[9376] in Perl-Users-Digest
Perl-Users Digest, Issue: 2971 Volume: 8
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Perl-Users Digest)
Wed Jun 24 20:08:53 1998
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 98 17:01:49 -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 Wed, 24 Jun 1998 Volume: 8 Number: 2971
Today's topics:
Re: system() and security again <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: system() and security again <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: system() and security again (Larry Rosler)
Re: system() and security again (Larry Rosler)
system() call and quoting on NT (Todd O'Connor)
Re: system() call and quoting on NT <rootbeer@teleport.com>
Re: Text manipulation with packed fields <rra@stanford.edu>
trying to run a unix prog with perl <ricdola@email.msn.com>
Re: trying to run a unix prog with perl <rra@stanford.edu>
VB ActiveX control/Database Access <paulh@mdli.com>
Re: What a Crappy World (oh, yes!) <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: What a Crappy World (oh, yes!) (Jonathan Stowe)
Re: What a Crappy World trieger@hotmail.com
Re: What a Crappy World <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: What a Crappy World <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: What a Crappy World <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: What a Crappy World (Chris Nandor)
Re: What a Crappy World <rra@stanford.edu>
Re: What a Crappy World (Jonathan Stowe)
Digest Administrivia (Last modified: 8 Mar 97) (Perl-Users-Digest Admin)
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 15:49:23 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: system() and security again
Message-Id: <m37m264dqk.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Larry Rosler <lr@hpl.hp.com> writes:
> Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> says...
>> In comp.lang.perl.misc, lr@hpl.hp.com (Larry Rosler) writes:
>>> It looks like 'system BLOCK LIST'
>> As is documented in perlfunc; at least, in my version. :-)
[...]
> I have been trying to cool down for an hour, waiting for someone else to
> intervene in this "discussion". Now, *you* have defined your
> participation here as "fun". It is clear that "fun" for you includes
> supercilious sarcastic SADISM.
Um, Larry, it's quite clearly documented in the perlfunc man page in
5.004_04 under exec, and the documentation of system in the same man page
clearly states that system functions the same as exec except that it
returns to your program, sets $?, etc.
Calm down a little, maybe?
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -- Russ Allbery, Just Another Perl Hacker
$^=q;@!>~|{>krw>yn{u<$$<[~||<Juukn{=,<S~|}<Jwx}qn{<Yn{u<Qjltn{ > 0gFzD gD,
00Fz, 0,,( 0hF 0g)F/=, 0> "L$/GEIFewe{,$/ 0C$~> "@=,m,|,(e 0.), 01,pnn,y{
rw} >;,$0=q,$,,($_=$^)=~y,$/ C-~><@=\n\r,-~$:-u/ #y,d,s,(\$.),$1,gee,print
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 15:52:21 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: system() and security again
Message-Id: <m34sxa4dlm.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Jonathan Epstein <Jonathan_Epstein@nih.gov> writes:
> I'm sure that I'm not the only c.l.p.m. reader who spent/wasted time
> looking at the commonly available PERLFUNC references, as well as the
> Camel book, searching for this "obvious" piece of information.
system LIST
Does exactly the same thing as "exec LIST" except that a fork is
done first, and the parent process waits for the child process
to complete. Note that argument processing varies depending on
the number of arguments. [...]
exec LIST
[...]
If you don't really want to execute the first argument, but want
to lie to the program you are executing about its own name, you
can specify the program you actually want to run as an "indirect
object" (without a comma) in front of the LIST. (This always
forces interpretation of the LIST as a multivalued list, even if
there is only a single scalar in the list.) Example:
$shell = '/bin/csh';
exec $shell '-sh'; # pretend it's a login shell
or, more directly,
exec {'/bin/csh'} '-sh'; # pretend it's a login shell
When the arguments get executed via the system shell, results
will be subject to its quirks and capabilities. See the section
on "`STRING`" in the perlop manpage for details.
windlord:~> perl -v
This is perl, version 5.004_04 built for sun4-solaris
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -- Russ Allbery, Just Another Perl Hacker
$^=q;@!>~|{>krw>yn{u<$$<[~||<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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 16:35:34 -0700
From: lr@hpl.hp.com (Larry Rosler)
Subject: Re: system() and security again
Message-Id: <MPG.ffb2d1e9715cdef9896c9@nntp.hpl.hp.com>
In article <m37m264dqk.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>, Russ Allbery
<rra@stanford.edu> says...
