Clobbering

[asarch]

What does it mean and what is?

[Bubba56]

Not sure of the context your looking for but here from a google search:

http://www.techweb.com/encyclopedia/defineterm.jhtml?term=clobbering+memory

http://support.realsoftware.com/listarchives/realbasic-plugins/2003-09/msg00028.html

http://www.hypermail.org/mail-archive/1998/Dec/0017.html

[asarch]

So clobbering is like overwriting but clobbering is overwriting in RAM, isn't it?

[bwkaz]

It completely depends on the context.

On a good day, I can clobber a softball.

I can clobber my X.org source tree on any day (rm -rf).

I can clobber an unpatched Windows RPC process by feeding it too much data in a packet.

What is the context you're referring to?

[asarch]

This one (from man bash (http://techpubs.sgi.com/library/tpl/cgi-bin/getdoc.cgi?coll=linux&db=man&fname=/usr/share/catman/man1/bash.1.html&srch=bash)):


Redirecting Output
Redirection of output causes the file whose name results from the
expansion of word to be opened for writing on file descriptor n, or the
standard output (file descriptor 1) if n is not specified. If the file
does not exist it is created; if it does exist it is truncated to zero
size.

The general format for redirecting output is:

[n]>word

If the redirection operator is >, and the noclobber option to the set
builtin has been enabled, the redirection will fail if the file whose
name results from the expansion of word exists and is a regular file.
If the redirection operator is >|, or the redirection operator is > and
the noclobber option to the set builtin command is not enabled, the
redirection is attempted even if the file named by word exists.

[Jata]

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=clobber&r=f

Sounds like number four might be what you're after.

[bwkaz]

Originally posted by asarch
This one (from man bash): Quoting parts of it:

If the redirection operator is >, and the noclobber option to the set builtin has been enabled, the redirection will fail if the file whose name results from the expansion of word exists and is a regular file. If you do a "set -o noclobber" in your shell, then you can't redirect over an existing file from that shell. For example:

$ echo blah >testfile
$ cat testfile
blah
$ echo blah2 >testfile
$ cat testfile
blah2
$ set -o noclobber
$ echo blah3 >testfile
-bash: tesfile: cannot overwrite existing file
$ cat testfile
blah2
$ If the redirection operator is >|, or the redirection operator is > and the noclobber option to the set builtin command is not enabled, the redirection is attempted even if the file named by word exists. This just says that you can override the "noclobber" option's effects by using a different redirection symbol:

$ rm testfile
$ echo blah >testfile
$ cat testfile
blah
$ set -o noclobber
$ echo blah2 >|testfile
$ cat testfile
blah2
$ In this context, "clobber" means "overwrite [a file] without prompting".

[asarch]

Ahhh! I see, thank you very much to all of you. Keep up the good working and happy hacking! :cool: