[9057] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 2675 Volume: 8
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Thu May 21 23:07:39 1998
Date: Thu, 21 May 98 20:00:43 -0700
From: Perl-Users Digest <Perl-Users-Request@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU>
To: Perl-Users@ruby.OCE.ORST.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Perl-Users Digest Thu, 21 May 1998 Volume: 8 Number: 2675
Today's topics:
Re: Arrays (Martien Verbruggen)
Re: Clearly define "free software" <hp@pobox.com>
Re: determining if an array exists (Martien Verbruggen)
Fair use (was Re: GNU attacks on the open software comm (Paul D. Smith)
Re: GNU attacks on the open software community (Paul D. Smith)
Re: GNU attacks on the open software community (Paul D. Smith)
Re: GNU attacks on the open software community (Paul D. Smith)
Re: GNU attacks on the open software community <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Re: GNU attacks on the open software community (Paul D. Smith)
Re: GPL documentation == unspeakable evil (John Stanley)
Re: More double standards out of the FSF <hp@pobox.com>
Re: More double standards out of the FSF <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: More double standards out of the FSF <hp@pobox.com>
Re: Perl Net::Telnet() (Martien Verbruggen)
Problem with using Perl to Sendmail <alvinho@snp.com.sg>
Re: Quiet summary <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Re: Quiet summary (John Stanley)
Stop Changing Subject Lines!! <p-fein@uchicago.edu>
Re: strange behaviour of PERL (Martien Verbruggen)
Re: Why NOT crypt??? (Chris Nandor)
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 8 Mar 97) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:34:50 GMT
From: mgjv@comdyn.com.au (Martien Verbruggen)
Subject: Re: Arrays
Message-Id: <6k2o8a$fva$3@comdyn.comdyn.com.au>
In article <6k0om1$rpp$2@baker.cc.tut.fi>,
aajii@aajii.ton.tut.fi (Antti-Jussi Korjonen) writes:
> I've got an array full of expressions, one row for example:
> PORTS=16 ACTIVE PORTS=0 SWITCH 2=28 SWITCH 3=24
> Now, I want extract the values of PORTS and SWITCH 2.
> It would be nice to have a function, which does this for me.
> So I have an array, @array which contains a whole lot of rows like above.
> Now I pass @array and say PORTS or PORTS= to the function and it should
> return 16. What would be the easiest way to do this?
You are being very unclear about how your data is stored... Do you
have multiple array elements all with a string like the above? Do you
have one array with those strings as the elements? If that thing above
is one string, what are all those spaces between the items, multiple
spaces? tabs?
Please, be a bit more precise about how your data is stored. is it
@data = ( 'PORTS=16', 'ACTIVE PORTS=0', 'SWITCH 2=28', 'SWITCH 3=24');
or
@data = (
'PORTS=16 ACTIVE PORTS=0 SWITCH 2=28 SWITCH 3=24',
'PORTS=4 ACTIVE PORTS=3 SWITCH 2=24 SWITCH 3=12'
);
?
In both cases you will most likely need split() or do something with
regexps. If you have stored your data in the first way, you might want
to use a hash, as opposed to an array. If you have it the second way,
you might want to store it as an array of hashes. The following
documentation might tell you how to do that:
# perldoc -f split
# perldoc perlre
# perldoc perldata
# perldoc perldsc
and maybe
# perldoc perllol
# perldoc perlref
Martiea list ofn
--
Martien Verbruggen |
Webmaster www.tradingpost.com.au | "In a world without fences,
Commercial Dynamics Pty. Ltd. | who needs Gates?"
NSW, Australia |
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 02:11:15 GMT
From: robert havoc pennington <hp@pobox.com>
Subject: Re: Clearly define "free software"
Message-Id: <wsnbtsr837g.fsf@harper.uchicago.edu>
cls@seawood.org (Christopher Seawood) writes:
>
> robert havoc pennington (hp@pobox.com) wrote:
> : cls@seawood.org (Christopher Seawood) writes:
>
> : > If by "use", the FSF means something differently than compiling and
> : > linking, perhaps they should clearly state what they mean. Until such
> : > time, I will have to maintain that either
> : > 1) the definition of "free software as defined by the FSF" is ambigious
> : > (and for all practical purposes, useless)
> : > or
> : > 2) that software under the GPL is not "free software as defined by the FSF."
