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Fortune Mini-HOWTO (english)
Walter Harms
Version 0.01, 19.05.2004
How to use use fortune to generate cookies.
______________________________________________________________________
Table of Contents
1. Introduction
2. Usage of fortune, strfile and unstr
2.1 Fortune
2.2 generating a fortune database
2.3 unstr
3. other files to have fun with
4. remarks
______________________________________________________________________
1. Introduction
When a user logs into a system normally the /etc/motd is displayed. (
You can disable this by creating the file ~/.hushlogin.) You will be
greeted by something like ''welcome to 127.0.0.1''. That is boring.
Here comes ''fortune'' to the rescue. The package comes with 3
programs: fortune,strfile and unstr.
2. Usage of fortune, strfile and unstr
The programs have clear distinguished jobs: presentation, assembly and
disassembly of the fortune databases.
2.1. Fortune
fortune is the presenter program. A simple application is to call the
program in the crontab and modify the /etc/motd. e.g.:
______________________________________________________________________
*/10 * * * * /usr/bin/fortune >/etc/motd
To select a given database with quotes simply add the database as argument.
*/10 * * * * /usr/bin/fortune myquotes >/etc/motd
______________________________________________________________________
You can also specify more than one database file. Then fortune will
consider both files equally often.
______________________________________________________________________
> fortune myquotes startrek
______________________________________________________________________
Some people like some quotes more than others. So your can manipulate
the equilibrium by adding probabilities.
______________________________________________________________________
> fortune 90% myquotes 10% startrek
______________________________________________________________________
fortune has some additional command line switches but its beyond the
scope of this document to explain them. check the man page instead.
2.2. generating a fortune database
Now we come to terms. Pick a list of quotes. There are several
sources. Of cause the Internet will provide you with a long list.
Choose quotes you like they will appear regularly now. Collect the
quotes in one file. Every quote separated with a line containing a
single % e.g.:
______________________________________________________________________
quote 1
%
quote 2
%
quote 3
%
quote 5
______________________________________________________________________
This is not a very effective way. Therefor is the strfile program.It
will process the ASCII-file and add a binary helper. The <myquotes>
will accompanied by <myquotes>.dat .
______________________________________________________________________
> strfile myquotes
______________________________________________________________________
The <myquotes>.dat will by copied into the directory where the
datafiles are stored. This is usually /usr/share/fortune. Check the
installation with:
______________________________________________________________________
>fortune myquotes
______________________________________________________________________
2.3. unstr
This is what the man-page says:
______________________________________________________________________
The purpose of unstr is to undo the work of strfile. It prints out the
strings contained in the file source_file in the order that they are
listed in the header file source_file.dat to standard output. It is
possible to create sorted versions of input files by using -o when strfile
is run and then using unstr to dump them out in the table order.
______________________________________________________________________
3. other files to have fun with
An other possible target is .signature. Any selfrespecting
mailprogram will add that to an outgoing mail.
4. remarks
The patchnames mentioned here are based on the actual fortune package.
Distribution may change the place to somewhere.
Beside fortune there are several other programs that select random
quotes from a database.
Be carefull when choosing quotes. There are people who take them
serious like:
______________________________________________________________________
====### legal notice ###====-------------------------------------------
Microsoft Network is prohibited from redistributing this work in any form, in
whole or in part. License to distribute this post is available to Microsoft
for $499. Posting without permission constitutes an agreement to these terms.
walter@linux:~/bericht/fortune> fortune myquotes
"You have the right to remain silent, but I wouldn't encourage you to do
so. Anything you say will be taken down, altered to my satisfaction and
used in a court of law to send you down for a good many years!"
______________________________________________________________________
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