> Larry Rosler <lr@hpl.hp.com> writes:
> > Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> says...
> >> In comp.lang.perl.misc, lr@hpl.hp.com (Larry Rosler) writes:
>
> >>> It looks like 'system BLOCK LIST'
>
> >> As is documented in perlfunc; at least, in my version. :-)
>
> [...]
>
> > I have been trying to cool down for an hour, waiting for someone else to
> > intervene in this "discussion". Now, *you* have defined your
> > participation here as "fun". It is clear that "fun" for you includes
> > supercilious sarcastic SADISM.
>
> Um, Larry, it's quite clearly documented in the perlfunc man page in
> 5.004_04 under exec, and the documentation of system in the same man page
> clearly states that system functions the same as exec except that it
> returns to your program, sets $?, etc.
>
> Calm down a little, maybe?
It has taken me six hours to calm down, about the same time that it took
someone *finally* to point to this documentation at the end of 'exec' in
perlfunc (and, now that you point to it, under 'exec' in the Blue Camel,
p. 164 top). Note that neither 'system' nor 'exec' has a synopsis '...
BLOCK LIST' (compare with grep/map/sort, which I referred to in my
original question to Tom C). So, via one indirection, through an
undocumented syntax, to the end of the description of a different
function than the one I asked about.
This is "fun" indeed.
--
Larry Rosler
Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Larry_Rosler/
lr@hpl.hp.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 16:37:35 -0700
From: lr@hpl.hp.com (Larry Rosler)
Subject: Re: system() and security again
Message-Id: <MPG.ffb2d9836c558e39896ca@nntp.hpl.hp.com>
In article <m34sxa4dlm.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>, Russ Allbery
<rra@stanford.edu> says...
> Jonathan Epstein <Jonathan_Epstein@nih.gov> writes:
>
> > I'm sure that I'm not the only c.l.p.m. reader who spent/wasted time
> > looking at the commonly available PERLFUNC references, as well as the
> > Camel book, searching for this "obvious" piece of information.
...
> exec LIST
> [...]
> If you don't really want to execute the first argument, but want
> to lie to the program you are executing about its own name, you
> can specify the program you actually want to run as an "indirect
> object" (without a comma) in front of the LIST. (This always
> forces interpretation of the LIST as a multivalued list, even if
> there is only a single scalar in the list.) Example:
>
> $shell = '/bin/csh';
> exec $shell '-sh'; # pretend it's a login shell
>
> or, more directly,
>
> exec {'/bin/csh'} '-sh'; # pretend it's a login shell
>
> When the arguments get executed via the system shell, results
> will be subject to its quirks and capabilities. See the section
> on "`STRING`" in the perlop manpage for details.
Poor dumb Jonathan didn't make it that far through the maze either.
--
Larry Rosler
Hewlett-Packard Laboratories
http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Larry_Rosler/
lr@hpl.hp.com
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 15:12:31 -0700
From: toconnor@adobe.com (Todd O'Connor)
Subject: system() call and quoting on NT
Message-Id: <toconnor-2406981512310001@c-47-181.corp.adobe.com>
I have a perl script which constructs a command line to run and executes
it via system(). This command line has switches and quoted strings. If I
run the command by hand it works. If I run the command via perl it fails
with the message, "The name specified is not recognized as an internal or
external command, operable program or batch file."
The problem is with the quoted switch. I guess NT is choking on it. I'm
using perl 5.003_07 and NT 4.0 and MKS Toolkit.
Here is the syntax.
$path2exe = '"c:\Program Files\DevStudio\vss\win32\ss.exe"';
$cmd = "$path2exe get -r -i- \"-vlSome Label\" \$/";
system($cmd);
If I change \"-vlSome Label\" to -vlSomeLabel (without the quotes and
space) the command will execute via the perl call.