> : >
> :
> : Obviously 2) is false, so it would be illogical to maintain that.
>
> You just stated that the GPL restricts distribution of modified
> code, so how can you say 2) is false? The only way you could
> do that is if you substitute the purpose of the license for the
> effect. I'm talking about the actual effect of the GPL which is
> to create "proprietary software as defined by the FSF."
>
2) is obviously false, because the FSF created the GPL to embody what
they mean by "free." So they must mean that anything the GPL does
falls under their definition of "free."
Now, they may not say what they mean explicitly enough for your
liking, but I think it's clear that they don't *mean* to be
contradictory. I find www.opensource.org a better source of
definitions, really, and the FSF does agree with that definition too.
> Again, from http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/categories.html,
>
> "Proprietary software is software that is not free or semi-free. Its
> use, redistribution or modification is prohibited, or requires you to
> ask for permission, or is restricted so much that you effectively can't
> do it freely. "
>
Note that the GPL does not prohibit distribution, or require you to
ask permission. The third option "restricted so much" is ambiguous and
presumably the GPL's restrictions are not considered "so much."
> : 1) is not very ambiguous in common usage, and is applied with much
> : success by e.g. Debian and Red Hat and www.opensource.org. But perhaps
> : it could be clarified further.
>
> In common usage, it's even more ambigious. In this thread, I am
> explicitly defining what I mean by the terms I use and we still do not
> agree upon the meaning (or effect) of these terms. The majority of the
> time, I would guess that people do not do this. They assume since they
> know what they mean by a term the other person does as well unless the
> other person indicates otherwise.
>
I guess it's possible. I think the www.opensource.org guidelines are a
pretty good way to see what it means, from a linguistic, empirical
standpoint.
> : I'm sure you will be very objective when you decide what is "logical"
> : and what is "religious." ;-)
>
> Logically, meaning that the person can explain their position by stating
> examples and going step by step, proving and disproving things along
> the way. More/less like the scientific process.
>
> Religious, meaning that the person does not explain their position,
> they do not address the points at hand, and eventually they resort to
> degrading the other participants.
>
> How's that? ;)
>
I would call this "reasonable, civil, willing to consider both sides,
open-minded" and "rude, unable to take the other's perspective,
buttheaded," thus avoiding all the implied (and basically irrelevant)
connections to logical positivism vs. religion. But yes, I more or
less agree.
Havoc Pennington ==== http://pobox.com/~hp
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:26:41 GMT
From: mgjv@comdyn.com.au (Martien Verbruggen)
Subject: Re: determining if an array exists
Message-Id: <6k2np1$fva$2@comdyn.comdyn.com.au>
In article <01bd84d5$4580a080$915c5093@lfalkenhagen.dhs.state.tx.us>,
"Lee Falkenhagen" <falkenl@hotmail.com> writes:
> I am trying to determine if an array exists...here is psuedo code:
[snip]
> I have tried using exists and defined, but, I am missing something
> somewhere...any help would be appreciated.
Normally you'd use something like:
if (@array) # Does the array have any elements
Martien
--
Martien Verbruggen |
Webmaster www.tradingpost.com.au | "In a world without fences,
Commercial Dynamics Pty. Ltd. | who needs Gates?"
NSW, Australia |
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 22:42:59 -0400
From: psmith@baynetworks.com (Paul D. Smith)
Subject: Fair use (was Re: GNU attacks on the open software community)
Message-Id: <p5iumz2fgs.fsf_-_@baynetworks.com>
%% Barry Margolin <barmar@bbnplanet.com> writes:
bm> IANAL either, but I believe the fair use exception also specifies
bm> the purposes you can use those excerpts for, and I don't think
bm> incorporating them into programs that you license under your own
bm> terms is one of them.
How does anyone copy any examples out of any programming manuals,
including Programming Perl, etc.?
No O'Reilly, etc. book I've ever seen comes with a license that
explicitly allows this. If it's not fair use, we all have a lot bigger
problems than GPL'd manuals. At least with GPL'd manuals _some_ copying
of examples is allowed: with non-licensed manuals _no_ copying would be
allowed.
