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Back to newsletter 090 contents | All Javva's articles
After a few months of continuing chats that I could hardly believe on our internal chat channels, I decided to start keeping a select few that were by no means unrepresentative. The following chats may not, however, be representative of outsourced expertise generally. I really hope not, anyway. But their continuing presence, day after day at my current office, has lead me to detail them here. The outsourcers are all from various well known global outsourcing organisations. For those unfamiliar with web development, Perl or unix, all their questions are ones that basic level operatives would be expected to know how to handle. The names and some unix paths have been changed, but I promise the chats are real.
Day 1. outsourcer1 is listed as a "unix administrator"
11:22 outsourcer1 can someone give me the command to delete the folder with its content, without deleting the content first 11:27 chatter1 do you mean rm -rf? 11:22 outsourcer1 thanx
Day 9. outsourcer2 is listed as a "developer".
13:52 outsourcer2 i had install apachi in my dev Box and hosted a page now i need to start my perl script from HTLM page is it possible 13:54 chatter2 Do you mean you want to write a CGI program? 13:55 outsourcer2 yes 13:56 chatter2 Is you problem with a) writing the CGI program or b) calling the CGI program from your web page? 14:00 outsourcer2 b) calling the CGI program from your web pag 14:00 outsourcer2 page 14:01 chatter2 Do you want the program to run taking input from a form on your web page? Or should it just run each time the page is loaded? 14:04 outsourcer2 it should start run when i do a click 14:05 outsourcer2 mouse click 14:05 outsourcer2 perl script is avilable that script should get started once i do the click in web page 14:13 chatter2 So create a form on your web page which includes just one button. The action for the form should be the URL of your CGI program. 14:21 outsourcer2 can u give me a command which do that
Day 11. outsourcer3 is listed as a "programmer"
14:26 outsourcer3 Hi, I have a string. Depending on certain condifion I want to change the contents of string
14:26 outsourcer3 from position 7 to 14, Is this possible in Perl ?
14:26 outsourcer3 EXAMPLE :
14:26 outsourcer3 str="{1:F01XXXXXXXXBYYY2281089558"
14:26 outsourcer3 if ( condition is true )
14:26 outsourcer3 replace XXXXXXXX with AAAAAAAA
14:27 chatter2 Yes. It's possible.
14:27 outsourcer3 how ?
14:28 chatter2 s/some pattern/some replacement/ if (some condition);
14:30 outsourcer3 thats nice , but here XXXXXXXX can be anything , so i want do chnage the contenets from position 7 to 14
14:30 outsourcer3 so s/some pattern/some replacement/ if (some condition); will not work , bcoz we can NOT mention positions
14:30 chatter3 can
14:31 chatter2 Perhaps if you gave us a more concrete example then we'd be able to show you how to do it.
14:32 chatter3 s/^abc.../abcfgh/
14:32 chatter3 e.g.
14:33 outsourcer3 ok..in my string "{1:F01XXXXXXXXBYYY2281089558" , if certain condition is true then i want to replace the characters from position 7 to 14 with some other chnarachers
14:34 chatter4 perldoc -f substr
14:34 outsourcer3 we cant be sure that the first 6 charcters will be always {1:F01
14:34 chatter2 I don't think we suggested that you could :-)
14:35 chatter2 But as Paul says, substr might be more to your tastes :)
14:36 outsourcer3 any expert here ?
14:37 chatter4 do you just want a solution, or do you want to learn how to solve the problem?
14:38 chatter6 are you the correct person to solve the problem?
14:38 outsourcer3 $str="{1:F01XXXXXXXXBYYY2281089558"; if certain condition is true then i want to replace the characters from position 7 to 14 ( 8 characters ) with some other 8 characters
14:39 outsourcer3 i tried it , but since i am beginner in Perl, i thought somebody can help
14:39 chatter5 15:30 outsourcer3 thats nice , but here XXXXXXXX can be anything , so i want do chnage the contenets from position 7 to 14
14:39 chatter5 If you're sure about the positions then do: substr($mystring, 7, 14) = 'XXXXXXXXX' # note this hasn't been tested for the right numbers, etc., but that's the idea
14:39 chatter6 can you not do it in a language you're fluent in?
Day 24. outsourcer4 is actually listed as a "senior programmer"
... 12:47 chatter7 i would also suggest that following some kind of coding standard might help - indenting, global variables, case, etc all all over the place here 12:47 outsourcer4 i am very new to perl....i am sorry for the inconveinience 12:48 outsourcer4 do i have to include Test::Simple in the script and run? 12:48 chatter2 $curr_count is also reset on line 87. It's possible that you're getting undef back in a later loop. 12:49 chatter2 Have you been given any Perl training? 12:49 chatter2 Or do you have Perl books available? 12:49 outsourcer4 ii had a training for 2 days 12:49 outsourcer4 i refer to perldoc 12:50 chatter2 http://www.perl.org/books/beginning-perl/ - Good book. 12:50 outsourcer4 grt!! thanx 12:51 chatter7 no offence to you at all - but i'm surprised that you would be let alone to write production software here after just seeing a language for 2 days... 12:51 outsourcer4 :) 12:51 outsourcer4 i am trying
Day 33. outsourcer5 did not appear to have a listed job title. Which perhaps decribes his expertise somewhat better than the previously listed job titles for the other outsourcers.
