They probably use cat because the author just does it that way. Perhaps he uses it to overwrite what is there and doesn't want to bother with forcing or confirming it. And so he wrote the book with how he does things. I have been around too long and seen too many such things to believe that this would be much different. I hope that the certification will be such that one need not learn the test writer method of doing business. But I don't hold out a lot of hope. The certification would certainly be out on its own if that is pulled off. (I recall one particular stupid M$ certification question that if you failed to use the search command to find a server you missed the question. To me that would be like assuming you don't know the idiosyncracies of your distribution. Let's face it, all distributions have them. But if you are a competent administrator, you will know them, or learn them if faced with a machine from an unfamiliar distro. -- Kirk Wood Cpt.Kirk at 1tree.net ------------------ Seek simplicity -- and distrust it. Alfred North Whitehead
