Re: [Expectperl-discuss] PerlExpect for file

[Roland G. <Rol...@a1...>]

> Ankush wrote:
> Expect->exp_init(\*STDIN);

What is this supposed to do?  It creates an Expect object and attaches
STDIN
to it so you could parse user input.  But as the result isn't stored,
it's 
a NOP.

> $object=Expect->spawn("Makefile.PL");

Ahem, Makefile.PL is a perlscript, but it usually isn't executable 
like a normal script.  Instead, this probably should read
"perl Makefile.PL".

> $object->expect(10,"Enter the apppropriate number [3]:") ;
> $object->send(10,'1\r');

This looks strange too.  'send' is just an alias for 'print', so
what's the 10 doing in front?  Or was this just copied from
'send_slow' (which takes a delay argument)?

Also, the string should be in double quotes so the "\r" gets
sent as <CR> and not as '\' and 'r'.

> $object->exp_match();
> $object->exp_after();
> $object->exp_match_number();

This also doesn't make a lot of sense, as these methods return
results about the last expect match, but again, the return values
are discarded.

> $object->send_slow(10,'1\r');
> $object->hard_close();
> >>>And here is a string of the output
> 
> Waiting for new data (10 seconds)...
> spawn id(3): new data.
> spawn id(3): EOF
> spawn id(3): exit(2304)

As you can see here, the spawned command immediately exits with
an error code.  This is probably due to Makefile.PL not being
executable.

> spawn id(3): closing...
> Closing spawn id(3).
>         Expect::hard_close('Expect=GLOB(0x82ca850)') called at
> /usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/Expect.pm line 743
>         Expect::_multi_expect(10, undef, 'ARRAY(0x82cbe94)') called at
> /usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/Expect.pm line 462
>         Expect::expect('Expect=GLOB(0x82ca850)', 10, 'Enter the
> apppropriate number [3]:') called at perlexp line 8
> spawn id(3) closed.
> Returning from expect with TIMEOUT or EOF
> Printed character '1' to spawn id(3).
> Printed character '\\' to spawn id(3).
> Printed character 'r' to spawn id(3).

Here you see that the single quotes prevent the correct interpretation
of "\r".

> Closing spawn id(3).
>         Expect::hard_close('Expect=GLOB(0x82ca850)') called at perlexp
> line 27
> Closing spawn id(3).
>         Expect::soft_close('Expect=GLOB(0x82ca850)') called at
> /usr/lib/perl5/site_perl/5.005/Expect.pm line 1458
>         Expect::DESTROY('Expect=GLOB(0x82ca850)') called at perlexp
> line 0
>         eval {...} called at perlexp line 0
> 
> So I dont find my pattern matching.Please let me know where am I
> wrong. Please send a sample perlexpect script for "file input output"
> if you have any.

I'm not sure what you mean by "file input output".  The script could 
be written like this:

use Expect;
my $object = Expect->spawn("perl Makefile.PL");
$object->expect(10, 
                [ "Enter the appropriate number \[3\]:",
                  sub { my $obj = shift; $obj->send("1\r");
exp_continue; } ],
                [ "Enter another value: ",
                  sub { my $obj = shift; $obj->send("$value\r";
exp_continue; } ],
                # we wait for the configuration to be finished
                [ eof => sub { } ],
               );

Hope this helps,

Roland