Also, I know that RMS thinks that "fair use" does apply, because he's
stated that small patches, etc. don't require special permissions and
even that small bits of code (such as inline functions from GCC header
files, etc.) fall under "fair use" and don't require a special extension
to the license.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <psmith@baynetworks.com> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are my opinions--Bay Networks takes no responsibility for them.
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 21:59:44 -0400
From: psmith@baynetworks.com (Paul D. Smith)
Subject: Re: GNU attacks on the open software community
Message-Id: <p5u36j2hgv.fsf@baynetworks.com>
%% Barry Margolin <barmar@bbnplanet.com> writes:
bm> IANAL either, but I believe the fair use exceptions also specify
bm> the purposes you can use those excerpts for. These include
bm> educational purposes and critiquing (this is what allows book
bm> reviewers to quote a paragraph from the book), but I don't think
bm> embedding in another computer program would fall into any of the
bm> categories.
If this is not true then we've all got bigger problems than using GPL'd
manuals.
For example, I just checked my copy of Programming Perl, and there's no
mention whatsoever anywhere that I could find of a license that allows
the examples in that book to be copied. All there is is a copyright,
with "All Rights Reserved".
Ditto all of the other computer manuals I checked.
That means that _any_ perl program that inserted one of those examples
is completely illegal. At least with GPL'd work you have the right to
use them for _some_ purposes; without a license (and if "fair use"
doesn't apply) you don't have _any_ rights to copy them for _any_
purpose.
I'm not convinced, yet, it doesn't. I'll have to check my web sources
tomorrow, since my current link is too slow for comfortable browsing.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <psmith@baynetworks.com> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are my opinions--Bay Networks takes no responsibility for them.
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 22:05:10 -0400
From: psmith@baynetworks.com (Paul D. Smith)
Subject: Re: GNU attacks on the open software community
Message-Id: <p5ra1n2h7t.fsf@baynetworks.com>
%% fl_aggie@thepentagon.com (I R A Aggie) writes:
cr> Why try to bend the English language to your group's wishes? Why
cr> not just use the language correctly and be understood?
+ The language _IS_ being used "correctly"; the term "free" _can_ mean
+ what RMS uses it for. The problem is that it can mean other things,
+ too.
iraa> In which case language is pointless and communication
iraa> impossible. Death of Usenet, Film at 11!
Ah, no. People merely have to consider the context in which
communication is happening, as has always been the case in all
communication since the beginning of time.
Unfortunately, on USENET, that seems to be less and less possible.
If you check your dictionary I'll bet you could count on an extremely
small number of hands the words that have one and only one meaning
listed.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <psmith@baynetworks.com> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are my opinions--Bay Networks takes no responsibility for them.
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 22:18:47 -0400
From: psmith@baynetworks.com (Paul D. Smith)
Subject: Re: GNU attacks on the open software community
Message-Id: <p5ogwr2gl4.fsf@baynetworks.com>
%% fantome/@/usa/./net (le Fanttme) writes:
>> If the documentation author has made his documetation free, he's
>> not expecting royalties, no matter what form it's published in.
>> Why should royalties be due for hardcopy books when they're not
>> expected for electronic copies?
lf> Why not? The publisher of a hardcopy book is obviously making
lf> money off of your work, sometimes a significant amount of
lf> money. There is nothing wrong with reserving non-electronic
lf> distribution with a royalty requirement -- even if a documentation
lf> is otherwise free.
After all these weeks of arguing on gnu.misc.discuss, Austin, I can't
believe you still don't get it.
People who put works under the GPL do so because the _EXPLICITLY_ don't
want to require royalties. It doesn't matter if that work is a manual,
or a software package, or whatever.
The _whole_point_ of using the GPL is that you are _NOT_ requiring
people to pay you royalties if they go off and make a hardcover book out
of your manual, or charge people $1,000 for your software package, or
whatever. You are _allowing_ them to modify your work, without
requiring permission. Contrary to some claims made on this thread, the
GPL does _NOT_ require you to give up ownership (copyright ownership) of
any works.
