Re: Looking for *real* docs

[Gerhard Sittig]

On Mon, Mar 05, 2001 at 09:27 -0600, David H. Thornley wrote:
> 
> [ ... parsing command output with scripting languages ... ]
> 
> As far as I know, there is no defined way to read this
> information.   This way suffers from the possibility that a
> future revision will change the output (AFAIK, there are no
> guarantees anywhere that this will not happen), but I'm the guy
> who recommends when to install new versions, and evaluates
> them, so I figure I can always change the scripts to accomodate
> any changes.

Isn't this one of the reasons the client/server protocol was
designed for?  It's versioned, negotiates capabilities (on both
sides IIUC) and is well documented.  Plus there are plenty of
tools for network access from within your scripts.  And hasn't
there been some effort to build libs?  Doesn't use cvs such a lib
itself?

To cut it short:  I wouldn't go the route of parsing command
output.  Exactly for the reasons you state above.  I'd rather
look for a protocol that's made for machines instead of users. :)


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