[25663] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 7904 Volume: 10
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Tue Mar 22 11:05:53 2005
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 08:05:18 -0800 (PST)
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, 22 Mar 2005 Volume: 10 Number: 7904
Today's topics:
@ARGV not getting command line arguments bkimelman@hotmail.com
Absolute path problem (seema)
Re: Absolute path problem <phaylon@dunkelheit.at>
ANNOUNCE: DBD::Informix - IBM Informix Database Driver <jleffler@earthlink.net>
Re: Cron Job & Perl <joe@inwap.com>
Getting the word to conventional programmers (Cameron Laird)
graph problem <jmccloughlin@[remove this]hotmail.com>
Re: How to find installed Modules <joe@inwap.com>
Re: Need help converting unix text to windows text <rprp@gmx.net>
Re: Need help converting unix text to windows text <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script. <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script. <chariya@verizon.not>
Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script. <news5@sidestreet.gotdns.org>
Net::FTP <aolblowz@yahoo.com>
Re: OOP Tutorial babydoe@mailinator.com
piping cmd output problem dimsol@gmail.com
Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: tadmc@augustmail.com
Re: quickist way to repopulate a html form <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Re: test <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 22 Mar 2005 07:24:24 -0800
From: bkimelman@hotmail.com
Subject: @ARGV not getting command line arguments
Message-Id: <1111505064.345114.216560@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>
Perl on my Windows XP PC at the office is having a strange problem.
First, my version of Perl is 5.8.6 (downloaded from Activestate.com).
When I run a Perl script from the DOS command line the parameters I
specify are not placed into @ARGV !!! (This does not happen on my
Windows XP PC at home !)
Here is a sample test sc ript I wrote to demonstrate the problem:
=========================================
#!/usr/bin/perl -w
use strict;
my ( $count );
$count = scalar @ARGV;
print "ARGS [$count] ",join(", ",@ARGV),"\n";
exit 0;
==============================================
When I call the above script (named args.pl) as follows :
args.pl hello world
the output is : ARGS [0]
Where are my missing parameters ?
------------------------------
Date: 22 Mar 2005 06:48:11 -0800
From: seema_coma@yahoo.co.in (seema)
Subject: Absolute path problem
Message-Id: <e87f4591.0503220648.49cfab0e@posting.google.com>
hi all,
I am fresher learning perl programming. Is it possible
to resolve the (.,~) to give the absolute path. for
example to parse strings like "~john" or "../john/LFS"
to get the absolute path of directory specified. I have tried glob() it only
resolves string when used as command. Somebody please
help me to get the absolute path.
thanks in advance
Seema Rao
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 16:22:55 +0100
From: phaylon <phaylon@dunkelheit.at>
Subject: Re: Absolute path problem
Message-Id: <pan.2005.03.22.15.22.55.650474@dunkelheit.at>
seema wrote:
> I have tried glob() it only resolves string when used as command.
Please read the posting guidelines and give an example of what you've
tried.
phaylon@hamlett:~> perl -e "print 'Homedir: ', glob('~')"
Homedir: /home/phaylon
hth,p
--
http://www.dunkelheit.at/
sapere aude.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 05:51:05 GMT
From: Jonathan Leffler <jleffler@earthlink.net>
Subject: ANNOUNCE: DBD::Informix - IBM Informix Database Driver for Perl DBI Version 2005.01 (2005-03-14) released
Message-Id: <IDrC9G.81C@zorch.sf-bay.org>
IBM Informix Database Driver for Perl DBI Version 2005.01 (2005-03-14)
has been uploaded to CPAN.
IBM Informix Database Driver for Perl (also known as DBD::Informix) is
the driver code that enables Perl 5.6.1 or later to access Informix
databases via the DBI module (but if you are not already using Perl
5.8.5, you should be planning to upgrade to it). You will need the code
for DBI version 1.38 or later as well (v1.48 recommended). The code for
DBD::Informix is available for download via:
http://www.perl.org/CPAN/modules/by-category/07_Database_Interfaces
http://dbi.perl.org/
** When you successfully build this module, use the ItWorks (Perl)
** script to report your configuration to the maintenance team (meaning
** Jonathan Leffler) at dbd.informix@gmail.com.
** Note that ItWorks does not send email to anybody; you have to do that
** yourself.
New in release 2005.01:
* Various minor bug fixes made as reported - see ChangeLog.
* Release required to handle Informix ClientSDK 2.90, which includes
ESQL/C 2.90. The previous release (CSDK 2.81, included ESQL/C 9.51),
and the older DBD::Informix compilation based decisions off the ESQL/C
version, rejecting 2.90 as obsolete and unusable.
* Note that a number of obsolete versions of ESQL/C are no longer
supported.
