[HRPM] Is dbmopen different in Perl 5.6.0?

[Mike Patten]

On Tue, 18 Apr 2000 chicks at chicks.net wrote:

> On Mon, 17 Apr 2000, Mike Patten wrote:
> > 45. $HISTORY = $opt_database || "$dotdir/.netscape/history.db";
> 
> If I recall correctly , the dbm subsystem adds the extension itself.  Try
> it without the '.db'.

I tried that and it creates a new "Berkeley DB 2.X Hash/Little Endian 
(Version 5)" file called "history" (at least that's what 'file' says it
is) and a few lines later I get an error about using an uninitialized
value when I try to use %dist_db.  The perlfunc man page says that you
should leave of the .dir or .pag extension if there is one.

> >  can't dbmopen /home/mpatten/.netscape/history.db: File exists at
> >  /home/mpatten/bin/ggh line 48.
> 
> Is Netscape open at the time?  You may be getting 'file exists' since it's
> open by Netscape.

No, I didn't even have X running, let alone netscape.  (And I checked with
top to double check.  I know that sometimes it hangs around.)

> > I recently upgraded from 5.005 to 5.6.0, is dbmopen different?
> 
> Do you have an old perl binary lieing around you can try?  Are you sure
> your modules are up to date?  Did it pass all the tests?  The 5.6.0
> release notes indicate that dbm does fail on some non-x86 architectures.
> But the odds of tripping over that bug seem rather remote.

I just checked and found a file called /usr/bin/perl5.00503 so I changed
#!/usr/bin/perl to #!/usr/bin/perl5.00503 and got the same error so I
guess it's nothing new.  I had to recompile the extra modules I've added
but the only database module I've added was Mysql.  I kept the old modules
after compiling the new version.  (I said I wanted to support the old
modules when I compiled it but they didn't work.)  Yes, when I compiled
Perl 5.6.0, it passed all the tests when I did 'make test.' My computer is
running on an Intel Pentium so I doubt that that's the problem.  The only
module the script calls explicitly is Getopt::Long but I've read that the
'dbmopen' function calls others for what it deems appropriate for the
particular file.

I assumed that all the scripts in the _Perl_Cookbook_ worked with Perl
5.005.  I guess it wouldn't have worked with the old version either, at
least on my computer. I think I might have to use 'tie' if I really want
to use this script.

Thanks for the helpful suggestions.

-- 
Mike Patten <mpatten at exis.net>