Frequently Asked Question
It should be understood that you may have missed the applicable FAQ
when you checked, which is not a big deal. But if the Frequently
Asked Question is worded similar to your question, folks will assume
that you did not look at all. Don't become indignant at pointers to
the FAQ, particularly if it solves your problem.
Asking a question easily answered by a cursory doc search
If folks think you have not even tried the obvious step of reading
the docs applicable to your problem, they are likely to become
annoyed.
If you are flamed for not checking when you *did* check, then just
shrug it off (and take the answer that you got).
Asking for emailed answers
Emailed answers benefit one person. Posted answers benefit the
entire community. If folks can take the time to answer your
question, then you can take the time to go get the answer in the
same place where you asked the question.
It is OK to ask for a *copy* of the answer to be emailed, but many
will ignore such requests anyway. If you munge your address, you
should never expect (or ask) to get email in response to a Usenet
post.
Ask the question here, get the answer here (maybe).
Beware of saying "doesn't work"
This is a "red flag" phrase. If you find yourself writing that,
pause and see if you can't describe what is not working without
saying "doesn't work". That is, describe how it is not what you
want.
Sending a "stealth" Cc copy
A "stealth Cc" is when you both email and post a reply without
indicating *in the body* that you are doing so.
Be extra cautious when you get upset
Count to ten before composing a followup when you are upset
This is recommended in all Usenet newsgroups. Here in clpmisc, most
flaming sub-threads are not about any feature of Perl at all! They
are most often for what was seen as a breach of netiquette. If you
have lurked for a bit, then you will know what is expected and won't
make such posts in the first place.
But if you get upset, wait a while before writing your followup. I
recommend waiting at least 30 minutes.
Count to ten after composing and before posting when you are upset
After you have written your followup, wait *another* 30 minutes
before committing yourself by posting it. You cannot take it back
once it has been said.
AUTHOR
Tad McClellan <tadmc@augustmail.com> and many others on the
comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup.
------------------------------
Date: 21 Oct 2003 02:42:32 -0700
From: qazmlp1209@rediffmail.com (qazmlp)
Subject: rsh & perl -Directory creation not possible
Message-Id: <db9bbf31.0310210142.1b5acfed@posting.google.com>
I have a perl script which creates a directory in the local machine.
But, if I call this script from the remote machine using rsh, the
directory is not created. And there is no error message reported. Why
is that so ?
What is the remedy for this ?
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 19:53:53 +1000
From: Gregory Toomey <nospam@bigpond.com>
Subject: Re: rsh & perl -Directory creation not possible
Message-Id: <15032379.dJrgBL0MkI@gregs-web-hosting-and-pickle-farming>
It was a dark and stormy night, and qazmlp managed to scribble:
> I have a perl script which creates a directory in the local machine.
> But, if I call this script from the remote machine using rsh, the
> directory is not created. And there is no error message reported. Why
> is that so ?
>
> What is the remedy for this ?
Does the script make any assumptions about which dirctory it starts in?
Write debugging messages to /tmp
gtoomey
------------------------------
Date: 6 Apr 2001 21:33:47 GMT (Last modified)
From: Perl-Users-Request@ruby.oce.orst.edu (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
Subject: Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01)
Message-Id: <null>
Administrivia:
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------------------------------
End of Perl-Users Digest V10 Issue 5689
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