[30157] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 1400 Volume: 11
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Fri Mar 28 03:09:42 2008
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:09:08 -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 Fri, 28 Mar 2008 Volume: 11 Number: 1400
Today's topics:
Re: Copy multiples files to a single file in seperate p <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
make test <test@example.com>
Re: make test <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Matching many when valid line exists <noel.james@gmail.com>
Re: Matching many when valid line exists <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Re: Matching many when valid line exists <noel.james@gmail.com>
Re: Matching many when valid line exists <someone@example.com>
new CPAN modules on Fri Mar 28 2008 (Randal Schwartz)
Re: perl on pc 104 <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: tadmc@seesig.invalid
Re: Readline using foreach and while <szrRE@szromanMO.comVE>
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 6 Apr 01) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 01:35:54 GMT
From: Jürgen Exner <jurgenex@hotmail.com>
Subject: Re: Copy multiples files to a single file in seperate pages..
Message-Id: <uohou3p30f88mcavrv1n2plfidmg6ntvr6@4ax.com>
Wg <techrepository@gmail.com> wrote:
>Trying to understand if we have a mechanism to copy multiple files
>( txt files ) to a single file (say abc.txt) with each file residing
>in single page. Each input file is large enough to fit into a single
>page. I have tried using perl format's like $- and other mechanism in
>vain.
>
>Is there a way to insert a page character after reading each file or
>seperate each file into different pages? Any suggestions other than
>adding "\n" is greatly appreciated..
On the level of text files a FormFeed character (FF, ASCII 0x0C)
_should_ result in a page break.
>The goal of this exercise is to convert the single file (abc.txt) to
>postscript file and then to pdf using ps2pdf utility..
Another approach would be to convert the individual files first and then
merge the PS or even the PDF files into one large file. I am sure there
are tools to join individual PS/PDF files.
>Can't use cpan
>modules as some of these input files contain unicode characters...
I hope all of them are Unicode only, because I would guess you probably
would have some serious problems with the conversion to PS and PDF if
there were any non-Unicode characters in those files.
But it would be a very unusual text indeed if it consists of non-Unicode
characters only. After all somewhere I've heard that even Klingon
characters and Babylonian cuneiform are included in Unicode somewhere.
jue
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 22:23:10 GMT
From: Ron Eggler <test@example.com>
Subject: make test
Message-Id: <i7VGj.790$9X3.712@edtnps82>
Hi,
When I tried to install perl, i got following on "make test"
[shell]
Failed 3 tests out of 1423, 99.79% okay.
../ext/Sys/Syslog/t/syslog.t
../ext/threads/t/join.t
../lib/Archive/Extract/t/01_Archive-Extract.t
### Since not all tests were successful, you may want to run some of
### them individually and examine any diagnostic messages they produce.
### See the INSTALL document's section on "make test".
### You have a good chance to get more information by running
### ./perl harness
### in the 't' directory since most (>=80%) of the tests succeeded.
### You may have to set your dynamic library search path,
### LD_LIBRARY_PATH, to point to the build directory:
### setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH `pwd`; cd t; ./perl harness
### LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`; export LD_LIBRARY_PATH; cd t; ./perl harness
### export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`; cd t; ./perl harness
### for csh-style shells, like tcsh; or for traditional/modern
### Bourne-style shells, like bash, ksh, and zsh, respectively.
u=2.38 s=1.42 cu=436.19 cs=42.84 scripts=1423 tests=188373
make[2]: *** [_test_tty] Error 1
make[2]: Leaving directory `/home/ron/software/perl-5.10.0'
make[1]: *** [_test] Error 2
make[1]: Leaving directory `/home/ron/software/perl-5.10.0'
make: *** [test] Error 2
[root@NEMS perl-5.10.0]#
[/shell]
not sure what i need to do, i tried to run ./perl harness but there's no
such file in the directory.
Thanks for help! :)
Ron
--
chEErs roN
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:11:57 +0000
From: Ben Morrow <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Subject: Re: make test
Message-Id: <dnptb5-92n.ln1@osiris.mauzo.dyndns.org>
Quoth Ron Eggler <test@example.com>:
> Hi,
>
> When I tried to install perl, i got following on "make test"
Does this mean you've fixed your <bits/errno_values.h> errors?
