in reply to Adding data to an access database

I believe that most programs used to scan email address from web pages, news groups, or any other forum are used to do evil in this world. Therefore, I regret that I cannot help you, as even if you are not a spammer, other people reading this forum may be.

You would see the same response from me if you asked how to create a virus, or a worm, or ...

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Re: Re: Adding data to an access database
by ibanix (Hermit) on Jan 08, 2003 at 02:10 UTC
    Update: As someone in the CB mentioned, what if the original poster had not mentioned this was being used to extract email? His problem is essentially a database problem, not an email extraction problem.

    Quick, delete all nodes on matching an email address! They might be used for spamming! Oh crap, delete all the nodes on regular expressions, they're used for finding email addresses! You see where this goes?

    End Update

    Your logic is similar to:

    "Most guns are used to do evil in this world. Therefore, I can not help you learn about guns."

    or pehaps this is closer to home:

    "Most email viruses are written in Visual Basic*. Therefore I can not help you learn about Visual Basic."

    * I have no idea if this is true. Used for example only.

    Unless I am gravely mistaken, this is a site for sharing a love of coding, perl in particular, and helping others. Not personal ethics.

    ibanix

    $ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;
[reply]
[d/l]
      Howdy!

      That the slope becomes slippery does not in and of itself mean we cannot look at what was asked and frown. Raziel lays out a scenario that looks suspiciously like address harvesting a la spammers. So far, Raziel has not offered any further explanation of his/her intentions that might clarify this point.

      In my mind, this question skates right at the edge. Given that useful conversation has occurred, I'm personally inclined toward leavgin this post stand.

      The worst thing about including the "extracting emiail addresses" function is that it obscured the actual issue. Other posters have spoken to the technical issue at hand.

      yours,
      Michael

[reply]

      Actually my logic is that I hate SPAM, and since I can see no sensible reason for the code other than SPAM, my morals do not allow me to contribute to something that may be used for SPAM. The problem with your logic is that guns have several 'reasonable' uses. What use do you see for SPAM?

      As a director on the board of a community-run ISP, I have been forced to recognize that SPAM is one of the key reasons that discourage people from using email.

      If you can come up with a reasonable use to harvest email addresses from webpages, that is not SPAM related, I will agree that your comparison to guns is correct. In any case, I have the right to make a moral stand, whether or not you agree with my stand. Down vote me if you think that my opinion should be held against me.

[reply]
        If you can come up with a reasonable use to harvest email addresses from webpages

        Before XML became widespread, I knew a company (which I shouldn't really talk about) that used HTML as their universal data format. It had the advantage of being browser-readable by almost everyone. Couldn't handle data like XML could, but it worked for them, espically with outside vendors.

        A script like this might merely be processing email addresses from internal documents. Opt-in email lists? Employee email lists?

        I dislike spam as much as you do. I but do -not- believe that we should be in the business of passing judgement on somebody for their *assumed* code uses.

        But if he comes out and says "Yes, I'm writing an email harvester", you have my full support to clue-by-four him. :-)

        Cheers,
        ibanix

        $ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;
[reply]
[d/l]
Re: Re: Adding data to an access database
by Anonymous Monk on Jan 07, 2003 at 21:42 UTC
    How do you know this guy is a spammer?

    I can think of a lot of reasons why someone would want to do this
    Try not to be so closed minded.
    There real evil in this post is that they are using MS Access!
    and OLE! yuck!
[reply]

      There's nothing wrong in using Access if you happen to use Windows and do not need to access the Access database from the web (that is if you do not need to make many concurrent connections). It allows you to create nice forms and reports easily, it's something Windozers can feel at home with, ...

      Using ADO from Perl on the other hand IS a little strange. It adds too much overhead. IMHO of course.

      On the other hand I can't think of a decent reason to extract emails from webpages. There are quite a few for extracting URLs, but emails?

      Jenda

[reply]

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