Incidently the command being constructed is a SourceSafe get.
Any ideas? Thanks is advance.
Todd
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 22:38:20 GMT
From: Tom Phoenix <rootbeer@teleport.com>
Subject: Re: system() call and quoting on NT
Message-Id: <Pine.GSO.3.96.980624153303.14091V-100000@user2.teleport.com>
On Wed, 24 Jun 1998, Todd O'Connor wrote:
> If I run the command by hand it works.
> $path2exe = '"c:\Program Files\DevStudio\vss\win32\ss.exe"';
>
> $cmd = "$path2exe get -r -i- \"-vlSome Label\" \$/";
>
> system($cmd);
Are you claiming that you can type this exact line at the prompt to get
this to work? I'm not sure what '$/' will do as an unquoted parameter on
your command line, but it seems unlikely, at best.
"c:\Program Files\DevStudio\vss\win32\ss.exe" get -r -i- "-vlSome Label" $/
I encourage you to use a print statement before or in place of the system
call as a diagnostic tool. Hope this helps!
--
Tom Phoenix Perl Training and Hacking Esperanto
Randal Schwartz Case: http://www.rahul.net/jeffrey/ovs/
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:31:40 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: Text manipulation with packed fields
Message-Id: <m390mm2x7n.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Philip Antoniades <Philip@Antoniades.com> writes:
> Has anyone worked with EBCIDIC COMP-3 data fields on NT? I am trying to
> remove only the first x bytes of each line in a text field, where packed
> fields occur later in the line. substr() doesnt seem to be able to do
> it.
I'm afraid I haven't worked with those particular data fields, but Perl's
substr() function should be acting on bytes as (currently) Perl considers
each byte to be a character. In other words, you should be able to use
substr() on things that are raw binary data from the perspective of Perl.
Since you're on NT, though, you may need to set binmode on your file
handle. Does doing that help any?
If not, what precisely is substr() not doing correctly?
--
#!/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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 18:21:26 -0500
From: "Dolores D. Alcazar" <ricdola@email.msn.com>
Subject: trying to run a unix prog with perl
Message-Id: <#E1HPa8n9GA.258@upnetnews05>
Hello all,
I'm trying to run htpasswd with a perl script. Its a simple program in
which you specify the password file and your username. Then it prompts for
you to enter your password twice.
The part of the script that I've written calls this program, however,
the htpasswd program itself prompts me for the password as opposed to the
script entering it from a user defined variable.
Here's a sample of my code:
print "Please enter your password: ";
$password = <STDIN>;
chomp($password);
print "\n";
print "Please verify your password: ";
$password2 = <STDIN>;
chomp($password);
open (HTPASSWD, "|$htpasswd $password_file $username") || die "Can't open
htpasswd! \n";
print HTPASSWD "$password \n";
print HTPASSWD "$password \n";
close (HTPASSWD);
The script, once it opens the prog, should provide the first command
arguments, which it does. However, it will not provide the user supplied
passwords (you have to enter it manually). I can't seem to figure out what
I've done wrong... Please help... thanks
Ric.
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:48:46 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: trying to run a unix prog with perl
Message-Id: <m3wwa61hup.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Dolores D Alcazar <ricdola@email.msn.com> writes:
> I'm trying to run htpasswd with a perl script. Its a simple program in
> which you specify the password file and your username. Then it prompts
> for you to enter your password twice.
[...]
> The script, once it opens the prog, should provide the first command
> arguments, which it does. However, it will not provide the user
> supplied passwords (you have to enter it manually). I can't seem to
> figure out what I've done wrong... Please help... thanks
htpasswd, like most password programs, probably manually reopens its
associated tty to prevent people from doing precisely what you're trying
to do for security reasons.
The technical answer is to either use something like the Expect module to
talk to it on a pseudo-tty or rewrite the password file yourself using
Perl's built-in crypt() function to encrypt the password and avoid
htpasswd entirely. The real answer is probably "why are you changing
passwords from an automated program and isn't there any other way that you
can do what you're doing in a more secure fashion?"