> [shell]
> Failed 3 tests out of 1423, 99.79% okay.
> ../ext/Sys/Syslog/t/syslog.t
> ../ext/threads/t/join.t
> ../lib/Archive/Extract/t/01_Archive-Extract.t
> ### Since not all tests were successful, you may want to run some of
> ### them individually and examine any diagnostic messages they produce.
> ### See the INSTALL document's section on "make test".
> ### You have a good chance to get more information by running
> ### ./perl harness
> ### in the 't' directory since most (>=80%) of the tests succeeded.
> ### You may have to set your dynamic library search path,
> ### LD_LIBRARY_PATH, to point to the build directory:
> ### setenv LD_LIBRARY_PATH `pwd`; cd t; ./perl harness
> ### LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`; export LD_LIBRARY_PATH; cd t; ./perl harness
> ### export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=`pwd`; cd t; ./perl harness
<snip>
>
> not sure what i need to do, i tried to run ./perl harness but there's no
> such file in the directory.
You missed the 'cd t' step, and it's likely the LD_LIBRARY_PATH bit is
important too, if you've built a shared libperl.so. harness lives in the
t directory (and there's a symlink to ../perl in there as well). These
failures are *probably* not a problem, at any rate not unless you will
be using syslog, threads, or Archive::Extract (which is used by
CPANPLUS, btw). It may be worth running the tests individually to
confirm they are unimportant failures, however.
Ben
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 19:56:11 -0700 (PDT)
From: Leon Williams <noel.james@gmail.com>
Subject: Matching many when valid line exists
Message-Id: <dfd35d19-4933-43cf-ac72-55c8e7a894bc@2g2000hsn.googlegroups.com>
I am pulling my hair out trying to make a regex that will
1) Validate an entire line of input
2) Return any number of matches in the line
The condition is that any number of product codes must exist on a line
separated a space. It may or may not start or end with spaces. The
product code is a 10 digit number.
Example Valid Input:
"1234567890 0987654321 5678901234"
Current Expression:
/^[ ]?([\d]{10}[ ])*?([\d]{10})[ ]?$/
This expression seems to validate well enough but, it only matches the
last two occurrences.
Any suggestions?
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 03:15:05 +0000
From: Ben Morrow <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Subject: Re: Matching many when valid line exists
Message-Id: <pe4ub5-peo.ln1@osiris.mauzo.dyndns.org>
Quoth Leon Williams <noel.james@gmail.com>:
> I am pulling my hair out trying to make a regex that will
> 1) Validate an entire line of input
> 2) Return any number of matches in the line
>
> The condition is that any number of product codes must exist on a line
> separated a space. It may or may not start or end with spaces. The
> product code is a 10 digit number.
>
> Example Valid Input:
> "1234567890 0987654321 5678901234"
>
> Current Expression:
> /^[ ]?([\d]{10}[ ])*?([\d]{10})[ ]?$/
>
> This expression seems to validate well enough but, it only matches the
> last two occurrences.
Capture buffers with a quantifier (/(...)*/) only capture the last
occurrence. To get all of them you have to use the /g flags and match in
list context, but in this case it would be easier to use something like
my $input = '1234567890 0987654321 5678901234';
my @codes = split ' ', $input;
for (@codes) {
/\D/ and die "non-numeric code: '$_'";
length == 10 or die "bad code length: '$_'";
}
Ben
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:35:26 -0700 (PDT)
From: Leon Williams <noel.james@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: Matching many when valid line exists
Message-Id: <66f4c751-9d4e-49de-9731-7f0a3256f81d@d1g2000hsg.googlegroups.com>
On Mar 27, 11:15 pm, Ben Morrow <b...@morrow.me.uk> wrote:
> Quoth Leon Williams <noel.ja...@gmail.com>:
>
>
>
> > I am pulling my hair out trying to make a regex that will
> > 1) Validate an entire line of input
> > 2) Return any number of matches in the line
>
> > The condition is that any number of product codes must exist on a line
> > separated a space. It may or may not start or end with spaces. The
> > product code is a 10 digit number.