Known problem:
* t/t91udts.t warns about an uninitialized variable on subroutine entry.
Support email address:
* This release is supported by Jonathan Leffler <dbd.informix@gmail.com>
* You may also report your bugs via the CPAN resolution tracking system:
http://rt.cpan.org/
* Such bug reports can be sent by email to bug-DBD-Informix@rt.cpan.org;
they also get sent to dbd.informix@gmail.com, etc.
As always, see the ChangeLog file for details about what has changed.
Jonathan Leffler (jleffler@us.ibm.com, jleffler@earthlink.net)
@(#)$Id: Announce,v 2005.1 2005/03/14 23:23:15 jleffler Exp $
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 03:47:18 -0800
From: Joe Smith <joe@inwap.com>
Subject: Re: Cron Job & Perl
Message-Id: <IoydnX_xE-BFmN3fRVn-1w@comcast.com>
goooo wrote:
> It works perfect when I launch it manually from cmd prompt. But via CRON.
> All it seems to do is delete the UPDATE.INI & DAT files and bombs out.
>
> system("wget","ftp://ftp.nai.com/pub/antivirus/datfiles/4.x/update.ini","-P"
> ,"/home/dats");
If your "wget" is someplace other than /bin or /usr/bin (such as
/usr/local/bin), then it's no wonder that it cannot be found
under cron.
Use absolute pathname, or set $ENV{PATH} to a known value.
-Joe
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 12:08:05 GMT
From: claird@lairds.us (Cameron Laird)
Subject: Getting the word to conventional programmers
Message-Id: <pic5h2-uq9.ln1@lairds.us>
*DevSource* profiles "The State of the Scripting Universe" in
<URL: http://www.devsource.com/article2/0,1759,1778141,00.asp >.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 14:43:40 -0000
From: "Sokar" <jmccloughlin@[remove this]hotmail.com>
Subject: graph problem
Message-Id: <3aap8tF6ak607U1@individual.net>
Hello,
I have a script which creates a pie chart from the following lines of code:
my @values = (["$val1", "$val2", "$val3", "$val4"],
[$var1, $var2, $var3, $var4]);
my $graph = GD::Graph::pie->new(300, 300);
$graph->set(
title => "Status of students for
year: $year",
'3d' => 1,
) or warn $graph->error;
my $image = $graph->plot(\@values) or die "cant print graph\n";
open(IMG, ">pie1.jpeg") or die $!;
binmode IMG;
print $image->jpeg;
close IMG;
This bit of code actually creates a jpeg and stores it on the hard drive.
What I am looking to do is actually create the graph and then e-mail it to a
person. I was wondering if anyone knew how I could maybe instead of writing
the graph into an actual jpeg, write it into a variable and then e-mail the
variable as a jpeg to an e-mail address, to save me having the created jpegs
sitting on my hard drive.
Thanks and regards
John
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 03:55:26 -0800
From: Joe Smith <joe@inwap.com>
Subject: Re: How to find installed Modules
Message-Id: <rb2dnQIsENFdmt3fRVn-sQ@comcast.com>
Tim Heaney wrote:
> Murugesh <appumail@gmail.com> writes:
>>I'm a newbie to Perl.How can we find what are the modules installed?
>
> There is a FAQ entry for this. You can read it locally
>
> perldoc -q installed
There is another way not mentioned in that FAQ.
If CPAN.pm is installed and configured, you can use
perl -MCPAN -e autobundle
to get a list of modules and their version numbers.
-Joe
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 11:37:36 +0100
From: Reinhard Pagitsch <rprp@gmx.net>
Subject: Re: Need help converting unix text to windows text
Message-Id: <423ff570$0$250$14726298@news.sunsite.dk>
Hello,
sking623@aol.com wrote:
> I have been working on this for weeks. Whatever my FTP client does to
> translate the unix text file with each line ending in a LF character
> back into a LF CR I need some code in Perl to this.
>
A simple substitute of CR (Unix) to CRLF (DOS) shall do this.
Look at: http://www.cpan.org/authors/id/G/GO/GONZO/linebreaktool-0.2pre1.pl
(No, the script is not written by me)
regards,
Reinhard
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 08:08:38 -0600
From: Tad McClellan <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Subject: Re: Need help converting unix text to windows text
Message-Id: <slrnd409n6.33m.tadmc@magna.augustmail.com>
sking623@aol.com <sking623@aol.com> wrote:
> Whatever my FTP client does to
> translate the unix text file with each line ending in a LF character
> back into a LF CR
No, you need it back into CR-LF, the order matters.
> I need some code in Perl to this.
s/\012/\015\012/;
> I have tried using some
> people's suggestion on how to do this. But it doesn't work yet.
