WHY AWK REALLY SUCKS BIGTIME

Yateen Dhareshwar

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Nov 8, 1994, 1:44:15 AM11/8/94

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Following reasons why awk really sucks bigtime!!

(Feel free to add to this list)

(By the way I am composing this list after spending 4 hrs,

trying to figure out, how to kill jobs using the program name,

I have to give up.)

1. The man page is poorly written.

2. The program was written by people who did not care if others

wanted to use it.

3. As with other Unix tools there are few or no books, and O-Reilly

wants to make a fortune out of poor grad students.

4. The GAWK manual says a lot of things but there are no concrete

examples!!! How to use ENVIRON, ARGV would be helpful!!

5. How the FUCK do you extract the command line variable from the

command line, if awk interprets each of them as a file and rushes

to open it!!!

If anyone finds a awk manual by the original !??!!??** who designed it

please post it in this area.

thanks

Jerry Alexandratos

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Nov 9, 1994, 1:10:59 AM11/9/94

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In article <39n6nv$3...@adam.cc.sunysb.edu> yat...@cs.sunysb.edu (Yateen Dhareshwar) writes:
:Following reasons why awk really sucks bigtime!!

[rantings deleted]

:If anyone finds a awk manual by the original !??!!??** who designed it

:
:please post it in this area.
:
:thanks

:

Well, one of my favorite awk books happens to be ``The AWK Programming
Language'' by Alfred V. Aho, Brian W. Kernighan, and Peter J.
Weinberger (notice the first letter of the last names). Hmm, I hope
these guys know what they're talking about. 8)

It's published by Addison-Wesley (ISBN 0-201-07981-X), and I think that
it ran me about $30.00. However, I've noticed that almost every
university that I've ever been to seems to have a copy of this book in
the library.

--Jerry

ps-Actually, I also tend to find the GAWK manual rather helpful. Oh
well...

David Lynch

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Nov 9, 1994, 9:49:09 AM11/9/94

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In article <39n6nv$3...@adam.cc.sunysb.edu> yat...@cs.sunysb.edu (Yateen Dhareshwar) writes:

>From: yat...@cs.sunysb.edu (Yateen Dhareshwar)
>Subject: WHY AWK REALLY SUCKS BIGTIME
>Date: 8 Nov 1994 06:44:15 GMT

>Following reasons why awk really sucks bigtime!!

[Bitching about AWK deleted]

I feel I have to respond. I began my work career without a single ounce of
programming skills, and started using AWK within a week. I operate on a PC so
I have to use somewhat stripped down versions. Nevertheless, I use AWK so
much, I keep it in the path of every computer I use (I even found a VMS
version so that I can use my VAX account). I have used AWK for some of the
most bizzare things, and I find it indespensible.

AWK is very easy to learn, but I reccomend the AWK Book (by Aho, Kernighan and
Weinberger). I think it gives the best explaination, and is full of examples.
It is not an ORA book, but its the one I use.

The best reason to use AWK, in my opinion, is just saying the name. People
who are not familiar with it always get the strangest looks on their faces
when you say: "Oh, I programmed it in AAAAWWWWKKKK!!! (like a bird screech)."

****************************************************************************
David Lynch e-mail:
Global Science and Technology ly...@gst.gsfc.nasa.gov
6411 Ivy Lane Suite 610 ly...@stars.gsfc.nasa.gov
Greenbelt MD. 20770
Phone STARS::LYNCH
(301) 474-9696
****************************************************************************

lvi...@cas.org

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Nov 9, 1994, 3:50:37 PM11/9/94

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Get the gawk manual - and gawk while you are at it. You end up with
a relatively compatible awk, with source code, and a very large manual.
--
:s Great net resources sought...
:s Larry W. Virden INET: larry....@cas.org
:s <URL:http://www.mps.ohio-state.edu/cgi-bin/hpp?lvirden_sig.html>
The task of an educator should be to irrigate the desert not clear the forest.

Scott Burkett (cis)

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Nov 12, 1994, 7:26:36 PM11/12/94

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Yateen Dhareshwar (yat...@cs.sunysb.edu) wrote:

: 1. The man page is poorly written.

Show me any man page that isn't? The fact of the matter is, that man pages
are meant to be quick references, not tutorials.

: 2. The program was written by people who did not care if others
: wanted to use it.

Simply a matter of personal opinion.

: 3. As with other Unix tools there are few or no books, and O-Reilly

: wants to make a fortune out of poor grad students.

1) "AWK & SED" - O'Reilly ans Associates
2) "The AWK Programming Language" - Addison-Wesley

: 4. The GAWK manual says a lot of things but there are no concrete

: examples!!! How to use ENVIRON, ARGV would be helpful!!

Now you are talking about GNU AWK - another story entirely.

: 5. How the FUCK do you extract the command line variable from the

: command line, if awk interprets each of them as a file and rushes
: to open it!!!

Simply reference ARGV's array elements:

BEGIN {
for (i=1; i<ARGC; i++)
printf("%s\n", ARGV[i]);
}

Simple enough!

: If anyone finds a awk manual by the original !??!!??** who designed it

: please post it in this area.

"The AWK Programming Language", published by Addison-Wesley, and authored
by the three gentlemen who engineered it to begin with (Aho, Kernighan, and
Weinberger). ISBN is 0-201-07981-X.

James Phillips

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Nov 16, 1994, 12:47:23 PM11/16/94

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Scott Burkett (cis) (sco...@costello.bsn.usf.edu) wrote:

: Yateen Dhareshwar (yat...@cs.sunysb.edu) wrote:
: : 1. The man page is poorly written.

: Show me any man page that isn't? The fact of the matter is, that man pages
: are meant to be quick references, not tutorials.

I like the man page. I printed the 4 pages, and it's my most-thumbed
manual. By reading very carefully, and marking it up with various
colors of ink, I have everything I need to know. Only after I'd been
using awk for a year or two did I learn that there was a whole book on
it. I've never looked at the book.

--
James Phillips Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
Opinions mine, not Harvard's or Smithsonian's.