>
> > Example Valid Input:
> > "1234567890 0987654321 5678901234"
>
> > Current Expression:
> > /^[ ]?([\d]{10}[ ])*?([\d]{10})[ ]?$/
>
> > This expression seems to validate well enough but, it only matches the
> > last two occurrences.
>
> Capture buffers with a quantifier (/(...)*/) only capture the last
> occurrence. To get all of them you have to use the /g flags and match in
> list context, but in this case it would be easier to use something like
>
> my $input = '1234567890 0987654321 5678901234';
> my @codes = split ' ', $input;
> for (@codes) {
> /\D/ and die "non-numeric code: '$_'";
> length == 10 or die "bad code length: '$_'";
> }
>
> Ben
Your right,
I got sucked into the vortex of making something more complex (and
more interesting) then it needed to be.
Thanks the reality check.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 03:39:45 GMT
From: "John W. Krahn" <someone@example.com>
Subject: Re: Matching many when valid line exists
Message-Id: <5MZGj.2230$pb5.1294@edtnps89>
Leon Williams wrote:
> I am pulling my hair out trying to make a regex that will
> 1) Validate an entire line of input
> 2) Return any number of matches in the line
>
> The condition is that any number of product codes must exist on a line
> separated a space. It may or may not start or end with spaces. The
> product code is a 10 digit number.
>
> Example Valid Input:
> "1234567890 0987654321 5678901234"
>
> Current Expression:
> /^[ ]?([\d]{10}[ ])*?([\d]{10})[ ]?$/
>
> This expression seems to validate well enough but, it only matches the
> last two occurrences.
>
> Any suggestions?
$ perl -le'
for ( " 1234567890 0987654321 5678901234 ", " 1234567890 ", " ", " 12345
" ) {
$count = @matches = / (?<=\A| ) \d{10} (?= |\z) /xg;
print qq["$_" ], $count ? "matched @matches." : "did not match.";
}
'
" 1234567890 0987654321 5678901234 " matched 1234567890 0987654321
5678901234.
" 1234567890 " matched 1234567890.
" " did not match.
" 12345 " did not match.
John
--
Perl isn't a toolbox, but a small machine shop where you
can special-order certain sorts of tools at low cost and
in short order. -- Larry Wall
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 04:42:19 GMT
From: merlyn@stonehenge.com (Randal Schwartz)
Subject: new CPAN modules on Fri Mar 28 2008
Message-Id: <JyFBqJ.x6y@zorch.sf-bay.org>
The following modules have recently been added to or updated in the
Comprehensive Perl Archive Network (CPAN). You can install them using the
instructions in the 'perlmodinstall' page included with your Perl
distribution.
Algorithm-RandomMatrixGeneration-0.06
http://search.cpan.org/~tpederse/Algorithm-RandomMatrixGeneration-0.06/
Generate internal cell values for a matrix given fixed marginal totals.
----
Apache2-ModSSL-0.04
http://search.cpan.org/~opi/Apache2-ModSSL-0.04/
a Perl Interface to mod_ssl functions
----
App-Wack-0.05
http://search.cpan.org/~szabgab/App-Wack-0.05/
the wisual ack
----
BerkeleyDB-0.34
http://search.cpan.org/~pmqs/BerkeleyDB-0.34/
Perl extension for Berkeley DB version 2, 3 or 4
----
CGI.pm-3.35
http://search.cpan.org/~lds/CGI.pm-3.35/
----
Catalyst-Controller-Atompub-0.4.2
http://search.cpan.org/~takeru/Catalyst-Controller-Atompub-0.4.2/
A Catalyst controller for the Atom Publishing Protocol
----
DB_File-1.817
http://search.cpan.org/~pmqs/DB_File-1.817/
Perl5 access to Berkeley DB version 1.x
----
Devel-Backtrace-0.06
http://search.cpan.org/~pepe/Devel-Backtrace-0.06/
Object-oriented backtrace
----
Devel-Backtrace-0.07
http://search.cpan.org/~pepe/Devel-Backtrace-0.07/
Object-oriented backtrace
----
FormValidator-Simple-Plugin-Number-Phone-US-v0.0.1