09:06 outsourcer5 hi, how to execute sybase bcp utility in unix shell scripts. 09:06 outsourcer5 some body help me on this 09:10 chatter8 the same way you execute other commands in shell scripts. without more detail noone can help you. did you try it? do you get an error? what's the error? 09:12 outsourcer5 i'm getting bcp not found error 09:13 chatter8 do you mean "bcp: command not found" ? try giving the full path, or editing your PATH 09:13 outsourcer5 i went thr this path /xxx/yyy/zzz/sybase/OpenClientServer/prod/bin/ 09:13 outsourcer5 and executed there 09:14 chatter8 not sure what you mean 09:15 chatter8 do you mean you did "cd /xxx/yyy/zzz/sybase/OpenClientServer/prod/bin/ ; bcp " ? because that won't work 09:15 chatter8 this isn't DOS 09:15 outsourcer5 ok 09:16 chatter8 again: try giving the full path, or editing your PATH 09:16 outsourcer5 ok 09:17 chatter8 if that doesn't mean anything to you, ask for some unix training
Day 35. By now I think I gave up recording what the outsourcer's job title was listed as, since it bore no resemblance to any skillset that I could understand. It's possible that this one was CEO.
08:25 outsourcer6 Hi
08:25 outsourcer6 I have created a folder in unix box and i am not able to delete it
08:26 outsourcer6 its creating some hidden nfs files inside the directory
08:26 chatter10 rm -rf ${directory}/.*
08:26 outsourcer6 its saying Directory not empty
08:26 chatter10 rm -rf ${directory}
08:28 outsourcer6 > rm -rf $temp/.*
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pi/RCS/.pi: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pi/RCS/etc: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pi/RCS: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pi: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pwdmgmt/.ssh: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.pwdmgmt: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.ssh/commands: Permission denied
08:28 outsourcer6 rm: Unable to remove directory /.ssh: Permission denied
08:30 chatter10 ok... try: find $directory -exec rm -rf {} \;
08:30 outsourcer6 ok
08:30 chatter10 where $directory is the directory you want removed
08:33 outsourcer6 > find $temp -exec rm -rf {} \;
08:33 outsourcer6 find: path-list predicate-list
08:34 outsourcer6 but still not getting deleted....
08:38 chatter10 echo "-- $temp --"
08:39 chatter10 please
08:39 chatter10 I bet $100 your variable is empty
08:39 chatter10 and you have probvably hosed your home directory too
08:42 outsourcer6 u r right...its empty...
08:42 outsourcer6 but why is it saying tht file exists in the directory?
08:43 outsourcer6 if i try ls -al
08:43 outsourcer6 am getting the below result
08:43 outsourcer6 drwxrwsrwx 2 rrwdev rrwdev 4096 Jan 10 08:22 .
08:43 outsourcer6 drwxr-sr-x 3 rrwdev rrwdev 8192 Jan 10 08:22 ..
08:43 outsourcer6 -rw------- 1 rrwdev rrwdev 12288 Jan 10 06:25 .nfsB59DA3
08:43 outsourcer6 -rw------- 1 rrwdev rrwdev 4096 Jan 10 06:25 .nfsC59DA3
08:43 outsourcer6 -rw------- 1 rrwdev rrwdev 12288 Jan 10 06:33 .nfsD59DA3
08:43 outsourcer6 -rwxrwxrwx 1 rrwdev rrwdev 4096 Jan 10 05:58 .nfsE59DA3
08:48 outsourcer6 and when i try deleting this .nfs* files its getting created again and again
08:56 chatter10 why do you want to delete the nfs files?
08:59 outsourcer6 since it was saying file exists in the directory i tred deleting it
08:59 outsourcer6 *tried
09:09 chatter10 I'm just hoping you know the implications of running "rm -rf $temp/.*" when $temp is empty....
09:09 chatter10 and I hope you realize how lucky you are there was a dot in there
09:10 chatter10 if I were you i'd raise a request to get all my unix accounts deleted
12:20 chatter8 rm -rf $temp/.* <-- oh boy!
12:20 chatter8 for anyone else who doesn't know what they're doing:
12:20 chatter8 never, ever, ever, ever give an argument like .* to rm. that will match both . and .. so will recurse UPWARDS until it reaches /
12:20 chatter8 congratulations, you've nuked your entire filesystem
12:20 chatter8 (in this case it made no difference, since it was run as rm -rf /.* so it started at the root anyway!)
Day 37.