What you _are_ requiring is that they provide those same rights to
everyone _they_ distribute to, and not restrict what they can do with
the software.
Why should manuals be any different than source code, in terms of using
the GPL?
If you don't agree with this concept of licensing, then obviously the
GPL isn't for you. But that doesn't mean it isn't for anyone, and the
GPL is there for those who want it.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <psmith@baynetworks.com> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are my opinions--Bay Networks takes no responsibility for them.
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:26:36 GMT
From: Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Subject: Re: GNU attacks on the open software community
Message-Id: <6k2nos$b6d$1@csnews.cs.colorado.edu>
[courtesy cc of this posting sent to cited author via email]
In comp.lang.perl.misc,
psmith@baynetworks.com writes:
:If you check your dictionary I'll bet you could count on an extremely
:small number of hands the words that have one and only one meaning
:listed.
Really? Please check for yourself. I don't believe you.
But that's not the point. The point was that choosing the less common
definition over the more common one invites gratuitous confusion.
In what fashion such gratuitous confusion might further one's goals I
shall leave to the conspiracy theorists to speculate upon.
--tom
--
A factor of 3000 is actually significant --Andrew Hume
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 22:38:09 -0400
From: psmith@baynetworks.com (Paul D. Smith)
Subject: Re: GNU attacks on the open software community
Message-Id: <p5lnrv2fou.fsf@baynetworks.com>
%% cbbrowne@news.hex.net (Christopher Browne) writes:
cb> RMS can only say so many "horrendously controversial" things
cb> before people start tuning him and his work out.
People who mistake the messanger for the message are merely making their
own lives unnecessarily more difficult.
Hundreds of people are _already_ tuning out RMS due to the "horrendously
controversial" things he's said.
That doesn't mean you have to "tune out" the work of the FSF. That is,
after all, one of the features of the GPL.
Every time this totally inane GNU/Linux thing comes up, many people with
apparently nothing better to do start shouting on the Linux newsgroups
that we should ditch all FSF code, rewrite the compiler, the C library,
the bin tools, shell tools, file tools, etc. etc. etc. How boring.
--
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Paul D. Smith <psmith@baynetworks.com> Network Management Development
"Please remain calm...I may be mad, but I am a professional." --Mad Scientist
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
These are my opinions--Bay Networks takes no responsibility for them.
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:17:42 GMT
From: stanley@skyking.OCE.ORST.EDU (John Stanley)
Subject: Re: GPL documentation == unspeakable evil
Message-Id: <6k2n86$4jf$1@news.NERO.NET>
In article <6k2br5$m51$2@csnews.cs.colorado.edu>,
Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> wrote:
>I want people to be able to steal my coding solutions for their
>proprietary code without having to release their own additions
>even if they ship it as a binary.
Then the solution to this entire thread is trivial. Tom, you put
whatever license in your work that will allow them to do that. Nobody
has said you cannot do that, but you seem to think it is an issue.
The second part of the solution is that you don't worry about what
licenese terms other people put in their work. This falls under the
"Perl has never told people what they can do" position you stated
earlier.
The third part of the solution is to stop worrying about whatever time
you think other people will be wasting by writing the "free"
documentation. It's their time, and if they want to waste it, so what?
If the stuff they write is poop, then better they write it there than
for distribution with perl.
Fourth, discuss this "failure to distribute documentation" with the
person who is packaging the releases. "Holds the pumpkin" is the term
you use, isn't it? If you don't like how he is doing the distribution,
then don't give him the pumpkin. If you are referring to some arbitrary
people making their own distributions, then apply the "perl has never
told" clause to this situation.
And finally, don't extract parts of FSF documents where the definition
of "free" is well known and wave them about claiming that the sky is
falling because they aren't using the same sense of "free" that Joe
Sixpack would. If you DO feel compelled to pick that fight, then please
do so entirely in an FSF newsgroup. This one here's for discussion of
perl.
(Mark-Jason, can you add a "comp.lang.perl.gpl-is-vile" newsgroup to the
next RFD and let Tom moderate it?)
