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From: warlock@ecst.csuchico.edu (John Kennedy)
Newsgroups: news.software.b
Subject: Re: NNTP 1.5.10 / Cnews 15-Dec-1990 / Stupid UNIX exec
Summary: inews exec()
Keywords: exec execlp execvp CTIX ENOEXEC
Message-ID: <1991Feb01.183943.9025@ecst.csuchico.edu>
Date: 1 Feb 91 18:39:43 GMT
References: <1991Jan30.062800.15853@ecst.csuchico.edu> <1991Jan31.023944.19068@blilly.UUCP>
Sender: news@ecst.csuchico.edu (USENET)
Organization: California State University, Chico
Lines: 25

In article <1991Jan31.023944.19068@blilly.UUCP> Bruce Lilly writes:
>
>I also ran into this, but I don't recall exactly how I solved it.  I'll
>just note in passing that one possible solution is contained in the
>exec(2) man page -- two members of the exec family will work with scripts
>(Hint: read the description of the ENOEXEC error return).

  Maybe it's a suble RTFM, maybe it's not.  (-:  In any case, one of the things
execle() *does* do is pass the environment, which is not one of the standard
things that the new process inherits from the process that called execle().
NNTP makes a small exercise in copying it's environment, and I'll just assume
they did it for a reason and try not to get too far out to pasture.  (-:{

  For reference:  The exec(2) call "... transforms the calling process into a
new process ... constructed from an ordinary, executable file ... [that]
consists of a header [see a.out(4)], a text segment, and a data segment."
Shell scripts don't meet the a.out header requirement, but under the possible
errors that can be returned, it kind of goes back on itself.  Under ENOEXEC,
it says:  "The exec is not an execlp or execvp, and the new process file has ...
an invalid magic number in it's header."
-- 
Warlock, AKA		+-----------------------------------------------+
John Kennedy		|    internet:	   warlock@ecst.csuchico.edu	|
 CSU Chico		+-----------------------------------------------+
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