Problem with creating users with SNAP

[Michael H. Morse]

I have discovered the answer to this question I posted:

>    I am having a problem with SNAP in that it no longer will create a 
> user.  I am running on the master yellow page server.  The message I
> receive is as follows:

>    The program cannot prepare changes to this user's
>    entries in the Yellow Pages database.

>    I have tried a complete rebuild of the YP databases as suggested
> in the release notes for 4.0.1.  (I am running 4.0.2 pre-release.)  
> The manual method described in 386i Advanced Administration and
> modified in the Admin release notes works just fine, so I know there's
> nothing obviously wrong with the data in YP.

>    Has anybody seen this problem and solved it?

By looking back through my change log, and backing out each change, I was
able to determine the problem and the solution.  I had edited
/etc/ypaliases myself (outside of SNAP) and a line that should have been:

    users:usera,userb,userc

had been "enhanced" (by me) to:

     users: usera, userb, userc

When I removed the spaces SNAP stopped complaining.

[flame on]
I spent about three full days on this problem.  How long would it have
taken some SUN developer to have written code that ignored whitespace?
How long would it have taken to write an error message that at least
mentioned which Yellow Pages file contained the "error"?  Frankly, this
is just ridiculously sloppy development!
[flame off]

The moral of the story is that SNAP is incredibly picky about what it
finds in the files that it uses, and very parsimonious with error
information.  To give the developers the benefit of the doubt, let's
assume they were under intense time pressure.  Keep meticulous records of
any changes you make to the yellow pages files.


--Mike

Michael Morse                           Internet: mmorse at note.nsf.gov
National Science Foundation               BITNET: mmorse at NSF
                                       Telephone: (202) 357-7659