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bmike

12:57 PM

@abbyhairboat nope - thanks for sharing the link

4 hours later…

blade19899

5:19 PM

Hallo, am trying to reset the Apple ID password of my father: they send me an e-mail on how to reset it, but i still haven't gotten one?!?! The Q's here, are of no help. And I really need to get it to work!

patrix

@blade19899 Do you still have access to the email address linked to the Apple ID in question? Did you look into the spam folder as well?

blade19899

@patrix Yes, i am logged in the e-mail account as we speak. And no the spam folder does not contain anything related to Apple ID

Ian C.

Q: Is there a simple script to duplicate files into a new folder based on a csv file?

Our challenge is that we need to search and duplicate approx 3000 images into a new folder. The list of image names is a csv file. The files are all on one drive, but in many different folders.

I hate these types of questions. This is tantamount to "do my homework for me" type stuff that gets closed on StackOverflow IMO. They'll post a CSV snippet and someone will run off and basically build it for them. Not cool.

I'm asking this here to get a feeling from the rest of the community on these types of questions.

Here's another one I dislike (and stupidly answered, though tried to do so in a teaching manner rather than just a "rewrite the script for them" manner):

Q: Shell script help

I am new to writing shell scripts for Unix and need a little help. I am not sure why cURL now all of the sudden after running the script is downloading corrupts packages which cannot be mounted and why running the commands separately in Terminal work, but during the script everything fails such a...

bash script shell

I think both of those should have been closed. If you want to ask specific, Apple-related scripting questions: fine. But a "do this for me" or "fix this script" type thing doesn't belong here (or on any Stack Exchange site really)

In my never-humble opinion of course. :)

patrix

5:36 PM

@blade19899 The only time I needed to reset a password it took a few tries.

@IanC. The first question (about the CSV) is better suited than the second one (which basically says "please debug my script for me"). Both of course don't have much use beyond the problem the OP has, but again the first one at least can help others with similar problems (aka how to parse a CSV in bash and do something meaningful).

OTOH which reason would you select to close them? :-)

Ian C.

@patrix I'm going to disagree on the first one because the answer is clearly, "no" -- there is no program that can handle arbitrary input and magically rename files for you based on it.

blade19899

@patrix Thanks. Am keep trying, and if it still doesn't work. Amm spam here :-)

Ian C.

For the second one it's off topic because it's about programming and it's too broad.

For the first one it's just a poor question. Too broad, un-answerable in its current form.

"Hey! I have a file with random data in it that's separate by commas! Is there a program that'll magically figure out what I intended to be done with this data and do it for me?"

Nope. Nope. Nope.

(wow...I need to get a coffee in me...)

patrix

@IanC. I can live with "unclear what you are asking" (that's why I've asked for a sample of the CSV in the comment)

Ian C.

@patrix I almost don't want them to follow up though because the answer, no matter what they post, is "no" -- there is no "simple script" that will do what they want and anyone answering the question shouldn't be writing one for them as an answer. We are not a "get your scripts written for free" site.

ok. going to get a coffee to see if it tamps down the cranky Ian....

patrix

5:48 PM

@IanC. might be tough to draw the line here though (IMHO), we have a lot of scripting questions and they are on-topic according to the FAQ. And honestly I kind of like them (but then I like to write shell scripts anyway, so I might be a little bit biased)

1 hour later…

Graham Perrin

6:59 PM

I'd like to ask whether, with Yosemite, it will be feasible to force visibility of the title in an app where the developer has chosen to hide the title. If I put the question in Ask Different, will it be closed? …

… There's a related question (not closed) at stackoverflow.com/q/24023000/38108 with a comment from me but no response to that comment.

bmike

7:15 PM

@GrahamPerrin yes. until its released to the public

Graham Perrin

7:36 PM

@bmike OK. I thought so. In the meantime, I suspect that …

… it'll be impossible to view title bars where required, and so I'll never choose to use Yosemite.

bmike

7:53 PM

@GrahamPerrin fair enough

Graham Perrin

8:20 PM

@bmike thanks anyway

Daniel Lawson

8:45 PM

@IanC. I've responded enthusiastically before to some of these questions, but only if I thought the problem had some general applicability and wasn't so idiosyncratic that I was basically solving one person's problem that no one else would ever encounter.

@patrix They can be fun to answer, I admit, but I haven't really done much with them (or anything else here, for that matter) since an earlier era in my life when I had more time for this sort of thing.

@IanC. This looks reasonable (not ridiculously complex) question and of somewhat general applicability — if such a script were posted, I'd use it from time to time. No objections from me here.

2 hours later…

Ian C.

10:45 PM

Oh god! Look at all those answers! Being dumped in that question without any clue as to what the contents of a the file will look like. Horrible. :)

It's a giant game of "let's make a guess! throw things up!" -- blech.

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