[Nagiosplug-devel] printf calls in library functions

[Ton Voon]

Hi,

On 22 Jul 2007, at 18:08, Matthias Eble wrote:

> we have an item in the Bugtracker (#1681516) that claims, that the
> output for various checks is too verbose due to printf statements in
> some library functions (for example netutils and sslutils).
>
> Example:
>> ./check_http -H foo -S
>> Name or service not known
>> HTTP CRITICAL - Unable to open TCP socket
>
>
> I'd like to know what you think about printing to stdout/stderr in a
> library. I see two possibilities to solve the issue:
>
> 1st: Always die on an error in a library (accepting the lack of the
> plugin name string in the output.
> 2nd: Add a verbosity argument to the library functions

My initial feeling is to not use stderr at all and all errors go to  
stdout.

Usually when you have errors in the library, it is left to the  
calling program can decide what to do with the error. But in our  
case, I think we could always exit with UNKNOWN and the error  
message. This would also have the advantage of having a consistent  
error message and simpler programming at the plugin level.

For warnings type messages, it would make sense to use the verbosity  
flag (though I'm not sure of any examples right now).

Comments?

> Btw: Why are the sslutils, etc located in the plugin directory?

Historical. We had issues compiling from an external directory  
before. I'm happy to have them moved to lib/ now that the  
infrastructure is in place to allow this easily.

Ton

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