[Mailman-Users] Solve: pcre traceback (was: Help)

[Aly S.P Dharshi]

Hi All, Greg,

On 17 Aug 2001, at 16:52, Greg Ward wrote:

> OK, but you haven't told us what Python version.  I suspect that's
> important here!
> 

	Yes, I am sorry that I neglected to provide this information, it 
is/was RedHat stock python 1.5.2 

> Also, as an aside, subject lines like "Help" are pretty useless.  I
> often delete such messages without bothering to read them, and I'm sure
> lots of other people do.  
> 

	Sorry, I will provide more useful subject lines.

> > 	Traceback (innermost last):
> >   File "/home/mailman/cron/qrunner", line 85, in ?
> >     from Mailman import MailList
> >   File "/home/mailman/Mailman/MailList.py", line 45, in ?
> >     from Mailman.Archiver import Archiver
> >   File "/home/mailman/Mailman/Archiver/__init__.py", line 17, in ?
> >     from Archiver import *
> >   File "/home/mailman/Mailman/Archiver/Archiver.py", line 33, in ?
> >     from Mailman import Mailbox
> >   File "/home/mailman/Mailman/Mailbox.py", line 27, in ?
> >     class Mailbox(mailbox.UnixMailbox):
> >   File "/home/mailman/Mailman/Mailbox.py", line 31, in Mailbox
> >     _regexp = re.compile(_fromlinepattern)
> >   File "/usr/lib/python1.5/re.py", line 79, in compile
> >     code=pcre_compile(pattern, flags, groupindex)
> > pcre.error: ('nothing to repeat', 36)
> 
> Let's see if we can reproduce this error outside of Mailman.  Fire up a
> Python interpreter:
> 
>   $ python
> 
> and at the ">>>" prompt enter:
> 
>   import re
>   p = r'From \s*\S+\s+\w\w\w\s+\w\w\w\s+\d\d?\s+' \
>       r'\d\d?:\d\d(:\d\d)?(\s+\S+)?\s+\d\d\d\d\s*$'
>   re.compile(p)
> 
> For Python 1.5.2 or 1.6, Python should see print something like this:
> 
>   <re.RegexObject instance at 8082a30>
> 
> For Python 2.0 and later, it should print something like this:
> 
>   <SRE_Pattern object at 0x8136c00>
> 
> If you get one of those, you may have found a Mailman bug.  If instead
> you get stack dump, you *might* have found a Python bug, but it's more
> likely that there's something wrong with your Python installation.

	I downloaded python 2.2 from ftp.python.org and yahoo!!! it seems to 
work again. I have no idea why it broke  before.

Some tests you asked me to perform:

[sysadmin at hermes /home/sysadmin]$ python1.5
Python 1.5.2 (#1, Mar  3 2001, 01:35:43)  [GCC 2.96 20000731 (Red Hat 
Linux 7.1 2 on linux-i386
Copyright 1991-1995 Stichting Mathematisch Centrum, Amsterdam
>>> import re
>>> p = r'From \s*\S+\s+\w\w\w\s+\w\w\w\s+\d\d?\s+' \
... r'\d\d?:\d\d(:\d\d)?(\s+\S+)?\s+\d\d\d\d\s*$'
>>> re.compile(p)
Traceback (innermost last):
  File "<stdin>", line 1, in ?
  File "/usr/lib/python1.5/re.py", line 79, in compile
    code=pcre_compile(pattern, flags, groupindex)
pcre.error: ('nothing to repeat', 36)
>>>

On Python V 2.2 a:

[sysadmin at hermes /home/sysadmin]$ python
Python 2.2a1 (#1, Jul 26 2001, 05:00:49)
[GCC 2.96 20000731 (Red Hat Linux 7.1 2.96-81)] on linux2
Type "copyright", "credits" or "license" for more information.
>>> import re
>>> p = r'From \s*\S+\s+\w\w\w\s+\w\w\w\s+\d\d?\s+' \
... r'\d\d?:\d\d(:\d\d)?(\s+\S+)?\s+\d\d\d\d\s*$'
>>> re.compile(p)
<SRE_Pattern object at 0x8165a60>
>>>

	But it is now working, thanks for your help. 

	Cheers,

	Aly.