Then you should followup to the article containing the non-working
suggestion so that we could help you fix it.
> #!/usr/bin/perl
You should ask for all the help you can get!
Especially before asking hundreds of people around the world to
look at it for you.
use warnings;
use strict;
> use CGI ':standard';
> $subdirectory=param('subdirectory');
> $ID = param('id');
Who will be filling out your web form?
Any-old-body on the Internet?
If so, you better have taint checking in your program before you
put it on a publicly available web server:
perldoc perlsec
> $file_location = "../" . $subdirectory. "/" . $ID . "du.txt";
You should declare your variables in the smallest possible scope.
Variable interpolation _is_ concatenation, only easier to read:
my $file_location = "../$subdirectory/${ID}du.txt";
> print "Content-type: text/html\n\n";
Here you tell the browser that you will be giving it HTML.
> print "You must specify a file to download.";
That doesn't look like HTML.
You shouldn't lie to the browser like that.
> open(DLFILE, "<$file_location") || Error('open', 'file');
> binmode -f(DLFILE);
It can't be *both* text and binary.
You must treat it as one or the other.
Which is it?
That isn't how you use binmode() anyway, have you read the docs for it?
perldoc -f binmode
> @fileholder = <DLFILE>;
> #foreach $fileholder (@fileholder) {
Why do you need a "file holder" if you are going to process it
a line-at-a-time anyway?
> #$fileholder =~ s|\012|\m\n|g;
What character does the \m escape give you?
Why the "g" option when you only have a single line anyway?
Where did you get this "suggestion" from?
> #$fileholder =~ s|\012|$/|g;
If you are on a unixlike system, then that is a no-op.
What were you hoping that it would accomplish for you?
> open (LOG, ">>/home/mortga20/public_html/$subdirectory/log.txt") ||
> Error('open', 'file');
> print LOG "$ID\n";
> close (LOG);
You had better implement file-locking in your CGI program if
you don't want the log file to become corrupted.
> #print join(//, @data); # send client
That is a mighty strange looking 1st argument to join() ...
--
Tad McClellan SGML consulting
tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 00:58:44 -0600
From: Tad McClellan <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Subject: Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script.
Message-Id: <slrnd3vgh4.1kd.tadmc@magna.augustmail.com>
packat <chariya@verizon.not> wrote:
> I installed Perl 6
I'm pretty sure that you did not.
--
Tad McClellan SGML consulting
tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 12:58:48 GMT
From: "packat" <chariya@verizon.not>
Subject: Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script.
Message-Id: <cEU%d.6751$uw6.1671@trnddc06>
Tad McClellan wrote:
> packat <chariya@verizon.not> wrote:
>
>> I installed Perl 6
>
>
> I'm pretty sure that you did not.
Ack! I am sorry, it is perl 5.8.4.
Apache is configured the way it should. Perl works fine
except for the CGI part.
thanks,
pac
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 15:53:48 GMT
From: Trey Waters <news5@sidestreet.gotdns.org>
Subject: Re: Need help getting start with a test cgi script.
Message-Id: <Pine.LNX.4.61.0503221039020.6857@pbhtne.fvqrfgerrg.tbgqaf.bet>
On Tue, 22 Mar 2005, packat wrote:
> I am trying to get my first cgi script running. First I put
> a simple try.cgi in the directory
> C:\Program Files\Apache Group\Apache2\cgi-bin\try.cgi
> The config file has the line ScriptAlias /cgi-bin/ "C:/perl/eg/cgi-bin/"
>
> Can anyone help me find what was wrong?
This question appears to be related to misconfiguring Apache, and should
probably be directed to a group dealing with Apache.
As for your problem:
The above discrepency sticks out for me....I haven't used Apache on Win,
but on Unix the ScriptAlias declaration usually denotes where you put your
CGI scripts; and you stated that you put your CGI script in a different
location than you configured.
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
Trey Waters news5@sidestreet.gotdns.org
Experience is the worst teacher.
It always gives the test first and the instruction afterward.
+-----------------------------------------------------------------------+
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 08:01:34 -0500
From: lucas <aolblowz@yahoo.com>
Subject: Net::FTP
Message-Id: <B5idnTUQsbWxit3fRVn-2w@rogers.com>
having trouble listing the files using Net::FTP:
print ">Connecting...";
my $ftp = Net::FTP->new($addy, Port => $port, Debug => $debug) || die
"Could Not Connect\n";
print "Done\n";
print ">Logging in...";
$ftp->login($user,$pass) || die "Can't Log In\n";
print "Done\n";
print ">Listing files...";
@_ = $ftp->ls();
print "Done\n";
print "@_\n";
this code returns:
Net::FTP=GLOB(0x82de9d8)>>> PORT 192,168,0,2,129,26
Net::FTP=GLOB(0x82de9d8)<<< 200 PORT command successful.