http://search.cpan.org/~bcmb/FormValidator-Simple-Plugin-Number-Phone-US-v0.0.1/
United States phone number validation
----
GD-3DBarGrapher-0.9.5
http://search.cpan.org/~swarhurst/GD-3DBarGrapher-0.9.5/
Create 3D bar graphs using GD
----
KSx-Highlight-Summarizer-0.04
http://search.cpan.org/~sprout/KSx-Highlight-Summarizer-0.04/
KinoSearch Highlighter subclass that provides more comprehensive summaries
----
Log-Report-0.16
http://search.cpan.org/~markov/Log-Report-0.16/
report a problem, pluggable handlers and language support
----
Mail-Karmasphere-Client-2.16
http://search.cpan.org/~shevek/Mail-Karmasphere-Client-2.16/
Client for Karmasphere Reputation Server
----
Net-Amazon-S3-0.44
http://search.cpan.org/~lbrocard/Net-Amazon-S3-0.44/
Use the Amazon S3 - Simple Storage Service
----
Net-Partty-0.01
http://search.cpan.org/~yappo/Net-Partty-0.01/
Partty.org! interface
----
Net-Partty-0.02
http://search.cpan.org/~yappo/Net-Partty-0.02/
Partty.org! interface
----
Openvatar-URL-0.0.1
http://search.cpan.org/~gugod/Openvatar-URL-0.0.1/
Make URLs for Openvatars from an OpenID
----
PICA-Record-0.36
http://search.cpan.org/~voj/PICA-Record-0.36/
Perl extension for handling PICA+ records
----
Pod-Coverage-TrustPod-0.000
http://search.cpan.org/~rjbs/Pod-Coverage-TrustPod-0.000/
allow POD to contain Pod::Coverage hints
----
TM-1.35
http://search.cpan.org/~drrho/TM-1.35/
Topic Maps, Base Class
----
Template-Plugin-WebService-0.12
http://search.cpan.org/~earl/Template-Plugin-WebService-0.12/
plugin to allow webservice calls from Template and Template::Alloy
----
Template-Plugin-WebService-0.14
http://search.cpan.org/~earl/Template-Plugin-WebService-0.14/
plugin to allow webservice calls from Template and Template::Alloy
----
Template-Plugin-WebService-0.16
http://search.cpan.org/~earl/Template-Plugin-WebService-0.16/
plugin to allow webservice calls from Template and Template::Alloy
----
Time-Format-1.05
http://search.cpan.org/~roode/Time-Format-1.05/
Easy-to-use date/time formatting.
----
Tk-Spectrum-0.01
http://search.cpan.org/~kirsle/Tk-Spectrum-0.01/
A stylish color selection dialog.
----
VMPS-Server-0.01
http://search.cpan.org/~kbrint/VMPS-Server-0.01/
VLAN Membership Policy Server
----
cpan_bot-0.08
http://search.cpan.org/~zoffix/cpan_bot-0.08/
an IRC CPAN Info bot
----
eps2png-2.6
http://search.cpan.org/~jv/eps2png-2.6/
convert EPS files to PNG, JPG or GIF images
----
setenv-0.01
http://search.cpan.org/~elizabeth/setenv-0.01/
set %ENV variables at compile time
----
setenv-0.02
http://search.cpan.org/~elizabeth/setenv-0.02/
conveniently (re)set %ENV variables at compile time
If you're an author of one of these modules, please submit a detailed
announcement to comp.lang.perl.announce, and we'll pass it along.
This message was generated by a Perl program described in my Linux
Magazine column, which can be found on-line (along with more than
200 other freely available past column articles) at
http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/LinuxMag/col82.html
print "Just another Perl hacker," # the original
--
Randal L. Schwartz - Stonehenge Consulting Services, Inc. - +1 503 777 0095
<merlyn@stonehenge.com> <URL:http://www.stonehenge.com/merlyn/>
Perl/Unix/security consulting, Technical writing, Comedy, etc. etc.
See PerlTraining.Stonehenge.com for onsite and open-enrollment Perl training!
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:00:25 +0000
From: Ben Morrow <ben@morrow.me.uk>
Subject: Re: perl on pc 104
Message-Id: <p1ptb5-92n.ln1@osiris.mauzo.dyndns.org>
Quoth Ron Eggler <test@example.com>:
>
> Alright, ./Configure -Duseithreads went well withou doing anything else to
> pthread libraries.
