Re: where is what?

[Mark Buda <hermit@clark.net>]

>>>>> "Keith" == Keith Harbaugh <harbaugh@math.georgetown.edu> writes:

    Keith> `what' was an old unix program which would access certain
    Keith> identifying lines within text files, allowing easy reading
    Keith> of key parts of files without having to use a pager or
    Keith> editor.

Your description doesn't quite match what "what" does - maybe you're
thinking of some other command? Like "strings"?

"what" is part of SCCS, the Source Code Control System, and looks for
magic strings inserted by SCCS that get compiled into a program.
Debian doesn't have SCCS because the free equivalent of SCCS is RCS,
which isn't quite the same thing.

The RCS equivalent of the SCCS "what" command is "ident". Both of
these commands will only work on executables whose source has arranged
to have the magic keywords compiled in as strings, usually with
something like

static char sccsid[] = "something";

or

static char rcsid[] = "something else";

in each source file. The general idea of both is to be able to
identify what versions of source files were used to build an
executable.

    Keith> So, two questions: 1) where (i.e., in what package) is the
    Keith> program `what' to be found?

It isn't.

    Keith> 2) how could I effectively use the web pages search, or
    Keith> some other search capability, to have answered that
    Keith> question without bothering the debian mailing lists?

Here's one way:

(1) Get /pub/debian/dists/slink/Contents-i386.gz (or the potato or
non-i386 version of the file).

(2) zgrep '/what[^a-z._-]' Contents-i386.gz

(3) Think "Oh, it printed nothing, there must not be any files in the
distribution named 'what'."

-- 
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