ID: 49988
User updated by: mwease at tx dot rr dot com
Reported By: mwease at tx dot rr dot com
Status: Bogus
Bug Type: Strings related
Operating System: Linux 2.0
PHP Version: 5.3.0
New Comment:
in answer to your responses:
YOUR COMMENT: 1. You really need to include the \n in the format
string..
----- so, you're saying that, even though the documentation
specifically states that fscanf 'reads one line' per call, i must
include the endline char in the format? ridiculous AND stupid! however,
i accidentally did that on the first try and i got the same results and
thought that was the reason, ESPECIALLY the reading of only every other
line, which you did not address. even you have to admit that SOMETHING
is wrong when i get the same results WITH or WITHOUT a '\n' character in
the format!
YOUR COMMENT: 2. What do _you_ expect the first %s in the reading to
match? Now think what the computer does.. :) (hint: it's all string to
it..)
----- thanks for the "hint". *I*, and anyone who thinks, would expect
that first %s to take the smallest possible substring of the larger
string that it is dealing with UP TO BUT NOT INCLUDING the very first
occurrence of the delimiting character ('~') specified and put that
substring into the first variable listed. period. logical. your
documentation implies it, if not explicitly stated, if only by
mentioning tabs and blank space. this is also the way it works in every
language prior to C and C++. why you think i should expect anything
different is a mystery to me. your documentation (and logic) explicitly
states that tabs or whitespace can be used as delimiters. it did NOT
state that nothing ELSE could be. if you want to ignore all this, then
at least change the documentation to say that "fscanf, sscanf and all
reading functions that supposedly parse input strings according to a
specified format DO NOT WORK AS ANY LOGICAL PERSON WOULD IMAGINE",
because THAT is the way it is.
never could i have imagined that such a format character could actually
IGNORE 15 tildes and take the entire string. i don't know what logic
YOU are applying to the situation, but it makes no sense. (see comments
below about example 6).
YOUR COMMENT: You need to use more precise format. Simple %s just won't
work.
http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.sprintf.php and example 6..
---- my point exactly: "%s just won't work"! hence, the bug report.
yet, you reject the report and stil have the gall/ignorance to say that
%s doesn't work? you just said that %s doesn't work but it's not a bug.
you design shit like this on purpose? apparently so. if you don't
call that a bug, then i'm certain that i can't do anything about it. i
WAS precise. i told fscanf to look for some substring (%s), then it
will find a '~', and to put the substring it found into my first
variable, based on the %s being the first format character. i didn't
say "use this format character, %s, and suck up as many characters as
you can and ignore all the other format characters and delimiters i put
in this format string"!!!!!!!
---- by directing me to this example, it appears that you are
suggesting that i use fixed-length fields when i output so that i can
overcome the deficiencies in PHP when using the xscanx functions. well,
one answer is that i have one field that in this data that can be
entered by users or not, that it is a max of 80 characters, and because
i am efficient. i refuse to waste 80 characters of space for 90% of the
records in my data file just because of the poor and illogical design of
PHP functions and the smugness of the maintainers who can't see it.
(and, no, i'm NOT smug. i'm right.)
YOUR COMMENT: Basically you're writing/reading CSV format here, why not
use those funcs instead?
---- i don't know what CSV is or what it stands for and why would i
want to waste my time learning it when so many OTHER things in PHP don't
work as expected, even though you all believe it's perfect?
PLEASE NOTE: i don't appreciate the condesending attitude. i was a
software engineer for 20 years and i was paid more as a designer than
many of the next level supervisors simply because i was good. all facts
and a lot of it because i recognize bullshit when i hear/read it and i
am extremely efficient when i work, how i work and in my software.
PHP is an extremely powerful language and i like a lot about it. i've
only been using it for about three months. however, all of its power
doesn't matter too much to someone who has to spend hours and days
trying to figure out a simple little error such as leaving off a '$'
from the front of a variable or, as C and C++ are, NOT using two equal
signs instead of one in comparison. yes, it's powerful, but it is also
painful and massively time-consuming in development ONLY because your
error messages SUCK. languages back in the 1980s could tell me exactly
what i did wrong, but you folks can't seem to determine when a variable
lacks a $.
i opened a previous bug report about the lack or error message and was
put off just as you have, [email protected]. when i open a bug report, i am
thanked for trying to make the product better, but both times i have
done so, i feel a little ridiculed and the points i made are ignored.
apparently, you believe that you all have done everything just perfectly
and how it should have been done and don't give a shit about how
difficult it is to use. you are probably all C/C++ babies, but i
started before such ridiculously free-wheeling languages existed.
what the C worshipers will never understand is that costs of developing
software when a programmer can do just about anything with a language
skyrocket because the programmers spend so much time getting the
programs right exactly BECAUSE of the syntactic power.