--
#!/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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 16:46:11 -0700
From: Paul Hounshell <paulh@mdli.com>
Subject: VB ActiveX control/Database Access
Message-Id: <35918FC2.EE2F6C6D@mdli.com>
Question 1:
I have a VB ActiveX control which actually has no on-screen
representation. Instead it is a number of functions packaged together.
Is there any way to use these functions in Perl? If so, how would the
ActiveX control be refernced? How would the individual functions be
called? How would passing parameters work if the ActiveX control has
very well defined input types? (e.g. would a variable containing 42 be
considered a string, integer, or long?). Every function in the ActiveX
control would return either a string or nothing, and strings and
integers would be the only parameters.
Question 2:
Can Perl be used to muck about with any of the most popular database
tools? Specifically, I have an Oracle RCG database and an MS Access
database that either need to be dealt with in either Perl, or the above
ActiveX control. Which would be more beneficial and or easier for me to
access the database with: the Perl script, or the ActiveX Library? I
understand (almost) how to accomplish this in VB, but if Perl has any
easy tool, I would prefer that.
Thank you in advance,
-Paul Hounshell
paulh@mdli.com
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:21:51 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World (oh, yes!)
Message-Id: <m3hg1a2xo0.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Craig Berry <cberry@cinenet.net> writes:
> I've never seen Tom insult anyone whose post conformed to rudimentary
> rules of netiquette, who had done some basic research in the bundled
> documentation, and who presented their own best effort toward solving
> their own problem.
> People who can't meet those minimal standards *should* be afraid to
> post.
I largely agree with Tom and others on the point of what I'd prefer this
group to look like, but when I see people say things like this, I have to
admit I start worrying. See, the first post I ever made to Usenet was
three days after I started reading, before I read news.announce.newusers,
and was badly miswrapped (not because I was using Microsoft trash, but
because I had only been using vi for three days and it didn't work at all
like EDT always did). Despite that, I got a very cordial welcome from the
group I posted to.
I hate to think of what my experience with Usenet might have been if that
had not been the case. I might have given up on the place completely and
thereby not met hundreds of wonderful people and found out an immense
amount about a huge variety of topics.
--
#!/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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 23:56:51 GMT
From: Gellyfish@btinternet.com (Jonathan Stowe)
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World (oh, yes!)
Message-Id: <3591917d.13178869@news.btinternet.com>
On Wed, 24 Jun 1998 12:40:44 -0500, Olga wrote :
>Oh, ok
>and who should get to set the minimum standards, Craig?
>You?
"We" perhaps.
But perhaps a quick peek at news.announce.newusers might be more
instructive for many of the more hard done by posters of recent
months.
/J\
Jonathan Stowe
Some of your questions answered:
<URL:http://www.btinternet.com/~gellyfish/resources/wwwfaq.htm>
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 22:42:05 GMT
From: trieger@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <6mrvbt$qmv$1@nnrp1.dejanews.com>
In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980624093825.25068A-100000@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
Olga <katzman@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
>
> You know,
> I was just browsing this newsgroup and I noticed something that I would
> like to share with you all. Why is it that once a person becomes
> knowledgeable in a subject they have to make everyone else around them
> feel like shit. For example, take any number of posts by Mr.
> Christiansen. I realize that he is very intelligent, we are all familiar
> with his books, but why does Mr. Christiansen feel the need to insult
> people who are trying to learn. You know, it would be so nice if upon
> reading a "stupid" question, Mr. Christiansen said, "Hmm, what a stupid
> question, and I feel instulted that people even ask these types of
> questions, but I am not going to insult this person. Nope, I'll just keep
> my mouth shut and let someone else answer this one." That would be so
> nice.
> So I guess what I am trying to say is, wouldn't it be nice if when people
> had nothing good to say and they couldn't help someone, they just wouldn't
> say anything? I think so.
> These newsgroups are made for discussion purposes, which includes asking,
> somtimes not the most intelligent, questions. But the people asking those
> questions arent' doing it because they want to be insulted, but merely
> because they want to learn.
> Just my 5 cents.
> Thanks all for listening.