> BUT I get this on make test or make install:
> [shell]
> NEMS perl-5.10.0 # make test
> make: *** No rule to make target `/usr/include/bits/errno_values.h', needed
> by `miniperlmain.o'. Stop.
Do you have a /usr/include/bits/errno_values.h? If not, you need to find
one from somewhere (is there a libc headers package you can install, or
is bits/errno_values.h part of the kernel headers and you don't have
them installed?), or you need to work out why miniperlmain.c thinks it
needs it when it doesn't. IIRC bits/errno_values.h is a glibc-ism, and
is included by errno.h; you mentioned uclibc at some point, so perhaps
you are ending up with the wrong errno.h?
If you do have one, and make is just being silly, you could try removing
the
miniperlmain$(OBJ_EXT): /usr/include/bits/errno_values.h
line from makefile (note: *not* Makefile) and see if that changes the
error message. If it does you will probably need to remove all the
dependancies on headers in /usr/include before it will build.
> NEMS perl-5.10.0 # make install
Since you've been having problems configuring, you *really* want to run
make test before you make install.
> Not really sure wht this means and if this relates to the pthread problem i
> had before.
No, it probably doesn't.
Ben
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 28 Mar 2008 06:18:00 GMT
From: tadmc@seesig.invalid
Subject: Posting Guidelines for comp.lang.perl.misc ($Revision: 1.8 $)
Message-Id: <s40Hj.83$Gq7.57@newssvr19.news.prodigy.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: 1.8 $)
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://www.rehabitation.com/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
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Must
This section describes things that you *must* do before posting to
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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
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Check the Perl Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
Checking the FAQ before posting is required in Big 8 newsgroups in
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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
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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
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Try doing a word-search in the standard docs for some words/phrases
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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
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Your post is in competition with 199 other posts. You need to "win"
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These sections describe how you can help keep your article from being
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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,
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It should be understood that you may not know that the root of your
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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 and many others on the comp.lang.perl.misc newsgroup.
--
Tad McClellan
email: perl -le "print scalar reverse qq/moc.noitatibaher\100cmdat/"
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 20:26:50 -0700
From: "szr" <szrRE@szromanMO.comVE>
Subject: Re: Readline using foreach and while
Message-Id: <fshohr010q@news2.newsguy.com>
Peter J. Holzer wrote:
> On 2008-03-27 04:45, szr <szrRE@szromanMO.comVE> wrote:
>> nolo contendere wrote:
>>> Provably untrue. See Ben's example. I'll restate the concept below.
>>>
>>> my @ary = qw/a b c/;
>>> # for (@ary, ()) {
>>> # for ( (), @ary ) {
>>> for ( @ary ) {
>>> push @ary, 'd' if /c/;
>>> print;
>>> }
>>>
>>> ...
>>>
>>> only the uncommented 'for' line prints a 'd' at the end. so what you
>>> say MAY be true if LIST is ONLY an array.
>>
>> Isn't that because the two commented one are two lists being combined
>> into a new list, and it's *that* new list that's being iterated
>> over, so even if you add to @ary, it doesn't change the "new list",
>> which is just that, a new list created at the start of the loop
>> before iterating begins - therefore the values of the new list are
>> set and @ary has nothing to do with it after the create of the "new
>> list."
>
> Yes. But the same should be true for
>
> for (@ary) {
> ...
> }
>
> for() expects a list, the list is constructed from the elements of
> @ary. If you modify @ary after the list is constructed, the list
> shouldn't be affected, but it is. I think Ben Morrow is right here:
> This smells like an optimization: If there is only a single array, it
> can be used directly instead of creating a list from it.
Actually the behaviors of "for (@ary)" and "for (@ary, ())" do seem
consistant if you really think about it. The resulting list is what it
iterates over (from the first element, to what ever *count* is... in the
former case *count* come fro mthe array, and since the condition is
checked at the start of each iteration, if the array is added to, the
count is incremented.
In the latter case, a new list is created from contents of @ary + an
empty list, which gives you a new list, which contains the values of
@ary, but is a new seperate list, and thus is not effected by changes to
@ary because it has it's own copy of @ary's values.
--
szr
------------------------------
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 V11 Issue 1400
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