Hi there,
I'm trying to get better at CLI work and for a first project I'd like to be able to parse the daily changelogs of slackware -current and output them to a terminal.
So far i've got the following, i'd really appreciate people pointing out whats a) wrong b) stupid and c) stupidly wrong.
From the wget manpage, the option "-o -" prints to standard output, so sticking

in a cronjob would update my changlogs automatically and print it to the terminal, then how would i go about binding this to specific terminal (for example one i've pinned to the desktop)?
Maybe this would'nt be the best way either as it would not store a local copy of the changelog (just prints to stdout).
Also if the changelog is large how would i go about formatting the output, im guessing sed....

So whadya think?

I suggest you start by reading the Advanced Bash-Scripting Guide: http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/TV .
Your question is so vague that it is realy impossible to answer in a non-interactive way, like on this forum.

Eric

1 members found this post helpful.

It is a little unclear what you are trying to do. If you want the changelog to periodically be saved to your computer then you are nearly there. You could even write a script that would show the changelog on a terminal once a day -- but this probably wouldn't be a good thing since who knows what you are using that terminal for when it happens to run and dump the data to your screen?

Save it as changelog.sh, make it executable and then run it in your terminal or put it in your .bashrc:
But it's not particularly useful.

First try to come up with exactly what you want to do and I'm sure people will be happy to help.

Good point. Forums are not IRC, i probably haven't taken part enough in online communities to recognise that.

I thought id alluded sufficiently to what i was trying to achieve, but reading back i can see i should have made a clearer exposition.

Basically, using fluxbox i have several terminals pinned to the desktop (i.e frameless, persistant and beneath ever other window) to which i output things like htop. Sort of a poor mans conky.
I'd like to have one of these terminals display the daily changelogs of slack -current.

What i meant by the title of this thread (which thinking about it would have read better as "wanting suggestions for a way of parsing....) was to open up a dialog with more experienced users as to how to approach the problem of having the changelogs automagically update to my desktop.

The method i suggested was to wget them daily, another idea i had was to write a script to update locally whenever they were updated on the ftp server, and so on.

So im open to suggestions about approachs to the problem.

Thanks to Alien Bob and Brixtoncalling for the tips regarding clarity, they are good points and will be well remembered.

Put something like:
in cron on whatever schedule you like. (daily seems reasonable - don't do it too often so as not to abuse the ftp site)

Then display the latest days worth of log with
Instead of xmessage you can display it anyway you like. Putting the sed in .bashrc might not be a bad choice rather than having it permanently on your desktop.
Or if you prefer you could even use dialog:
to imbed this in an xterm you could use the -e option
The options are as unlimited as your imagination.

For those who use kde, like me:
Save it like:
Make it executable:
Then run:
PS****
For command line interface do:

I use a method that runs a script from a cronjob. Basically the steps

mv the last changelog to changelog.old
wget the new changelog
diff the two > somefile
if there is a change mailx the diff to me

Vincent Batts has RSS feeds for the changelogs. Just subscribe to one.

http://connie.slackware.com/~vbatts/

1 members found this post helpful.

Thanks guys, they are some great suggestions (im playing with GazL's method at the minute).

Sorry dugan, although that is by far the easiest method i am trying to use this as a learning experience in shell scripting. But thanks anyway.