It is amazing how many replies this troller has received. Check dejanews and
you will find that she has only posted once before her little trolling tirade
here. Look past the whining and you will see the same troll I do.
Here are some great quotes from Olga Katzass in this thread:
``I was just browsing this newsgroup and I noticed something that I would like
to share with you all.''
While browsing this newsgroup, she managed to find a bunch of rude replies.
Not surprising, but what is surprising is that she could have found all of
those replies without noticing the `Flames...' thread and she started this
one which is running parallel to `Flames...' now.
``I've spoken to several different people who over the last few days have
come to despise the name Tom Christiansen and they vouch to never invest any
money in his books because he was so insulting and rude to them.''
A minute ago she was just browsing this newsgroup, but now she has ``spoken''
to not only one but several people that have been flamed by Tom C. and will
not buy the best books out because Tom hurt their lazy, little feelings. Boy,
this chick gets around.
``I buy books to educate myself as well, I believe most people do that, but I
refuse to buy books that demonstrate my support for authors who can not even
properly answer a question, without insults.''
How many authors has she asked questions of? How does shew know her favorite
authors will answer stupid questions without insults?
``And more then half of Mr. Christiansen's posts were offensive, and I am sure
that the private e-mails he sends to these peoplem are no less insulting.''
Once again, she managed to read all of Tom's posts but missed the `Flames...'
thread altogether.
``I am just saying that you are offending many people and I've spoken to
quite a few that just don't appreciate the insulting replies they get from
you.''
Oh look, she speaking to more people. She fails to mention how many of these
people she ``spoke to'' told her that they didn't mind Tom's replies and
actually learned from them.
``I didn't think I could do CS because I felt I was not intelligent enough.''
I whole-heartedly agree with her on this one.
-----== Posted via Deja News, The Leader in Internet Discussion ==-----
http://www.dejanews.com/ Now offering spam-free web-based newsreading
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:07:18 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <m3pvfy2yc9.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Matt Knecht <hex@voicenet.com> writes:
> Why is this even an issue? You seem like a technically saavy person.
> Just killfile the thread when you see a newbie question, and you won't
> have to endure the responses. If both the issue, and reply are useless
> to you, you lose nothing except lost time.
One misses a great deal of very interesting information when using that
technique, due to topic drift and the like. Not to mention the times when
Tom follows up with a complete script that does exactly what the person
was asking for plus several hundred other things.
--
#!/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: 24 Jun 1998 16:11:42 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <m3n2b22y4x.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
T Ames <ames0009@tc.umn.edu> writes:
> Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> wrote:
>> In comp.lang.perl.misc, ames0009@tc.umn.edu (T. Ames) writes:
>>> I've noticed (and I'm not the only one) that you use your sigs. as a
>>> means to further insulting people. This group is really taking an
>>> ugly turn.
>> Gosh no. I do no such thing! I don't even know what sig is there.
>> It's something inews chooses for me.
> If that is the case, then I apologize. But you can see that in this
> particular case, the sig. didn't look so good.
I used to run a similar random signature generation program, and for a
while found it amusing if the generated signature happened to reinforce
something I said in my post. But after a while, I started reading the
random signatures generated to see if they were comments about me rather
than the person I was following up to.
It was a fascinating perspective shift, and at times I'm tempted to start
using a random sig generator again just for the occasional telling insight
into how I come across.
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -- Russ Allbery, Just Another Perl Hacker
$^=q;@!>~|{>krw>yn{u<$$<[~||<Juukn{=,<S~|}<Jwx}qn{<Yn{u<Qjltn{ > 0gFzD gD,
00Fz, 0,,( 0hF 0g)F/=, 0> "L$/GEIFewe{,$/ 0C$~> "@=,m,|,(e 0.), 01,pnn,y{
rw} >;,$0=q,$,,($_=$^)=~y,$/ C-~><@=\n\r,-~$:-u/ #y,d,s,(\$.),$1,gee,print
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:14:40 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <m3k9662xzz.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
Tom Christiansen <tchrist@mox.perl.com> writes:
> In comp.lang.perl.misc, Scratchie <upsetter@ziplink.net> writes:
>> Sometimes. Or sometimes you insult them for being so incredibly
>> ignorant that they didn't immediately know *which* of the 1000 pages of
>> documentation related to their problem, or that they dared try to
>> program in perl without knowing exactly how every app in /usr/bin
>> works.