12:00 outsourcer7 Hi 12:01 outsourcer7 i am using the 5.8.0 version of perl 12:02 outsourcer7 when i am running the SFTP script i get errors saying that can't locate Net/S FTP.pm in @INC.... 12:02 chatter2 You asked this question at 8:50 this morning. 12:02 outsourcer7 i tried adding the lib path use lib "/xxx/yyy/zzz/cpan/5.8.8-2006.03/lib"; 12:02 chatter2 And I gave you the answer 12:02 outsourcer7 i went thru the link 12:03 chatter2 If you're using Perl 5.8.0, why are you using a CPAN build for 5.8.8? 12:04 outsourcer7 i am not sure which lib to use 12:04 outsourcer7 pls advice 12:04 chatter2 I advise you to give this task to a Perl programmer. 12:05 chatter2 I don't think we have Net::SFTP in the Global cpan build. 12:06 chatter2 Oh. Wait. Looks like it was added in 5.8.8-2006.09 12:07 chatter2 use lib '/xxx/yyy/zzz/cpan/32-bit/5.8.8-2006.09/lib'; 12:07 chatter2 But you should also upgrade to using Perl 5.8.8 at the same time. 12:08 chatter2 And please read http://xxx/yyy/zzz/Perl-FAQ#Perl-FAQ-ArethereanygoodonlineresourcesforPerl 12:08 chatter2 (and some of the resources it points to) 12:09 outsourcer7 how to upgarde the perl version? do i need to raise aany request for that? 12:09 chatter2 All of the Perl versions are available on Global 12:10 chatter2 Did you get shown how Global works when you started working on a project? 12:10 outsourcer7 no 12:11 chatter2 Do you have any experience in writing Perl? 12:11 outsourcer7 no 12:11 chatter2 Sounds like you're a perfect choice for this task then :-) 12:11 outsourcer7 i recently started perl programming 12:12 outsourcer7 :) 12:12 chatter2 12:11 outsourcer7 i recently started perl programming <==== Then the link I posted above will be of great help to you 12:12 outsourcer7 i am going thru that 12:13 chatter2 Do you have any experienced Perl programmers that you can go to for assistance? 12:13 chatter2 (other than us) 12:14 chatter2 Strange. Net::SFTP is also in cpan/5.8.8-2006.03. Wonder why your code didn't find it. 12:17 chatter3 outsourcer7 are you running on unix or windows? 12:17 outsourcer7 on unix 12:18 chatter2 I just mention this in passing as I'm sure that no-one would make this mistake: but I assume you added the "use lib ..." line before the "use Net::SFTP" line. 12:21 outsourcer7 yes i did 12:24 chatter2 Ok. Well in that case I don't know why it didn't work. I recommend you spend a couple of weeks reading up on Perl and then revisit this problem. 12:25 outsourcer7 i too would prefer that...but it seems we have a release this weekend
Day 38. outsourcer7 returns to finalise the work for that weekend deadline. Oh, and in case you are wondering, yes, this is a quoted company. And yes, the share price is well off its highs.
13:30 outsourcer7 Hi 13:30 outsourcer7 i am using unlink to remove a file 13:31 outsourcer7 how to delete more than one file 13:31 outsourcer7 will unlink do that 13:31 chatter2 What happened when you tried it? 13:31 chatter2 What does the documentation say? 13:31 chatter3 have you checked the documentation for unlink? 13:31 chatter3 ah, too slow 13:31 outsourcer7 yes 13:31 outsourcer7 i used unlink for del one file 13:32 outsourcer7 now i have remove say 2 files 13:33 chatter2 And what does the very first sentence in the documentation say? 13:33 chatter3 out of interest, what documentation did you check? 13:34 outsourcer7 thanks 13:49 chatter4 make sure you check the return value appropriately 13:50 chatter2 Yeah. But it mentions that in the documentation :)
Day 45. outsourcer8 is another "developer"
08:29 outsourcer8 Hi how do i search only in specific columns for a chatcter in a file
08:32 chatter11 do you have some column delimiter? tab, comma, whatever
08:32 chatter11 or are they fixed width?
08:34 outsourcer8 the delimiter is |
08:36 chatter11 cut -d\| -f3,5,6 | grep whatever_you_are_looking_for
09:54 outsourcer8 Hi the data in the file is like L|GGLM|XXX|22834MXN2889000143
09:54 outsourcer8 i want the output to be L|GGLMXXX22834MXN2889000143
09:55 outsourcer8 bsiaclly merge the 2,3 and 4 th coulumns
09:59 chatter11 awk -F\| '{print $1"|"$2$3$4}'
10:01 outsourcer8 where do i ggive the filneame?
Like this last example, chatters often gave up when it was clear they had answered the question, only to have the outsourcer then request information that a first year student still at University would be able find the answer to with 5 minutes effort. I have to question whether these outsource organisations really understand just how badly their reputation is being affected by displaying this level of competence. But I guess that as long as the money keeps rolling in, they probably don't care.
BCNU - Javva The Hutt.
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