mac@uvacs.UUCP (Alex Colvin) (05/23/85)
Some of us use the name ZQX3 and variants when a meaningless name is needed. Legend has it that this practice stems (by way of Lou Fernandez) from an old book which advises the programmer to avoid meaningless or obscure names (e.g. ZQX3, after a cabdriver named Zarathustra Q. Xerxes III). Since then, a number of people have insinuated this name into every program they've touched. Ths does point out an annoying feature of UN*X -- the lack of an anonymous current file, which forces the invention of a lot of names for intermediate files. Pipes help, but sometimes you need to see intermediate stages before they disappear.
guy@sun.uucp (Guy Harris) (05/26/85)
> Ths does point out an annoying feature of UN*X -- the lack of an anonymous > current file, which forces the invention of a lot of names for intermediate > files. Pipes help, but sometimes you need to see intermediate stages before > they disappear. 1) If you have a need for more than one current file, how do you keep them straight when they're anonymous? 2) If you need to see the intermediate stages, how are you going to do that if the file is anonymous? I've never really felt the need for anonymous files in UNIX. Guy Harris
jdb@mtunf.UUCP (John Bell) (06/05/85)
In article <2123@uvacs.UUCP> mac@uvacs.UUCP (Alex Colvin) writes: ... >Ths does point out an annoying feature of UN*X -- the lack of an anonymous >current file, which forces the invention of a lot of names for intermediate >files. Pipes help, but sometimes you need to see intermediate stages before >they disappear. I thought that is what "mktemp(3C)", "tmpfile(3S)", and "tmpnam(3S)" were all about. (I admit that I'm new to SysV, and haven't tried any of them yet, but you can always hack up something with "getpid(2)", "sprintf(3S)", and "fopen(3S)" if you don't have "mktemp" or it doesn't work.) -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ John D. Bell, AT&T-ISL Holmdel, NJ 1J317 (201) 834-3372 UUCP: ...{ihnp4,mtu??,ucbvax}!mtunf!jdb "...You may be right, I may be crazy, but it just may be a lunatic you're looking for..." -Billy Joel