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 01:57:05 GMT
From: robert havoc pennington <hp@pobox.com>
Subject: Re: More double standards out of the FSF
Message-Id: <wsnd8d783v2.fsf@harper.uchicago.edu>
Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu> writes:
>
> It doesn't, provided that everyone ignores him. If people don't, it
> splits the documentation effort between two mutually incompatible doc
> sets, and documentation is *hard* to get written for free software
> projects, as anyone who's participated in a non-trivial one is aware.
>
I imagine that no one working on perl docs now is going to work on
RMS's docs, and I imagine the FSF isn't even working on Perl docs
since it's on the task list and not the "we are doing this" list.
So as a practical matter I think this won't happen.
Havoc Pennington ==== http://pobox.com/~hp
------------------------------
Date: 21 May 1998 19:23:39 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: More double standards out of the FSF
Message-Id: <m3vhqzoxg4.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
In comp.lang.perl.misc, robert havoc pennington <hp@pobox.com> writes:
> Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu> writes:
>> It doesn't, provided that everyone ignores him. If people don't, it
>> splits the documentation effort between two mutually incompatible doc
>> sets, and documentation is *hard* to get written for free software
>> projects, as anyone who's participated in a non-trivial one is aware.
> I imagine that no one working on perl docs now is going to work on RMS's
> docs, and I imagine the FSF isn't even working on Perl docs since it's
> on the task list and not the "we are doing this" list. So as a
> practical matter I think this won't happen.
Agreed. From a practical standpoint, I think much of this is a tempest in
a teapot.
>From a standpoint of communities and ethics, I'm not so sure.
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -- Russ Allbery, Just Another Perl Hacker
$^=q;@!>~|{>krw>yn{u<$$<[~||<Juukn{=,<S~|}<Jwx}qn{<Yn{u<Qjltn{ > 0gFzD gD,
00Fz, 0,,( 0hF 0g)F/=, 0> "L$/GEIFewe{,$/ 0C$~> "@=,m,|,(e 0.), 01,pnn,y{
rw} >;,$0=q,$,,($_=$^)=~y,$/ C-~><@=\n\r,-~$:-u/ #y,d,s,(\$.),$1,gee,print
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 02:51:44 GMT
From: robert havoc pennington <hp@pobox.com>
Subject: Re: More double standards out of the FSF
Message-Id: <wsn90nv81bz.fsf@harper.uchicago.edu>
Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu> writes:
>
> Agreed. From a practical standpoint, I think much of this is a tempest in
> a teapot.
>
> From a standpoint of communities and ethics, I'm not so sure.
>
That always makes it more complicated, doesn't it. ;-)
I think it's kind of ambiguous. But the best way to build community is
for everyone to tolerate a little difference of opinion, and sometimes
you just have to do it both ways or make it configurable or compromise
somehow, even at the price of duplicate effort or technical impurity.
It's basic politeness to just sort of overlook things once in a while,
and when you fail to do so, apologize afterward and try to reconcile
things.
Now, RMS is not Mister Compromise. But he is writing his own docs
rather than flaming the Perl people. And while he does criticize those
he feels have gone too far into the proprietary world, he does not
generally do so in an abusive way.
I don't think that's actively damaging to the community. Community is
not about agreeing on everything; it's about more or less working
together most of the time. And the bulk of Perl is indeed free
software by the opensource.org/FSF definition, so I think most of the
time things are going pretty well.
Lots of movements have crashed and burned because of a "radical"
vs. "moderate" split. It would be nice to avoid this. What's the old
revolutionary war quote, hang together or hang separately, etc.
This means not trying to "purify" the movement from either side - no
"let's ditch the nutcases making us look bad" and no "let's ditch the
sellout traitors." There's room for all of us. It will be OK. It's
just software.
Havoc Pennington ==== http://pobox.com/~hp
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 01:51:55 GMT
From: mgjv@comdyn.com.au (Martien Verbruggen)
Subject: Re: Perl Net::Telnet()
Message-Id: <6k2lnr$frd$1@comdyn.comdyn.com.au>
In article <6k0o5s$rpp$1@baker.cc.tut.fi>,
aajii@aajii.ton.tut.fi (Antti-Jussi Korjonen) writes:
> so, the Prompt there is '/korppi \d\d% /' and it works just fine.
> It should log in before it starts waiting for the Prompt, shouldn't it?
