[sword-devel] installmgr (and xiphos) crashes (svn 2831)

[Nic Carter]

(Sorry for the top reply)

IMHO it would be easier to switch to downloading a ZIP file of the module than it would to add the infrastructure required to generate a custom listing of file names.
I encountered the issues you point out (and agree with you) & gave up. If/when the CrossWire httpd server changes (& the HTML output changes), the installmgr code will break :)

My vote, long ago, was to switch to downloading ZIP files instead of each individual module file, but no one has implemented that yet (would you mind looking, Jaak? My c++ skills are very rusty, as you have seen!) :)

Sent from my phone, hence this email may be short...

On 26/06/2013, at 23:35, Jaak Ristioja <jaak at ristioja.ee> wrote:

> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> Hash: SHA1
> 
> On 26.06.2013 16:25, Greg Hellings wrote:
>> bserver directory listing output (which is what I think it does).
>> 
>> V E R Y   V E R Y   B A D   P R A C T I C E ! ! !
>> 
>> 
>> Parsing server output is bad practice? How in the world did you
>> reach that over-zealous conclusion?
>> 
>> --Greg
> 
> I didn't. It is not safe to assume that web servers provide similar
> output for directory listings. They might even do AJAX or something
> which might only be reasonably interpreted by human (if at all:).
> 
> Example: The current code doesn't work when links start with
>  <a id="x" href="
> because it only searches for "<a href=". Even parsing the HTML
> properly would not be enough in some cases.
> 
> Therefore, it is not reasonable to try to parse the directory listing
> output of the webserver. Instead, better mechanisms should be used,
> e.g. custom-format index files, e.g. with a format like "one
> filename/URL per line, separated by '\n' characters.". Sword would
> just need to download a single file (instead of the webserver
> directory output listing), and parse that.
> 
> This is much easier to parse and handle error conditions, no need to
> try to interpret HTML, filter links etc...
> 
> Blessings,
> Jaak
> -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
> Version: GnuPG v2.0.20 (GNU/Linux)
> 
> iQgcBAEBAgAGBQJRyu4qAAoJEEqsYmEt1rCO8X0//1TklYXolDw4Izp67jNUz+UG
> bA3D9+1cCQQ6+3GXm5qHDLSDIwhrY34s7S9bEf2NXZgna294PK+zTmZ0soruiV0O
> iwxp2AKX7P4vz0Or+3qfkX0g+1PEInd2I34uV21f5lsnY8p7ZmGlfxMKpAvO5my9
> MT0QnNupsbt8jWitmkVH2Ivd1iVUHcU+XU9MC66VkufTorIZqYz+yPT5Q9mAeNoq
> cph6m4tWGNMknM4EmOQderD0BjzxQ7COWFdCNcxwV6z+VKwzCXdfOyi3LH2RQjHb
> puRe7UMOUbOGr63h/w8dRuOaoQDF0EXR6E9q/W22yauQoiLNTwhu5Y19SwXh2MjN
> r8RJpfLxqEvw7iFVd+O0O6y4gdjxhGV61vHMLe5iftni9FZeRfq6s8JxOt1QCrFz