what the C++ worshipers will never understand is that, even though PCs
are something like 4000-10,000 TIMES faster than my first PC and
available RAM is not 64k as it was, but virtually unlimited, OOP and
fancy graphics have basically kept the response time to the end user
about the same or worse.
what NEITHER C or C++ (and now PHP, i guess) worshipers have NOT
realized for some unimaginable reason, is that the power of a language
comes from what it DOES, NOT how one types it in or that one might have
to repeat a variable's name (x = x + 1) in order to increment it by 1.
and, of course, it is intuitively obvious to every human being (and
college graduate) what the outcome of THIS would be, right?:
if ($x++ = $y-- + $z++) $x++ .= $q[$x++];
// gee. does x get increased before or after it's used?
it's absolutely ridiculous. someone once sent me a C program that
looked like absolute gibberish, had not one recognizable english or C
keyword in it, yet when ran, displayed all the verses to The Twelve Days
of Christmas. cool. incredibly STUPID that a language would allow such
a thing.
if i were paying someone to develop software for me, i would NEVER
allow them to use C, C++ (or any OOP language) or PHP. i couldn't
possibly make a profit on it, with the possible exception that the
entire industry has been taken over by such naive, but
cool-and-powerful-language seekers.
i know it's free. i assume that many people work on this without
compensation. that's a good thing.
i just finished 3 months of the most painful computer task i have ever
done. at least 50% of that pain, probably closer to 85%, was because
PHP gives the user just shy of absolutely NO help with errors,
regardless of what level or error displaying is turned on. i just
thought that the maintainers might for a second take into account the
usability of the product.
Michael R Wease
[email protected]
Previous Comments:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2009-10-25 11:11:21] [email protected]
1. You really need to include the \n in the format string..
2. What do _you_ expect the first %s in the reading to match? Now think
what the computer does.. :) (hint: it's all string to it..)
You need to use more precise format. Simple %s just won't work.
http://www.php.net/manual/en/function.sprintf.php and example 6..
Basically you're writing/reading CSV format here, why not use those
funcs instead?
There is no bug here.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[2009-10-25 01:41:24] mwease at tx dot rr dot com
Description:
------------
Maybe I'm doing something wrong, but I don't think so.
The documentation for fprintf() and fscanf() say that those functions
use the format string as defined in the documentation for sprintf().
This is not so. fprintf() works that way, but not fscanf(). One
should actually be REQUIRED to use exactly the same format for each
if they expect what is written with fprintf() to be read by fscanf(),
but this does not work.
Reproduce code:
---------------
fprintf($entryfile,
"%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~\n",$entrynum",
$timestamp,$tripmiles,$loadingtype,$content,$origcity,
$origstate,$firstdate,$lastdate,$destcity,$deststate,
$trucktypes,$entrynotes,$thisusername,$contact,
$_SESSION["company_name"],$phone);
output in file is:
2~200908301103~386~Drop~Unknown~Aliceville~AL~9/30/09~10/2/09~Pembroke~GA~Hopper~~JimmyB~Kyle~Ampro~800-849-6647~
$numfields =
fscanf($entryfile,
"%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~%s~",
$fentrynum,$fdatetime,$ftripmiles,$floadingtype,$fcontent,
$forigcity,$forigstate,$ffirstdate,$flastdate,$fdestcity,
$fdeststate,$ftrucktypes,$fentrynotes,$fusername,$fcontact,
$fcompany,$fphone)
Expected result:
----------------
fprintf() writes exactly the output I expect, i.e., the values of
the variables listed, all separated by the tilde (~). some of the
variables are multiple words and one of them can be 80 chars long and
at least one can be null, resulting in two tildes one after another
'~~'. fprintf() handles it.
since i used the exact same format, minus the "\n" at the end,
fscanf() should return exactly what fprintf() wrote, assigning the
same variables to exactly what they were when written with fprintf().
Actual result:
--------------
this is what and how fscanf() reads the first line (these are results
of echo statements):
numfields=1;
fentrynum=2~200908301103~386~Drop~Unknown~Aliceville~AL~9/30/09~10/2/09~Pembroke~GA~Hopper~~JimmyB~Kyle~Ampro~800-849-6647~
only the first variable was assigned and to the entire line from the
file, as evidenced by both echoes. all other variables are null. if
i don't include the variables on the fscanf(), only the first element
of the resulting array is assigned.
apparently, the fscanf() also skipped every other line in the file.
this is the second line printed, but is actually the third line of
the file written with fprintf():
numfields=1;
fentrynum=4~200908301103~642~Drop~Unknown~Birmingham~AL~9/30/09~10/1/09~Pompano
the scanning of the input line stopped at the blank in "pompano
beach", which is the first blank in the data. This is also wrong and
not what fprintf() does with the same
format string.
i cannot place blanks to match those in my data because i have no way
of knowing where they will be and i shouldn't have to.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
Edit this bug report at http://bugs.php.net/?id=49988&edit=1