> And it doesn't do that on my linux.
Once again: For the login, the Net::Telnet documentation states:
Login prompts must match either of the patterns:
/login[: ]*$/i
/username[: ]*$/i
Password prompts must match the pattern:
/password[: ]*$/i
If your linux box matches those prompts, but Net::Telnet still can't
get a connection, then there might be something else odd. You could
try using the input_log and dump_log methods to see what is going on.
Maybe that will tell you a bit more. Be careful with prompt matches,
because there will be terminal control characters in there, (But since
you're timing out on the password prompt, that probably isn't the
problem).
Martien
--
Martien Verbruggen |
Webmaster www.tradingpost.com.au | "In a world without fences,
Commercial Dynamics Pty. Ltd. | who needs Gates?"
NSW, Australia |
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 10:07:16 +0800
From: alvinho <alvinho@snp.com.sg>
Subject: Problem with using Perl to Sendmail
Message-Id: <3564DDD4.C90A5AE1@snp.com.sg>
Hi,
I got this piece of Perl code to open the Sendmail port
and send a mail out. I works fine except for the strange
thing that the body of the message can't contain a colon.
If I put one in, the mail is still sent out but is empty.
I'm using Perl for Win32 from ActiveWare sending to a
SMTP server on a Solaris box.
I've used the debugger and found that the body of the
message still contains the colon and everything else just
before it writes to the socket.
Anybody out there has any ideas? All tips and pointers
are appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
Regards,
Alvin Ho
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:13:12 GMT
From: Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com>
Subject: Re: Quiet summary
Message-Id: <6k2mvo$aeh$1@csnews.cs.colorado.edu>
[courtesy cc of this posting sent to cited author via email]
In comp.lang.perl.misc, lindahl@pbm.com (Greg Lindahl) writes:
:Where's your apology for not just stating this, and instead flaming
:your friends and calling people names?
Since when do I owe you something?
And I do not consider people who put the miscarriage of truth on their
web page friends of mine, nor of Perl, until and unless they correct
their error; its presence works counter to the Perl community. When and
if they do that, I shall very happily revisit my position. I want to
believe we are all working towards truth and goodness. Their correction
of that page will serve as a token of that benevolence.
:And this
:member of the Perl community knows full well that rms has a very
:particular definition of "free".
The word you are looking for there is not "particular", but "peculiar:
one's own; belonging solely or especially to an individual; not possessed
by others; of private, personal, or characteristic possession and use;
not owned in common or in participation."
:Grow up, Tom.
I find it odd that you should hold out some expectation of influencing
my actions while you continue to use that kind of language.
You got what I'm going to give. If the FSF apologizes for their
mistaken web page and corrects it, then maybe I'll give more. Maybe.
Certainly not until that time. I can't in good conscience do so
while still being on the side of truth and clarity.
:[ I got my v1 "Programming Perl" for free from merlyn for contributing
: code samples... ]
And your point here is what exactly?
--tom
--
"... an initial underscore already conveys strong feelings of
magicalness to a C programmer."
--Larry Wall in <1992Nov9.195250.23584@netlabs.com>
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:49:10 GMT
From: stanley@skyking.OCE.ORST.EDU (John Stanley)
Subject: Re: Quiet summary
Message-Id: <6k2p36$55t$1@news.NERO.NET>
In article <6k2bcn$m51$1@csnews.cs.colorado.edu>,
Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> wrote:
> your code with the GPL. The second matter is that in whatever
> form that Perl is distributed, its documentation may/must also
> be distributed.
Which is it to be? At one point you claimed that you had to act because
people were not distributing documentation with their releases of perl.
That seems quite acceptable if you say "may also". It is only
unacceptable if you really want to say "must also".
> The public statement by the FSF that Perl's
> documentation is not "free" risks misleading people -- because
> the Perl community recognizes that its documentation is free --
> and should be therefore amended.''
Let's use Chris' MacDonalds analogy here. There's a sign on the
billboard outside, and on the front door, that catsup comes free with
every burger. You come in and hear someone ask about getting catsup on
his burger, and the response from the clerk is "yes, catsup is free".
The limitation is clearly posted on the front door, it is posted on the
billboard outside, and it is included in the context of the question.