> The inability to run a simple search in a textfile or ten is a crippling
> disability, what which probably disqualifies one from programming
> altogether.
I'm really glad that shortly after I started programming on Unix, someone
took the time to explain grep and man to me so that I didn't have to keep
referring to printed documentation. (I tried to use "help", as I came
from a VMS world where that was the appropriate thing to do, and was
rather lost when it didn't work.)
I try to pay back that person by paying forward, teaching the programmers
who come after me how to find answers to their own questions as best I
can.
I like to think that my inability didn't disqualify me from programming,
as otherwise I have a very difficult time explaining how code ended up on
CPAN in my name. :)
--
#!/usr/bin/perl -- Russ Allbery, Just Another Perl Hacker
$^=q;@!>~|{>krw>yn{u<$$<[~||<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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 23:40:01 GMT
From: pudge@pobox.com (Chris Nandor)
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <pudge-2406981939410001@dynamic448.ply.adelphia.net>
In article <6mrmal$97r@mozo.cc.purdue.edu>, gebis@albrecht.ecn.purdue.edu
(Michael J Gebis) wrote:
# cberry@cinenet.net (Craig Berry) writes:
#
# }If someone can endure a serious flaming, learn
# }from it, and renounce idiocy to become a valued contributor to clpm,
# }great. If not...no great loss. One less person degrading the group.
#
# Except that eventually, you're left with a group filled with bullies
# and people who are willing to put up with bullies.
F*** you. Hitler.
--
Chris Nandor mailto:pudge@pobox.com http://pudge.net/
%PGPKey = ('B76E72AD', [1024, '0824090B CE73CA10 1FF77F13 8180B6B6'])
------------------------------
Date: 24 Jun 1998 16:45:33 -0700
From: Russ Allbery <rra@stanford.edu>
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <m3zpf21i02.fsf@windlord.Stanford.EDU>
trieger <trieger@hotmail.com> writes:
> It is amazing how many replies this troller has received.
Please don't start. The last thing we need is to have this group go down
the path of so many others, where half the traffic consists of people
accusing other people of being trolls.
If you honestly, truly believe someone is a troll, the correct response is
to not respond. Otherwise, you yourself are adding to the problem that
you're complaining about. If you feel *that* strongly about it, start
sending *private e-mail* to people following up, pointing out your
suspicion.
> ``I didn't think I could do CS because I felt I was not intelligent
> enough.''
> I whole-heartedly agree with her on this one.
This sort of personal insult is more off-topic in this newsgroup than the
person who you were responding to was.
This is a comp.* group, not a talk.* or a news.* group. Please don't drag
it down to this level.
Thank you.
--
#!/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: Wed, 24 Jun 1998 23:51:09 GMT
From: Gellyfish@btinternet.com (Jonathan Stowe)
Subject: Re: What a Crappy World
Message-Id: <35918ccd.11979087@news.btinternet.com>
On 24 Jun 1998 15:48:05 GMT, Michael J Gebis wrote :
>pudge@pobox.com (Chris Nandor) writes:
>
>}In article <Pine.SOL.3.96.980624093825.25068A-100000@ux5.cso.uiuc.edu>,
>}Olga <katzman@students.uiuc.edu> wrote:
>
>}# So I guess what I am trying to say is, wouldn't it be nice if when people
>}# had nothing good to say and they couldn't help someone, they just wouldn't
>}# say anything? I think so.
>
>}I don't. I would rather go down fighting than just abandon ship.
>
>Ultimately, this is the difference that divides this group. Half the
>people see it as "going down fighting," while the other half see it as
>"going down whining."
>
I see a third way - "going down laughing"
/J\
Jonathan Stowe
Some of your questions answered:
<URL:http://www.btinternet.com/~gellyfish/resources/wwwfaq.htm>
------------------------------
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 2971
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