Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!ncrlnk!ncr-sd!hp-sdd!sceard!mrm
From: mrm@sceard.UUCP (M.R.Murphy)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Worm/Passwords (really: 'rm *')
Message-ID: <864@sceard.UUCP>
Date: 18 Nov 88 22:40:54 GMT
References: <22401@cornell.UUCP> <4627@rayssd.ray.com> <8563@rpp386.Dallas.TX.US> <125@embossed.UUCP> <672@quintus.UUCP> <466@yarra.oz.au>
Reply-To: mrm@sceard.UUCP (0040-M.R.Murphy)
Organization: Sceard Systems, Inc., Carlsbad, CA  92009
Lines: 24

In article <860@sceard.UUCP> I (0040-M.R.Murphy) wrote:

|I think that the following shell script does about what is asked for. The
|idea is to use existing tools rather than change exisiting tools.
|
|#! /bin/sh -
|if test `echo "$*" |wc -w` -gt 5
|then
|	echo ": expands to more than 5 arguments, are you sure? \c"
|	read answer
|	if test "$answer" != "yes" -a "$answer" != "y"
|	then
|		exit 1
|	fi
|fi
|#change "echo" below to the command(s) that you feel like doing for $*
|echo $*

And I should know that
  `echo "?#"`
is preferable to
  `echo "$*" |wc -w`
because it is faster.
More than one way to skin a cat (no offense to cat lovers :-)