You go outside and start telling people two blocks away that
MacDonalds gives out free catsup -- without adding the limitation that
it is on a burger that you have to pay for.
Who is misleading whom here?
The FSF use of the term "free" is made clear on their website, and to
expect it to be repeated every time the word "free" appears is just
ridiculous. I'm sure that you could come up with several examples from
perl documentation you have written where you did not fully qualify
every statement you made regarding some aspect of perl, and if someone
claimed you made a mistake you would be quick to point three paragraphs
up where the qualification was stated.
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 02:50:50 GMT
From: Peter A Fein <p-fein@uchicago.edu>
Subject: Stop Changing Subject Lines!!
Message-Id: <87wwbfvx11.fsf@bj2-64.rh.uchicago.edu>
Look, this GPL/Perl/FSF discussion is very entertaining, but it would
make some of us *real* happy if you all would stop changing subject
lines every post. It makes generating a useful killfile damn near
impossible. I'm all for a good intellectual debate every now and
then, but these threads have rapidly swamped the perl group.
--
Peter Fein 773-834-6206
1005 E. 60th St. Chicago, IL 60637
p-fein@uchicago.edu http://pfein.home.ml.org/
------------------------------
Date: 22 May 1998 02:24:46 GMT
From: mgjv@comdyn.com.au (Martien Verbruggen)
Subject: Re: strange behaviour of PERL
Message-Id: <6k2nle$fva$1@comdyn.comdyn.com.au>
Please read the following information on how to choose a good subject
line:
http://www.perl.com/CPAN/authors/Dean_Roehrich/subjects.post
In article <3563E5A4.8D0C5267@tss.tei.ericsson.se>,
Peng Li <teilipe@tss.tei.ericsson.se> writes:
> I have an array, if I use default stack to extract the array
> element : foreach (@array), if inside the loop I calling other
> function which use the stack. After that, the array has been
> changed eventhought I declare with "my".
The answer can be found in the documentation:
# perldoc perlsyn
/Foreach Loops
[snip]
If LIST is an actual array (as opposed to an expression returning
a list value), you can modify each element of the array by
modifying VAR inside the loop.
[snip]
You loop over each element of @array, which is an actual array. This
means that modifying $_ will actually modify the array element.
The fact that the array is lexically scoped with my doesn't make any
difference.
Martien
--
Martien Verbruggen |
Webmaster www.tradingpost.com.au | "In a world without fences,
Commercial Dynamics Pty. Ltd. | who needs Gates?"
NSW, Australia |
------------------------------
Date: Fri, 22 May 1998 02:21:24 GMT
From: pudge@pobox.com (Chris Nandor)
Subject: Re: Why NOT crypt???
Message-Id: <pudge-2105982215430001@dynamic95.ply.adelphia.net>
In article <6k2lo9$lh$1@monet.op.net>, mjd@op.net (Mark-Jason Dominus) wrote:
# In article <3564A11F.613E2D5F@kodak.com>,
# Brian Mathis <brianm@kodak.com> wrote:
# >crypt() has been around for (I'm guessing) as long as UNIX itself. It is not
# >illegal, unexportable, or anything else.
#
# Cite, please? Crypt is (slightly modified) DES; the key size is 56
# bits, and I believe that it *isn't* exportable under current US
# policies.
A colleague of mine reports this after consulting John Gilmore of the EFF:
"It turns out that, because the function only *encrypts* data (with no
provision for decrypting), it is pretty useless as a way of encrypting
data for transmission. In fact, it is only useful for generating a test
value which can be matched against.
And, because it is only useful for authentication, it isn't a problem."
--
Chris Nandor mailto:pudge@pobox.com http://pudge.net/
MacPerl: Power and Ease (ISBN 1881957322), http://www.ptf.com/macperl/
%PGPKey = ('B76E72AD', [1024, '0824090B CE73CA10 1FF77F13 8180B6B6'])
------------------------------
Date: 8 Mar 97 21:33:47 GMT (Last modified)
From: Perl-Request@ruby.oce.orst.edu (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
Subject: Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 8 Mar 97)
Message-Id: <null>
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End of Perl-Users Digest V8 Issue 2675
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