Net::FTP=GLOB(0x82de9d8)>>> NLST
Net::FTP=GLOB(0x82de9d8)<<< 150 Opening ASCII mode data connection for file
list.
Net::FTP=GLOB(0x82de9d8)<<< 226 Transfer complete.
>Listing files...Done
ARRAY(0x8308ef8)
printing @_ just shows "ARRAY(0x8308ef8)". this is the way it's done in the
examples. anybody know what's wrong with it?
regards,
--
lucas
-------------------------
Perl Coder since 2001
shift || die;
-------------------------
------------------------------
Date: 22 Mar 2005 04:10:01 -0800
From: babydoe@mailinator.com
Subject: Re: OOP Tutorial
Message-Id: <1111493401.380923.235920@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com>
Hello Leslie,
There is not enough bondage in this lesson : OO is the whole
pony package - blinkers, riding-crop, and bit. Is it so hard
to enforce discipline in a basic tutorial ? For instance,
starting with the 'fields' pragma for compile time checking,
and encapsulation that is not trivial to bypass. I would
prefer a tutorial with a good programming style that I can
use as a template, rather than simplistic examples that I
have to unlearn as quickly as I learn them.
------------------------------
Date: 22 Mar 2005 03:45:22 -0800
From: dimsol@gmail.com
Subject: piping cmd output problem
Message-Id: <1111491922.780224.133600@l41g2000cwc.googlegroups.com>
Hi
I have the following scenarion:
open(FILE, "some_cmd |") || die "some error message";
my $output = <FILE>;
close(FILE) || die "some error message";
The problem is that some_cmd failes (exit status 1) and prints error
message to STDOUT.
The return value of open() according to man pages is the pid of forked
process.
Now, the problem, how I can find out that some_cmd failed.
BR
Dima
------------------------------
Date: 22 Mar 2005 08:22:12 GMT
From: tadmc@augustmail.com
Subject: Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: 1.5 $)
Message-Id: <423fd5b2$0$23564$8b463f8a@news.nationwide.net>
Outline
Before posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
Must
- Check the Perl Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
- Check the other standard Perl docs (*.pod)
Really Really Should
- Lurk for a while before posting
- Search a Usenet archive
If You Like
- Check Other Resources
Posting to comp.lang.perl.misc
Is there a better place to ask your question?
- Question should be about Perl, not about the application area
How to participate (post) in the clpmisc community
- Carefully choose the contents of your Subject header
- Use an effective followup style
- Speak Perl rather than English, when possible
- Ask perl to help you
- Do not re-type Perl code
- Provide enough information
- Do not provide too much information
- Do not post binaries, HTML, or MIME
Social faux pas to avoid
- Asking a Frequently Asked Question
- Asking a question easily answered by a cursory doc search
- Asking for emailed answers
- Beware of saying "doesn't work"
- Sending a "stealth" Cc copy
Be extra cautious when you get upset
- Count to ten before composing a followup when you are upset
- Count to ten after composing and before posting when you are upset
-----------------------------------------------------------------
Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: 1.5 $)
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.
The article at:
http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html
describes how to get answers from technical people in general.
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
"top-posting", "Jeopardy" (because the answer comes before the
question), or "TOFU" (Text Over, Fullquote Under).
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: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 08:13:17 -0600
From: Tad McClellan <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Subject: Re: quickist way to repopulate a html form
Message-Id: <slrnd409vt.33m.tadmc@magna.augustmail.com>
sking <sking623_at_aol_dot_com@foo.com> wrote:
Please pick one posting address and stick with it.
> I have a flatfile database. | symbol is the delimiter. How does one read
> this file and repopulate the fields in a html form with 325 fields?
>
> I can get it into a hash. But what after that?
Write a loop that iterates over the hash and emits the proper HTML.
If you are having trouble writing the loop, post the code you've
tried so far to this newsgroup and we will help you fix it.
If you are having trouble determining what the proper HTML is,
post to some newsgroup about HTML.
--
Tad McClellan SGML consulting
tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 22 Mar 2005 01:00:07 -0600
From: Tad McClellan <tadmc@augustmail.com>
Subject: Re: test
Message-Id: <slrnd3vgjn.1kd.tadmc@magna.augustmail.com>
Chandrakant <chandrakant.m@in.bosch.com> wrote:
> please ignore
And ignore the useful info that it has provided to me?
No can do!
--
Tad McClellan SGML consulting
tadmc@augustmail.com Perl programming
Fort Worth, Texas
------------------------------
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>
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------------------------------
End of Perl-Users Digest V10 Issue 7904
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