> j0s3ZuWSkDb1B3Uefmx2T6uQXOWKIFKvK7eHPSKtNFb+wGNBPzB0kEZCfaf3jQ4b
> yyY1Ff2YoIAqWiyalWwqCxT8HXGEQCtZOJt6vG7Quow/7wpoawM9uH+A6ijgJ5ZH
> YLtPZBqVOmbTi4fpwVMipjjSw9PfSfOsfVlV6JabVQv9w2zH76stXvMDM+C0/aiT
> staXI7UD4a9MuyyMxc/fYsbjGzx5zyzyGPhVd4o73ZZ+PBGzW/sePHTnftWYdtsx
> BWcmuPoBohF07gCo20g932wIsIpShM+TztYaozYOfJzuQKX5LfqKeKLss8rL8JPZ
> H3FJHp12a0+DcdGzGfZ4/Vkgb5NzCv8GXoNLvG0R5Rgq3tbQqPc2vT4lt+fgXr6F
> ecRhdso5Mw7MEfU08RCyPczoeU9Zx5EBadIYjrBHsAl7argkjEgUEWW1BC/5WBO3
> G999NhkZuyeLMozzpstEcGUkOfffx/k/E+lnTdcbgnZmHi9j4F3blgxPTboyuY/t
> chm4FYkxEXjObHcTXbIa1i3hhnLWxgjHTzWE6pYWhg4S9uJW2DLGPrssMP2ehw4Q
> VGYLVIcRLap6a53EVnPbkkKE/TZYmHXzwM2NUfE8QgceDBzBgeFPIFh7nFw7HZuk
> RPtuX11RQmoAD9Np6hr9NlB98Mx0SC11NUcn62wjiuHgK1unPj4KfdWHmTH3v4iD
> SouXy9h2Rnj6N/mth6nEvjmETPvRFhtnUIdkNwXyu8uXsYWIwIURwy/qGxoAYBhy
> 7S4PRqxwh4RSemuYvCeTix462ARekq9ANcGKSEZNi46JpBLHNLXDaoJCr1Sj5lCe
> rsClTMcqtPxj5Z9uvyHwp+6q4G0gkwSoGuD3Z77o6Hg0/pSottarjc+y9mW2srWX
> eaVvbccpgwDsW9hn5JJxNQ9o5xRSrkMrmzM0GuR/Zl44zsXWIe9hC1nxIh4v8L+L
> tWtKgrv/GcyGb/yRwzGf/17OpyHJB7rtvarQLi+pyzWQpEPt0Pxp5bEGpjxJT+a7
> cilGKPBXYH0MEmrq75bqlGVwtVqSnBPN9N8H7iCY0eF4EkSPYGhACC7YYD58ziQB
> yY+AaAJz0A7aqvUAhv6K6s+5uXmugaSvXYYOo5kS6EiM5SdjCitLpt1THDJ1EHPT
> nA+USbnsP3BMML6g3FRKQmln7vrmlaY5ofRvi9VfVe7P0V+2l+UJ5bhhMsZrlB+p
> loH/qItGMNzIZeu1QQRbgWuVsm20/QdH0KIH+dOw7Geid/i0IH2kW48PUOUj2WeJ
> noGD3Un+oH7UvQx1zRZEN4Pa4s4bn8ryI578qn6laQn39hfe2TqjXgrfMIcu8omg
> lyk7leYWl/jNy6DhlNuiUaAARWJ9cMkYI0L7JoqoBZ+vwBB1H6U9I41R5Y/ZNIbk
> frJbnG9L1aQqSkwOmlkaunhDOyYShIDFxMQlI4HjyFLMnMKRHJFKCMDyw2Uobn5K
> nA09C6sdiPkvdBv/EzyUOhkU5iBVYUhDw+DrFCOoWIyeqwHNtGqLz2EKE7nNgYue
> g9igpFeFmdMPlw9jIicEm+rmRIlYNwlUBxfufkEpMWzhNyPzt+uSKGqb7Fzv4BQw
> VlHnwhElYMnWLu14R2SPuPw9UABadA+ejMYiiColH2bz+yhfCyNkOfESl6OZc0z8
> vwcNR3eVeHRwypOA9gL0QCEaNnixqVw770LASolx+0qw8ftOCJMks1KaBhYPTQAH
> EawB1BgY/38cZCwcSYR0nLq+Wnv9V7TTmpBDQ3evwR9DTmppmTWbTrJadtdjp0H5
> KZoTuxssEVjmrAhIwIq8cUq9TlS1KTk+9kn2lHm7W18MrVab0d2Ka6A35mZFirkG
> g24d8DzuClyGn3NPVAvYKF9OM22tBG1XOac+7/kLSeuKekrdYbGLTQxiAbQgTe36
> ixiJXx5LvUSS/SBkQWJ8GaQAuH0OBHQxKHm46uZkh82llS0KZVEK/GhHvGi9+zcc
> 7kX76EGPj7eJI5H+LZKb9tV9of/36CVCTOsw7HNCW4dl5dBKeU3Ej1/C9FiCqDa3
> 7+tkSbEuGU0BsgEj1RZVeWD+hhrEL9TJ8Uz/ZzEjl0VTh8Ahn9u+eEWN5SntUe9b
> nhmjphXtq4/Yo5yKZbhRu8eOKaVcX8pVMfgjDbYz8GX6OTZiJcNWy/Z02pyJhUmc
> NeNjh4iqVt+I1M73+B63zx39XPQtrWGa0UqGKBssC51ed56/dHYRiIKAElWUplO9
> vZDyvZ2iVIjtc8otiI96GFYStyYBF0630Ya8bwZoxbLd13/YxskxEqbHqmAPWh1Q
> s7UXb9jv4LpK43n0Zx9C
> =oZdy
> -----END PGP SIGNATURE-----
> 
> _______________________________________________
> sword-devel mailing list: sword-devel at crosswire.org
> http://www.crosswire.org/mailman/listinfo/sword-devel
> Instructions to unsubscribe/change your settings at above page